 Good morning, Traders. Welcome to the Traders Lab. I'm your host, Tom B. Thanks for visiting the lab today. Can I please get an audio and screen check in YouTube and also the Bookmap Discord Trader Lab? Can I get a check in YouTube, please? All right. Thanks, everyone. Appreciate it. Just a little technical stuff going on here for those of you who might not be aware. Well, first of all, welcome to the Traders Lab. And I am streaming from Costa Rica, and I've been having some intermittent power and internet issues. You know, just one of those things that happens when you're in an area that has an infrastructure that's kind of sometimes on a wing in a prayer. Thanks for coming by to the Traders Lab. I'm your host, Tom B. I stream Monday through Friday, 11.30 to 1p Eastern Standard Time. This stream is about integrating Bookmap order flow tools with auction market theory using the volume profile in the intraday developing timeframe. The essence, I would say, of trading and really in a very in a bridge version is to understand that we are in a random environment and the process that emulates this environment as closely as possible is the gaming industry or casinos. And if we understand that trading is not a prediction-based business, but more of a statistical-based business. And this is, of course, a personal opinion only and not a recommendation. You might find then that psychologically you might be in a much better position to deal with the variables that you cannot control. The psychology of trading is one of the greatest obstacles to the potential of actually having longevity in this business. Now, a personal belief I have is that you can learn how to trade potentially in the Trader Lab. However, whether or not you can manage yourself, which is much greater obstacle than you will probably ever imagine to actually face it, that is really the key. So I believe that traders or potential traders can learn. They have to decide whether or not they have what it takes to go through a learning curve, find a process they can relate to psychologically, whatever it is, and understand that the market is a dynamic, ever-changing, developing entity or process that is based not on indicators but on participant behavior. It is the behavior of an interaction of the participants that creates all outputs, whether it's indicator-based, backwards-looking, or multiple timeframe-based, or anything else that you can overlay on this behavior to try to create a process that can create an edge. That is really what the trading business is. I'm sure there's much more to it, of course, but the fact is if we cut it down and try to, let's say, call it disassemble it, that is what the business is. Now, how you place yourself in it and what you do, that's an individual decision. General disclosure, all book map limited materials, information, and presentations are for educational purposes only and should not be considered specific investment advice or recommendations. Risk disclosure, trading futures, equities, and digital currencies involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. And please remember this is not a trade calling room. This is for educational purposes only. This is based on structure trades that are available to everyone in the Book Map Discard Trader Lab chat, as well as, in fact, it's 60 PDFs of trades that you can not only reverse engineer, see if you can glean some ideas from it, but also the trades I review here in the streamer based on these structures. And of course, everything is, as you know, is random and past performance is not indicative of future results. As far as the audio coming through that is what we're going to be hearing, market pulse, and we will be hearing also IRT alerts, aren't too many of them that should be going off. Now, are they louder than me or are they in the background? Yeah, well, that's the market pulse. There you go. Okay, so what we're going to do today is I'm going to pick up and we're going to start with, we're going to start with the RTH Open. We're going to talk about the behavior in the transitions in behavior. The hardest thing I think for developing traders and even experienced ones really is to stay in alignment with the market because no matter whatever you have, unless you have the magic eight ball that can look into the future, we're always going to be attempting to stay in alignment, but the alignment is dynamic and changing. So there's no way in my opinion to predict what will happen. All we can do is try to align with what is happening. So we operate in the present. And we also operate by looking in the past. We cannot unfortunately look into the future yet, maybe a time machine. But until we get one of those, this is how we have to operate. So let's go take a look. Let's see what's going on. And let's see if we can extract where our opportunities might take place. Now, what I do, and I do the same process every day. And the reason I do it this way is so you can see that if you're in a random environment, and I'm going to ask you guys if you're not familiar with the stream that you grab a pen and paper. And even if you are familiar, reinforcement is very important. And that's where you develop unconscious competence. So take some notes if you choose. But, you know, like anything, the more you can glean, the more maybe you can take away from the time you invest here. The thing about the market is, it is a dynamic entity. And what we want to be able to do is try to stay in alignment. Now, using auction market theory, volume profile, all it is, when you hear a term like theory, I think right away you're thinking of Einstein or something. Auction