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The two most common crowd behavior patterns in the market — how they show up in real data, and why they're called 'biases,' not emotions that can be measured directly.
FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) is the pattern where a sharp rise in a stock's price draws in new buyers not because of independent analysis, but out of fear of missing a continued rally. The pattern shows up in data as a combination of a sharp price rise, higher-than-usual trading volume, and unusually positive news sentiment — together, not any one alone.
Panic selling is the reverse phenomenon: a sharp decline triggers further selling from investors afraid of additional losses, regardless of the company's actual fundamental value. Both patterns feed on themselves — a rise or fall draws in behavior that accelerates that same move even further.
It's important to understand: no system can actually measure what an individual investor 'feels.' What can be measured are observable patterns in price, volume, and news sentiment that historically correlate with herd behavior — a statistical inference, not mind-reading. That's why the accurate term is 'behavioral pattern,' not 'what the market feels.'
StockIQ's psychology engine identifies patterns like these (FOMO, panic selling, herding, and more) from real price, volume, and news sentiment data — as a completely separate feature from the weighted Investor Score, not part of it, because these are two different kinds of information: what the fundamental/technical data shows, versus how the market is behaving around it.
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The information in this guide is intended for general educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Full details on the disclaimer page.