If you are purely talking tape then that last part of your post is false, if I place a sell and a MM absorbs the order, guess what, it only show as a sell, no buyer. The transaction/tape is not directly between the BUYERs & SELLERs, but a representation of the MM's clearing out orders- period, that is why a tape could have 500,000,000 sells and 24,000,000 buys. The MM picks up the extra as obligated to try and ensure liquidity to the stock