market theory is very simple. It's just shopping. So let's talk about, this is the RTH open. This is the ETH mid. This is the ETH volume point of control. And if we're shoppers, remember high and volume point of control is another term for retail. Retail, if you think of shopping, what's a retail price in the store? It's where the sellers and the buyers come together and agree on a price. And that means most of the volume would be done at the highest volume price. Kind of logical, isn't it? So when the market goes too high, it'll shut. The buyers at some point refuse to pay it. If the market goes too low, the sellers refuse to sell it down there. In other words, it's on sale and the market tends to cross back and forth over these high volume areas. Also, the market tends to be attracted to those areas. So if we move away, we come back, we move away, we come back. Kind of simple. You know, it's just like you shopping. The market's on sale, they bring it back to retail. If they raise the price at some point, you give price resistance, you don't shop there anymore. And then it's either going to come, the price is going to lower to retail or you're going to shop at another store. And that's basically what consolidations are. Rotations. Now, this is the value area low from Friday. By the way, Monday was a holiday, so there is no data in here from Monday. Everything I'm using is based on Friday being the last RTH and then this morning's ETH being the start of today's session. Now, by that, don't be confused. RTH is separate from ETH, but the ETH behavior on its own, even though less volume creates levels that we can understand and maybe use in our process. Okay. By the way, remember, if this stream goes down because of being in Costa Rica and having some issues this morning, you can access the stream in the Bookmap Discard Trade Lab chat. There's a link in the bottom of YouTube. YouTube is the thing that might be problematic that I might not be able to get back into. Just want you guys to know one moment, please. Trying to keep our, as they say, keep our stuff together. Okay. Let's go take a look at the RTH open. Here's the RTH open. This column is going to show a CVD, Chart Volume Delta. It's only showing us what's on that we can see on the chart. This does not reset. It is showing the Delta right here, the buying. Okay. And this is custom notes where I put in levels as they develop. This is cloud notes. These are coming off of investor RT, which is my higher time frame platform. This is the limit order book and this is the session volume profile. So this shows all the volume. The chart volume profile only is going to show the volume on the chart that I want to see. So if I just want to see from RTH open, that's all I'm going to see. And I'm only going to see the Delta in the legs I'm interested in. So let's go take a look. So RTH open, I believe, where's it? Right here. RTH open here. So right now I'm only looking at the volume starting here. This yellow line represents the highest developing volume. And it's called the developing volume point of control. And let's strip away the term and just say what is it? High volume. High volume is retail. So the way the market tends to work is it tends to try to figure out what's too high and what's too low. So here we open, we're opening on the edge. Let me just see where yesterday's low was right here. So right here, you're opening right ahead outside of range. To me, that says, well, not too much has changed. We're opening lower, but we're also this in the ETH, so you know, was retail. If this is too low, and we come all the way out here, then the possibility, there's a couple possibilities. One is too low. The other part is, here's yesterday's range. So we can come up and check inside of yesterday's range. If it's too high, then we can then come down and visit here. And of course, I don't know what it's going to do, how it's going to do it, if it's going to do it, that's part of the random joy. So let's go take a look at the first behavior. So now I'm going to be discussing structured trades. And one of the things I think that's very complex for traders is patience, because there's adrenaline running and all kinds of stuff is going on. And what you will find, I believe, if you sit back and do the work, is that patience, who said patience is a virtue? Well, whoever came up with that must have been in trading because patience is important to understand context. And it's not the trades that get away. It's the trades that you have vetted where you have potential discipline. So let's go take a look at the first behavior. So the market opens, we check yesterday's low. Now right here, break low, come back and check. This is a potential structured trade in the trader lab. Now, but here's the thing about it. Now, in a vacuum, it is a potential short. So let's go take a look at it. Now, this is the overnight mid. I don't like the, well, you know, I've been promising I'm going to do less on statistics, but I can't help myself sometimes. So the overnight mid has about an 83% probability. The overnight volume point of control also about an 83% probability. Past performance, not indicative future results. Now, the thing that's a bit of a problem here is opening and checking yesterday's low. And by the way, let me just look one more. Oh, there's another one. Hold on. I got to give you these because I just can't help myself. About a 60% probability, we'll get to something called the value area high. So this is a structured short. This is a target. This is a target. And remember, we're in a random environment, so nobody knows. So right here, here's