Wave-count consensus and open-interest confirmation

The unfinished count

A wave-count hypothesis is a labeled impulse or correction used as a map of crowd psychology, not as a finished trade idea. Elliott wave structure and a numerical crowd-consensus reading are treated as two expressions of the same psychology. When the count is unclear, the procedure lets the consensus resolve it rather than forcing a preferred count.

The documented decision rule is not to act against the consensus figures. Those figures outrank every other input in the procedure.

Tails, trend, and the open-interest filter

Contrary positioning is reserved for the two sentiment extremes, the one-sided tails of the crowd. Between those tails the procedure stays with the prevailing trend and waits for the next consensus extreme.

A sentiment extreme that can persist is not acted on until the open-interest filter prints. Open interest must stop expanding at a high, or contract into a price low. Those turns decide whether a persistent consensus reading is still being funded.

A packaged top and a later new-selling condition

In the 1987 equity sequence, a completed five-wave rise, a multi-year consensus high, and open interest that declined into the high were treated as a single package of top conditions.

A later decline accompanied by expanding open interest was classified as a new-selling condition: falling prices together with rising open interest, read as fresh short initiation rather than a completed washout. That reading is different from open interest that later contracted during the crash itself.

Off-plan attention and size

Off-plan attention is the process rule that watches positions leaving the planned path. Off-plan or losing positions receive priority attention. Positions that are tracking a pre-set upside objective are left alone. A recognized personal state of adding to a loser, or of mentally banking gains, is itself an exit rule.

Size is not increased when conditions are unfavorable. The procedure decides when a larger commitment is justified rather than letting the activity dictate exposure.

What retires the thesis

A long-horizon wave forecast is kept as a revisable probability. The working bearish thesis is defined as wrong if a five-wave advance can be counted from a low, or if price clears a pre-committed threshold. That pair is the invalidation condition, and it is written before the thesis is allowed to stand.