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Balanced Price Range (BPR): when two opposite gaps overlap

A balanced price range is the overlap of a bullish and a bearish fair value gap. Learn how the engine defines a BPR, how to read it and what to avoid.

2026-10-29 · 4 min read · by the ICC Charts team (how we write)

A fair value gap shows where price moved so fast that one side of the market was barely traded. But price rarely moves one way only. Sometimes it rises and leaves a gap, then falls back through the same area and leaves an opposite gap. Where those two gaps overlap, ICT traders talk about a balanced price range, or BPR.

The idea in plain words

The first move left an imbalance. The second move, in the other direction, travelled through that imbalance and left its own. The overlap is a zone where price has been "unbalanced" from both sides, and where traders may expect a reaction when price returns.

Think of it as a place that both buyers and sellers have already been in a hurry to cross. Whether it holds is never certain, but it is a clear area to watch.

How the ICC Charts engine defines a BPR

In the engine, a BPR is built from fair value gaps:

The later gap decides the direction because that is the latest push of the market: if the second gap is bullish, the BPR is read as bullish.

A worked example

These numbers are only an illustration on a 15-minute chart:

  1. A bearish gap forms between 1,985 and 1,990 as price drops.
  2. Price turns and rallies sharply. On the way up it leaves a bullish gap between 1,988 and 1,994.
  3. The two gaps share the area from 1,988 to 1,990. That is the BPR.
  4. The second gap is bullish, so the BPR is bullish. If price pulls back into 1,988 to 1,990, a trader may look for a reaction there, with a stop below the zone.

BPR, FVG and volume imbalance

What makes a BPR more interesting

Common mistakes

Why the 60-bar limit matters

The time limit keeps the idea honest. Two opposite gaps that form hours apart on a fast chart are usually unrelated moves. When the second gap appears soon after the first, the second leg really did trade back through the first imbalance, and that is what the term describes. If you work on a higher time frame, remember that 60 bars there cover far more clock time than 60 bars on the 1-minute chart.

It also helps to write down your own rules before looking at results: which time frame, which sessions, and what counts as a reaction. A written rule is easier to test than a feeling.

Practise it

Open the terminal and turn on the FVG / IFVG layer. Scroll back through a few days and look for places where a bullish and a bearish gap share an area. Note what price did when it came back. Keep an honest count of hits and misses. You can also see how the engine combines these ideas on the models page.

Education only. ICC Charts is not affiliated with Inner Circle Trader (Michael J. Huddleston); these ideas are explained in our own words. A BPR is not a signal on its own. Trading involves risk; practise on a demo account first.

Try it on a live chart

Open ICC Charts in your browser, free, with the ICT and VSA layers and the model scanner. Or practise on past charts in the free Chart Challenge game.

Open it on the chart → Play the chart game

On MetaTrader 5? Our free FVG & order block indicator draws these zones on your MT5 charts with the same rules as ICC Charts (free account).

New articles and the daily chart challenge on Telegram → t.me/icccharts

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