your seller. Here's your pullback. This is developing volume point of control. Let me just open this up so you can see it right here. I'm going to label it right here. This is what I do. Very simple. It's simple. And the reason I'm doing this is really to narrate because what I'm the way I think, and I'm not saying it's anybody should do this the way I think, but I had to kind of adopt trading to something I already understood. And instead of making it complex, which is what I did, I'm going to say let's say instead of continuing to make it an extremely complex process, because I thought inside a complexity was the secret. I found that if I went in the other direction, I might better be able to interpret it. And I related it to shopping because I shop and I understand how shopping works. You do too. So if yesterday's low is too high, and this is retail, if I break away from it, and this shifts down, this is a structure. This is called V-Pock migration. In micro, this is saying potentially and it's always potentially this is too high. Now we're not willing to pay this price for S&Ps. The price has been lowered. Now why? How do you know the price is lowered? Well, because there's more volume here than there is here. So if the price is, let's just say $1.05 over here, and the price comes down and there's more interaction here, more volume. It might, and this is the big term here, might mean this is too high. So we break, we check. This is a short in the trader lab. Let's go back. Stop over the high of the day, not a recommendation. Where is the target? Here and here. So let's see the trade. This is a scale. Now you're looking for a rotation potentially back here or in this area, and then you want it to reject if it's going to continue. So let's see what happens. Comes back here. You get your counter rotation right here. Your teeth chatter a little bit, and then you're going to get taken out of the trade. Is everybody seeing the first potential opportunity? Now again, whether or not you take it is not the key. I'm just narrating structure trades. So this is, that was the first trade. Now here's the other thing. Is this the best place to take a trade? If you trade on the open, it is a legitimate trader lab structure trade. And what would happen? Remember, this had a 83% probability past performance, not indicative of future results. You got to, you know, vet everything you hear anywhere from anybody. Otherwise, you don't know what you're getting. So this has this probability of 83%. Is that reasonable that if you get short here, and this is really the first structured trade that you would scale here? I don't think that's terrible, you know? Because you're using a tight stop. Your stop would be here. Then once the trade breaks down here, your stop could be here. Or even above here. So for me, the stop would go here or here. Once it breaks down. So now your stop is here. Your scale is here. And it's just an idea, not a recommendation for trade management. And then you're going for this. Okay. So that's the first one. Now let's go back and think about what the condition of the market is. Now we know the market is short. So now we're going up and it's like, okay, now what? So let's look. This is called VPOC migration right here. Now, so what that is saying is this is too low. So right here, market comes up, pulls back. This is now retail. That is saying this is too low and this is too low. Now there's a couple possibilities right here. If this is too high, we're going to come back here. If this changes into rotational trade, it's going to be called mean reversion. So there's two possibilities. Outside back here and potentially higher or too high back here. I still have Easter. Now let's say. So this is too high. Now right here. Here's the key to this whole thing. When what we need to do here is push off. Instead, we fall out. This now is support right here or here, right against this volume. You can see here, the alignment, the alignment. So the idea between right here is too high. Too low. You can see the behavior here. So the possibilities are the following up here. So from here to here, or if this is too high back to here. So right here, it needs to regain this. Break low, too high, pull back, trade a lab short, going for this. V-Pac migration, just watch it. So this is a potential short right here. You want it to stay below here. So here's how this works. Too high, break. This is retail. Target is here. Remember? Pull back to where? Mid, VWAP, alignment, variable high volume node, short to here, to here. Then there's another stat down here, the overnight low, wherever that is. This is our next target down here. So let's go a little further. And if you're in the trader lab, you know all of this. So liquidity, what do we know? Too high, too high, too high, break, too high. Remember, target, break below, test, too high, target. So, you know, you'd get a little, a little spun around, but not too bad. So short, short, short, short, working targets, you know, target, overnight, mid, target, target, target. And it looks like it's going south of the border. Here, target, I'm sorry, target. Pull back, potential, add. Now, why might you add here? I'm not saying anybody should. I'm saying why might you think about it? So let's, let's look at this. V epoch migration and a statistic here that has roughly a 93% probability, past performance, not in DICU future results, that you're going to either take out the first hour high, I'm sorry, the ETH higher low. And I don't know about you, but I'm kind of thinking the low. So that's why it's a viable target. Now this is an ad. If it's in your trade plan, break