Piercing Line and Dark Cloud Cover

Piercing line (bullish): in a downtrend, a strong bearish candle is followed by a bullish candle that opens below the prior low (gap down on daily stocks) and closes above the midpoint of the bearish body. Buyers reclaimed significant ground.

Dark cloud cover (bearish): in an uptrend, bullish candle followed by bearish opening above prior high and closing below the midpoint of the bullish body. Sellers rejected higher prices meaningfully.

The 50% penetration rule matters. A close barely above bearish open is weak piercing. A close deep into the body shows conviction. Manual traders eye the 50% line as minimum quality threshold.

These patterns work best at HTF demand/supply and when the first candle is large — they are reversal dialogue between two strong periods. Small bodies produce small signals.

Confirmation: optional third candle continuing direction, or retest of the piercing/dark cloud midpoint holding as support/resistance.