A Japanese charting system which maps the open- high-low-and close of periodic price movements. A box is drawn around the open and close, and painted white if the close is above the open, and black if the close is below the open. The boxes and their little heads and tails look like candles and their wicks. Candlestick studies are full of exotic terms like Morning Star and Dark Cloud Cover; these describe how the black and white candles look, and can be interpreted as buy or sell signals.