low, the epoch migration, this is a structured trade. This is a short, and you're going for that. Let's watch it. Same setup here, except what's the except no range. So that's the short sequence. Now, before I go further and we start talking about change, any questions are you guys with me? Yeah, Dr. M, you could post that in the bookmap discord futures channel. That's really not relevant for what we're doing here, but thank you. Bear in mind, I'm phasing out the, well, I think I just did mention the stats. I'm getting a question in my phasing out stats. No, I'm not. They're available to everyone in the bookmap discord trader lab. And I think if someone's interested in though that they should go to trader lab and download the 60 PDFs of these trades so they can anticipate them in the stats. So I'm not going to spend a lot as much time on those because I've done that for several years. So they're available. So I want to focus on reading the context because stats are just a piece. If one can't read the context and the changes in the stats aren't going to do us any good. Yeah, you're welcome. No problem. So here we, now let's go take a look. Does anybody know where the low of the day is? Come on, raise your hand. I'm really good at it after the fact. Yeah. So since we don't know how low or indifference, how might we detect change? Let's talk about that. Now right here, now we got the overnight low. We know all this, you know, the south side, the shorts, I think very nice, very tradable, very good in trader lab. Trader lab participants, how did you guys do on the short side this morning in general? Good, good, good, good. Good. Okay. And if you're in YouTube and you've been following the stream, I want to ask you guys, and even if you're new here, is it logical to see how these trades played out based on what you're watching here? Is it logical to you? Now remember, no magic eight ball. We can't predict anything. We are in a completely random environment. Given an understanding of the language of the market. Now one of the, I don't use indicators and it's not a badge of honor. It's just because been there, done that beyond what most traders do because of the time, my time in the business, but also because I was in systems. And when you build systems, you're really putting indicators or derivative indicators in your own math on steroids and really leveraging out many different processes and then attempting optimization. I've done that. And so I ended up going in the other direction. I don't have any indicators. You might find that interesting and never thought it would end up that way. But over time, I kept stripping out things that create a conflict or we're redundant. And a lot of things we have are almost like to confirm the other thing, you know, and if you think of the term confirmation, that is telling that is a very telling word. If you think confirmation, it is looking for certainty. And we are not in an environment that gives us certainty. We're continually in an environment of randomness. So the thing about the randomness is if I understand them in a random environment, then I'm not going to attempt certainty. I'm going to accept randomness. And instead of indicators, which inject a degree of red light green light and more indicators, maybe creates more certainty, which actually does not. And it's a personal experience. Not saying it's right for you. Then what I need to do is do something else. What do I do? I read the language of the market. Now, indicators are an output of price or some derivative of price. So let's just say an indicator is an interpretation of the language of the market. All I do is speak market. So I read the language in real time and interpret it versus having the language and then an indicator translate the language in a lagging fashion. This is our output. I've eliminated the indicator. My mind and understanding of how the market works now is the translator. I've removed the piece in between. And I've also removed the conflict and the ambiguity that's created by indicator outputs that are mostly not sensitive to changes in the market until way after the fact. Because of the lag of these outputs and the conflict. So the conflict interfered with my ability and, you know, analysis by whatever it is, you know what I'm saying. So that was my experience with it. And I fought that for years. And I don't mean one year. I mean years. So, okay, great moves in the Trader Lab. You guys had a good time on the short side. That's great. Thank you. And I hope you guys in YouTube, if you follow the Trader Lab or these trades that you got to participate. And of course, past performance is not indicative of future results are required to say that. And, you know, you have to vet each of these structured trades and see if you can generate a statistical edge. Now, let's talk about change. Now, right here, I don't, by the way, change. I'm really good at it after the fact. Not so much as it's happening. So nobody knows. But here's how we might detect it. Let's look at the story. Too high. This is now retail. Check. Here, back here. I'm not paying that. Boom, they leave the store. It's overpriced. Look at the story. This is narration. Price is here. Here's the volume. I'm not paying that. I'm not paying that. You can keep your can at tuna. Break. Check this. This is too high. This is too high. We are out of here. Absorption. Cell stops by iceberg just showing you. I'm not mentioning too much about order flow at the moment. But I will. So let's watch rotation. Don't know. Go in here. Teeth chattering like everybody else. Statistic. This is my target. So what I do besides