Definition

Consumption

The removal of resting liquidity when aggressive orders trade against and fill it.

Full Explanation

Consumption occurs every time aggression fills against resting limit orders. A sell market order consumes buy-side liquidity. A buy market order consumes sell-side liquidity. Once a resting order is filled, that portion of the available liquidity is gone unless someone adds more.

This is one reason repeated interaction with a level cannot be reduced to 'more tests make it stronger' or 'more tests make it weaker.' Each visit may consume some liquidity, but the order book is alive. Participants can replace what was filled, add more, move their orders, or remove what remains.

If repeated aggression consumes liquidity faster than it is replaced, a shelf can eventually become too thin to absorb the next wave and price relocates through it. The chart can show the eventual break, but it cannot tell you how much of the change came from prior consumption versus other invisible changes in the order book.

In the Book 1 chapter

Chapter 4 · The Mechanics

The Living Order Book

There’s a belief that floats around trading communities, stated so often it’s become assumed wisdom: if a level has been tested multiple times, it’s getting weaker. The idea is that each visit to a level chips away at the liquidity sitting there — buyers or sellers getting used up — and eventually there won’t be enough left to hold, and the level breaks.

From the Blog 2 posts

The Fallacy of "Key Levels" (And the Myth of "Strength")

A price level is just a number. Its significance comes entirely from the orders sitting at it right now—and those orders change constantly.

Absorption: When Aggression Arrives and Nothing Happens

Absorption is the mechanical event where market orders meet enough resting liquidity and price fails to move—understanding it changes how you read every consolidation.