Ranked dark pool prints: why rank beats size
By Faizan Ahmad. Updated .
Tradytics ranks every dark pool block print against the stock's own last 12 months: each print gets a number by dollar value, where #1 is the largest print in that stock in a year. That answers the question a dollar figure can't, which is whether a print is big for this stock. A $50 million print is routine in SPY and can be the print of the year in a mid-cap. The ranks then feed dark pool levels, the prices where the dollars concentrated, shown as a volume profile on each stock's dark pool research page and as levels on the chart. The year's top ten prints wear their rank wherever they appear.
Why does rank beat dollar size?
Because size only means something next to what a stock normally trades. A fixed dollar cutoff treats every stock the same, so the busiest names flood the list and a smaller company's most important print of the year gets lost.
| Question | Dollar size answers | Rank answers |
|---|---|---|
| How many dollars changed hands? | Yes | Yes, alongside the rank |
| Is this unusual for this stock? | No | Yes: #3 means only two prints were bigger in a year |
| Can I compare a mega-cap with a mid-cap? | No, the mega-cap always wins | Yes, each is ranked against its own year |
| Is today different from the past year? | Hard to tell | A top-ten print says so at a glance |
Rank also cuts through repetition. Large stocks print big blocks every day; a rank shows which of them actually stand out from the stock's normal day-to-day institutional trading.
How is each print ranked?
- Take every block print in the stock over the last 12 months.
- Sort them by dollar value, largest first.
- Rank within each kind, so like is compared with like: trades against trades, closing auctions against closing auctions, opening auctions against opening auctions.
- Show the rank on every print, out of the year's total.
Prints reported at an average price, at a price agreed earlier, or under other conditions that aren't a trade at the current market are marked separately on the chart (drawn hollow), because their price says less about where the stock trades now. What is a late dark pool print? explains those reports.
What are dark pool levels, and how are they ranked?
A dark pool level is a price where an unusual amount of dark pool money changed hands. Add up the dark pool dollars at each price and the heaviest prices stand out; those are the levels traders watch as possible support or resistance, because large holders who bought or sold there may defend or revisit them. Tradytics ranks each session's levels against every session's levels in the year, so a level tagged #1 is the heaviest price of the year, not just of the day. The full idea is in what are dark pool levels?
Where do you see ranked prints on Tradytics?
On each stock's dark pool research page, for example NVDA dark pool, in three parts.
| Part | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Session chart | The latest session's 5-minute candles with each print as a bubble at its time and price, sized by dollars, dark pool and exchange blocks in different colors, auctions as diamonds; the year's top ten prints carry their rank; the year's biggest dark pool levels in view run across the chart tagged with rank and dollars; a volume profile of block dollars by price grows in from the right |
| Daily activity | A bar per session for the last 30 days, 90 days, year or all history: dark pool dollars, exchange block dollars and the close, with the five biggest dark pool days in the window tagged by rank |
| All prints | Every print of the year, 50 a page, newest or largest first: date, time, price, shares, value, where it printed (dark pool, exchange, opening or closing auction) and its rank, with the top ten highlighted |
Dark pool levels also sit on Tradytics charts as an indicator, so you can see them against your own chart, and the market-wide list of prints is on the Darkpools page. Tradytics keeps more than a year of dark pool history. Dark pool research comes with Plus and Pro.
How do you read a ranked print?
- Top ten of the year near the current price. The most important kind: an outsized amount of money changed hands at a level the stock is trading at now.
- Several top-ranked prints at one price. A level being built, not a one-off. Check whether the session chart's level line and the volume profile agree.
- A top-ranked closing auction. Closing auctions carry index and fund flows at the close, so they're ranked only against other closes and tell a different story from a midday block.
- A big day in Daily activity. A top-five dark pool day in the window says something changed in who is trading the stock, worth comparing with the price that day.
A rank tells you a print was unusually large. It doesn't tell you who was buying or selling, because a dark pool print has both. Are dark pool prints bullish or bearish? covers how to think about direction, and how to read dark pool prints covers the rest of a print.
Common questions
What does a #1 dark pool print mean on Tradytics?
It is the largest print by dollar value in that stock over the last 12 months, among prints of the same kind. #10 means nine prints were bigger in a year.
Why rank dark pool prints instead of filtering by size?
Because a size cutoff favors the biggest stocks. Ranking each print against its own stock's year shows what is unusual for that stock, whether it's SPY or a mid-cap.
Are dark pool prints ranked against other stocks?
No. Each print is ranked only against the same stock's prints of the same kind over the last 12 months.
What is a dark pool level?
A price where an unusual amount of dark pool money changed hands. Tradytics ranks each level against every session's levels in the year and shows the heaviest on the research page and the chart.
Sources
- FINRA: Trade Reporting Facility (TRF): where off-exchange (dark pool) trades are reported.
- FINRA, Where Do Stocks Trade?: lit vs dark venues, and ATS trades reported to a FINRA trade reporting facility and published on the consolidated tape.
- FINRA, Trade Report Modifiers: the late, prior reference price and average-price flags and whether each updates the last sale.
- Dark pool and block prints on 2026-11-04: 10,893 prints worth $125.42B, $54.51B of it in dark pools.
- Most traded in dark pools and blocks: SPY ($9.72B), ORCL ($6.12B), IWM ($2.13B), HYG ($2.02B), IVV ($1.86B).
Updated 2026-11-05 07:45 UTC