the stomach lining flipping around is I just follow and I use stats. So the park migration says this is too high. This is retail. Now the way this works and I'm going to point something out so you could see the change. We either going to bounce this way off of retail. In other words, let's look here. If this is really if this becomes too low, instead of pushing off. Oh, it's too high. If we do the opposite, then it's too low. Just think in a way it's like support and resistance, but not in the typical way we think of it. It's really more pricing. Is this too high or is this too low? Now you could think of that as support and resistance, but I it's a little different for me. To me, this is too high. I'm not paying that. And that's why the volume is moved out. Now this is retail. It's still too expensive. We leave it. I'm not shopping here. Remember shopping? We come back. Is this still too high? Yeah, it is. I shift down. I'm not paying that. Now let's mark this. Variable high volume node. You know, you see I do this. I'm very process oriented. And it's the way I kind of keep track on the participant behavior. I don't have an indicator of crossing, you know, what I have an indication of volume. That's all volume profile is. How much volume happens at a price? And the volume tells us a lot. This is the highest volume at the time when the market is here. So it's telling me this is retail. If I leave it, it's saying is that's too high. Now the volume as this is progressing, there's more volume taking place here than there was here or here. So price and volume are moving together. So as long as this is moving down, I'm a happy camper. Other than the teeth chattering. And this is my target. So right here, target. Now, if you're in the trader lab, you might be done or subject to your plan. Who knows? Everybody's different. You might be holding runners or runner or wherever. Now let's watch the behavior. Now again, nobody knows until you know. And that's why they say hindsight is 2020. So right here, let's look at a change in behavior. Too high, too high, too high. We're looking for it to stay under here to continue. Break above. This is the first change in behavior. This is the last location that was too high right here. So if this market's going down, we want it to stay under the variable high volume node. Watch takes it out off the shorts. Now there's a couple possibilities. Let me give you to back out here to check this. If it's too high, we can come back here. Let's watch. Also, what else do we know? VWAP and mid. So we have VWAP, mid, by stops will be here. And this, which was too high from the ETH, and this is an outside edge of what's called the distribution. So what you think about this, if this is the retail price and we move outside, we are the possibilities exist as follows. Now you have to kind of think always from both sides. Where's the retail stops? What did they do? Write this down. Think like a retail trader. Don't act like one. So by stops will be here. Why? That's what retail traders do. This was retail. Too high. We rejected it. Outside edge. Remember shopping. If the price gets too high, you notice how the volume dried up on the way down. What happened here was, whoops, come here. Too high, too low retail. This is your retail. We fell out of this, which says this is a consolidation and retail price was too high. We then rotate down here. And this is the outside edge. Too high, too low retail, retail, high volume. So there's a couple of possibilities. We come out here, check this, take the stops at the VWAP in the mid and mean revert and come back here. So that's one possibility. The other possibility is, since we hit a key statistic, that's that, but we don't know. So there's a couple of pieces. Too low. So we rejected it. Next layer. Too high. We rejected it. So the possibilities are the following. Potential long only up to here or potential short back to here. Let's see what it does. And that's what I know. I don't know anything else. So where do we come? Here. And here. So right here you get your stops, you get your sell iceberg. If you're taking the outside in or mean reversion trade, this would be a short possibly down to here or this becomes right here. Here's your key. Here's your key. Watch this. So too low. Up here. Get the stops outside edge overnight volume point of control. Remember, this is the confluence area. This is right here. So you have too low, too low. Right back there. It's right here's key. So if you took a short here, this is your obstacle for a scale. And then you'd be holding, you know, for it to continue. If you took the short here. And you didn't get through here. Here's the pot. This is what it says. Context change. Why? Too low. This is resistance. Let's look at it in micro. Right here. See the behavior. Selling, selling, break high, pull back, support, rotate outside. This is your outside. Then it's either going to rotate back to here. So that's why your scale. Remember, resistance becomes support. But you don't know, you know, this is the joy. You come out here. You're looking for this, but you're looking for this first. So if you took a short, let me show it to you. I'm going to show you the micro now. Let me show you the microstructure. I know I'm jumping around a little bit, but I got to show you fractals. This is your outside edge. And the idea is to come back. It's called mean reversion. We know this was too high. And now we're at an outside edge. We got our stops. Let me show you the microstructure and the trigger. Right here is micro high volume. You can see it there. I came to an outside edge there. That's a low volume note. I'm