How Follow the flow works
Follow the flow shows which coins the largest traders on Lighter agree on right now. Every position on Lighter lives on-chain and is public, so we track every address with $1M+ in open perpetual positions and measure, for each coin, how much of this whale money is long and how much is short. The result is a live ranking of whale consensus — a long/short ratio of smart money rather than of the whole market.
What counts as a whale consensus
We only count directional whales — traders whose positions look like a bet on price. Hedges, long/short baskets, market makers and vaults are excluded: a fund shorting a basket of coins against spot holdings elsewhere is not bearish, and counting it would distort the picture. A coin gets into the ranking when at least 60% of whale money is on one side; from 90% it is marked as a strong consensus. To filter out noise, the coin needs $1M+ of whale positions, at least 3 whales on the dominant side, and the largest of them must hold less than half of that side — otherwise it is one trader’s bet, not a consensus. The share is measured by money, not by headcount: one whale with $50M outweighs ten with $100K.
How to read the tables
- Consensus — the share of whale money on this side.
- Whale positions — how much whales hold on this side, in dollars.
- Whales — how many whales are on this side out of all whales in the coin.
- Net change, 24h — how much whales bought minus how much they sold over the last day: are they still entering or already leaving.
- Whales’ PnL — the unrealized profit or loss of whales on this side: is the trade working.
- Squeeze risk — how much of this side gets liquidated if the price moves against it, compared with the order book. See how squeeze risk is calculated.
- Funding — the hourly funding rate: a crowded side usually pays it.
How traders use it
- Trend confirmation. A strong consensus where whales keep adding (positive net change for longs, negative for shorts) and are in profit means large traders are backing the move.
- Crowded trade warning. A strong consensus where whales are losing money and their liquidations are close is fuel for a squeeze against them — the classic setup for a long squeeze or a short squeeze.
- Exit signal. When the consensus still holds but the net change turns against it, whales are taking profit or cutting the position.
- Watchlist. Coins that appear in the ranking for the first time are worth a look: whale money has just aligned there.
Limitations
We only see Lighter: hedges on other exchanges and spot holdings elsewhere are invisible, and one trader can split positions across several addresses. Whales can be wrong, and a consensus is also a crowded trade. The ranking updates every minute from live data. HyperScan is an analytics tool — nothing here is investment advice. Full details are in the methodology.