Marking swing highs without arguing with the last wick

Swing highs become controversial the moment a bar prints a long upper wick. One trader calls the wick tip the pivot; another insists on the closing price. In our technical analysis training we settle the argument before the session starts.

Use the extreme for structure, the close for confidence. The wick tip still defines where sellers appeared. The close tells you whether that appearance held through the bar. When you mark a swing high for a multi-day hold, draw the horizontal from the extreme, then note in the margin whether the close finished weak or strong.

For homework we ask students to mark twenty swings on a daily chart and write one sentence per pivot: “extreme respected / close rejected.” That habit reduces later debates during live reviews.