in the area of the overnight volume point of control, which was too high. This is a confluence. I'm now looking for it to rotate here. And I got to clear this to get there and down here. So, so right now I'm thinking mean reversion. Here's my high volume. Here, microstructure. There's the volume. You could see it there. Here's my seller there. My volume is here. Watch the behavior. Short is here. Stop is here. And you are going for this and then this and then that. That's the trade. And what would happen is you'd get a scale and you get taken out. Now, if you got a scale, your stop is here. You might scratch this trade, maybe give up a tick or two or keep a tick or two. It's subject to your entry. Now, things have changed. Now, now again, we don't know, you know, this is too low. So too low, too low, context change. So let's watch V poc migration out. I'm going to we have now shifted. So let's look. So, too low. Let me label this thing here. I just want to be consistent. You know, it is what it is, you know, sometimes things are really clean. But when it changes, I mean, for me, the hardest part for me, and still is, is the context change, because you don't know. So you could be trading a short here, but the context has changed. But you know what? Until we don't get under here, it's still selling for me, except what I know what happened here, because to continue down right here, it needs to push off. When it comes above here, and this is important, I want it to push off. So it needs to get stay under here, which is that clear this, and then it would be fine. But this changes it. So now I go from sellers trending to rotation. I cross, I'm above the V poc, I cross above the VWAP in the mid, and I know there's stops. Once those guys are out, I'm then looking back to my locations overnight V poc and stop pick. Let's look again, microstructure. Sellers. There's my seller. That's a trigger. There's my volume. There's my pullback. That's my short. And I got a scale here. So that's, this is all good until this. And then once this goes, then everything changes. Okay, now it's what happened. What happened was, you can't be short now at the moment. So let's look. So now we get V poc migration. This is saying it's the exact opposite of what we were seeing coming down, except now it's the opposite. So what else do I know? Well, I know now this that there's by stops up here. So I know that I know if I can take this out. We have a statistic, which is always a surprise which one we take out that at nine o'clock, the first half hour high, there's about a 86% probability will take out the first half hour high or low don't know which one. Once we take that out, then we have another statistic that's going to come into play. Let me find it for you. Maybe I know I keep saying I'm not going to do this, but you got to see why statistics might be important. Then the first hours high is going to have a 73% probability to get taken out. So we'll see. So this gets taken out here. We're then going to be going for the first hour high. So we'll see right here is the first hours high there. It's that yellow line called the IB high and past performance, not indicative of future results of 76% probability, we're going to take this out. So now what do we do about this? Here's the IB 30, nine o'clock. Here's the value area low. We now get inside the previous day's value. There is a statistic for this. I'm not going to go into it more statistics. They're available in the trader lab. So I have my IB 30, which is here. I have my value area, which is there. I break inside a value. There's a possibility of going to the other side of value actually to get here. Naked volume point of control next target and then up here. So that's the possibilities. We have another trade subject to you vetting it called the IB continuation, IB 30 continuation, which is this. And we have targets above and we have a 76% probability. I think it was to get here. So this is a long in the trader lab back to here. Back to take this out and our statistic. Now there's the overnight high, but this is our next target. There's about a 70% probability to get here. Is everybody with me in the trader lab? Do you guys see the long? How we doing in trader lab? Are you guys, did you see the long setup that must be vetted? Let's look at the confluence. Let me help you guys with this. Because this is the kind of stuff that'll make you want to throw a brick in your face. Because it's so, this is why narration is important. If this, then that. If not, then what? If this, then that. If not, then what? This was too high. We left it. Support and resistance conceptually speaking. There it is. This is the nine o'clock or first half hour high. Remember, and we had, now we rejected the low. Who knows? But once you're trucking and going the other way, now we know there's a 86% probability to take that out. If you have an 86% probability and you've turned the barge around, then you'd be going for the stops here and the first hours high, which is going to be here. It creates, I think I mentioned it, a 70 some odd percent probability, right? If we pull back here, this becomes an IB continuation trade in alignment with this in alignment with value area low, which sets up the long to there. So let's look. So here, now for some in the trader lab, sorry, you might get along here. I'm not saying you should or shouldn't. I have no opinion. For me, because VPOC is down here, I'm just going to sit there like a deer in the headlights. When this changes, it's showing me as I interpret it. It's just one way to think of this, that this now is the high volume for the whole developing day so far. So this is retail. This is too low. Now I have confluence. I have this. If this is now retail, if it goes on sale, it can revert back. This is called mean reversion. I'm now back in alignment. I have my 930 stat, which means the first hour high, which was here. 77% probability. I have my pullback to IB 30 for the continuation trade. I have my pullback to the variable high volume node, which was too high at the open, which is now too low value area. And I know potentially I can come through this whole range, check this, which was the high volume price from Friday's RTH, in other words, retail. And the market tends in all fractals and timeframes to be checking what's a fair price. Too low, too low, retail, what was too high? There. Is it going to get there? Well, part of the joy. So let's go look at this trade. So this is along in the trader lab, right here. Going for this and that. That's the long. So I don't know where we are. Notice the liquidity in here. Now there's no way. And I think we broke from here, right? Is this where we broke? Yeah, Fed speaker, you know, everything goes out the window right there. So let's go. I haven't seen any of this really. So let's go take a look at this line. Okay, let's look at our next trade. Any questions? Now this is an input from the Fed, you know, Waller. Now it is good. Now nobody knows, right? Who knew? If I knew, that would be fun. Don't know. So it's trade management. And this is part of the random nature of trading. Who knows? So Waller talks. Everybody listens, right? Alcapoco cliff dive. Now let's look. Let's label. Let's keep going. Let me get rid of this. Variable high volume node. I'm going to label it. Now remember what we're trying to do here. We're trying to stay in alignment. So this is a input. Call it a fundamental input. So there's a reasonable chance that the market might underline, come back and check this because it was disrupted by a fundamental input Fed speaker. So we have to be conscious of the initial balance high here. So we want to be conscious of this right here, right there. So make a note of that. This is our variable high volume node. Now this switches down. So let's watch. This is now retail. This is micro structure. Nothing to do here. Let's just watch right here retail. So is this too high or is this too low? So right here, this turns into and we don't know right here. Chop, chop, chop. I'm looking at this. And if it comes up, this would be our target 4810. So we have to see what happens. Where does it come back? I'd be back to where the disruption in the auction was here. And let's see where I haven't seen this. Let's see where we are. This is still a potential target or we might be done. I really, you know, I can't predict anything. So out here. So I was looking for this. Let's look at it. Let's look at the behavior. Too high 4810. And then the IB would be the next target. Pullback potential long does not get there to here. Breaks down. You'd get taken out. If you took the long here, you'd get a scale. This is your next target. And then you're going for the IB. That's a structured trade. If it's in your trade plant. So you'd get scaled. This is also a selling structure. I mean, I was looking at this going, you know, takes out the stops. This is why in your trade plan, you have to have your trades planned out before because this is the target. Notice how the liquidity comes back in the book. It's not a coincidence in my opinion that it comes in right here. Takes out the stops. Once we break back above, this is your triggering structure. Right here. And you're going back to the tent. It's the same trade that you would have taken over here. Same. So this time you get your target. Now it's either going to bounce off of this, come back here, or it's going to continue to the next target, which is right here, IB. V poc migration. Let's watch it. There's your push. And that's it. Actually, this is a structured trade. So right here. So this is the long, this is the target. We come up above the IB. Let me explain it to you. So this was the target for this, this long for here to there. So that's the target. When you break below this and test here, it sets up a trade called the IB failure. Let me explain this to you. It is a mean reversion trade. Here's how it works. First of all, you got this. Okay. And we know about this. And we know about this. We have to be concerned about that just so you know what's going on. Liquidity comes into the book. It lines up with the liquidity that was over here. Break below the IB. Now it's the same thing here. Break below the IB. Short is here and here and here. These are all trader lab shorts. Break. So let's look at it in multiple dimensions. This is called the IBF. And here's what's important. Putting all these pieces together. Let me take you over here. Notice the liquidity. Liquidity comes back in. We stop sweep icebergs. Notice the iceberg selling. These are pieces. Nobody knows. Micro high volume seller pullback to the volume location IB seller pullback. Now for this to work, it has to get under here. So we're bobbling around here. Now if you took it here, it's more aggressive because this is the mean. This is called mean reversion. However, what do we know? This is a potential target and the VWOP in the mid. And why? This is support. Now potentially this is either support and we push off to here or this has been fulfilled already, but you don't know. So it's one of those things where you have to ask yourself, well, did this really do it? And there's no way to have the right answer. You have to determine. Now let's say you don't take it here because you're going, you know, maybe you break down, you come back up. You test this. This is still the IB failure. You break below. So now we have tested this sellers come back to the micro structure seller. So I'm seeing sellers sellers liquidity location. I got to get under here to go here. Let's watch seller pullback to high short to here to here stops and then to here. So this you're short here or in here, you're going for this and this and then you're holding. Let's just see what it does. I think we're there. And that's it. And then you're going for this. Not a recommendation. And there's other possibilities here. Let's look a little closer. This. So this is your next area. Let's let's look at the rationale. Why? Because this is so we have this to think about because we tested it there. It was too low. Variable high volume notes. So coming down now, it's this and this and this. And, you know, not for me to predict because I can't. All I can do is try to stay in alignment. So let's watch the targeting here, here and there. Is everybody tracking? Yeah, Dr. M, please post these someplace else. If I get questions, they run off the stream in YouTube and we really don't need to follow your trades because unless you give us all the reasoning behind it, post screenshots and everything else, we derive no benefit. Why don't you visit the bookmap discord trader lab chat and like other traders there contribute so we can derive some understanding and benefit and just, you know, post your screenshots and explanations and that would be useful. You took it. You guys got the IBF. Is that correct? In the trader lab, you guys got this short going here. Oh, good. Well, is that there's an old saying, you can't get them all. And we can't. Because remember what we're trying to do, we're trying to stay in alignment. Nobody and here's the thing about this, the randomness of the market. This is the target. Look where the high of the day is. I mean, I think that's pretty good. You know, there's no perfection in trading. In fact, the only thing you have is maybe in the outcome of every trade is random. I mean, while we're talking, I mean, you know, but here's remember I mentioned when you have disruption. And the market does the Alcapoco cliff dive. The tendency of the market is to come back and check it. Is that really too high? Well, yeah. Okay, we'll see you later. Now what? Let's go back to where it was too low. There, there, and maybe there. So those are our targets. Not a recommendation. So this is trader lab trading. Now, one of the things about trader lab. Here's the thing about trader lab. What I attempt to do is share and how to understand market mechanics. Since I'm not using indicators, I remove the conflict, but I cannot remove the ambiguity in the random nature of the market. I accept that. I accept it the same way casinos accept the random nature of their business, because they don't know what comes out of the deck when their, you know, cards are dealt. They don't know how to gamblers are going to play the cards. They just play the games the same way. That is trading. You may have, I don't know if you accept that. I'm not saying you should. I didn't. For years, and I mean years, we might take 15 of them, you know, or somewhere in there. And I was at the other end, you know, systems and indicator or math based outputs. Okay. It took me a real long time to change my belief. And the fact I had a belief is I kept building everything around what I believe, even though the evidence was starting to show up that what I believe might be erroneous. What kept me on the hook, if you will, of my belief was the randomness of the market because it would work. And that's what keeps you coming back to doing things that may not actually be representative of market, market behavior. By the way, look where we just came right here. Now, is it a coincidence? How about I answer you both ways? Yes and no. That's why this is a target. So what are the targets? Now, I mentioned this before we get there, and it's not to show you that I know what's going to happen because I'm the first one to tell you I have no clue. I know what might happen, and the reason I know what might happen is what already happened. This. That's too low. So what is the market? How does the market tend to behave? It tends to, it's trying to find a fair price. That's the only reason we got this market. Otherwise, what do we need the market for? We don't need it. So where's the fair price? Well, this was too low at the time. It could come back and check. Is this really too low? Well, if the price is too low here, then you might not be able to buy us some peas here. It's like going back to the store where they had a great price on your favorite can of tuna and you can't buy it here. That means now you're going to have to get in the car and drive to a different location and pay a different price. Now, we don't know where it is. So what else do we know? Let's think like a retail trader but not act like one. This right here is too high. Where's the stops? Mid and VWAP. Where's the retail price up here? What's too low? Down here. So that's why this is a target right there. And that's why this was a target up here. Same thing in fractals. Does that make sense? How do you do this is the question. You do it one piece at a time. The hardest part for me at least was recognizing the change. In other words, when I was short, what happened to me years ago is I'd be thinking shorts and I'd be selling this thing all the way up. Getting pounded, getting pounded, getting pounded. And the reason would be is when I was indicator driven, let's say like getting short here might be pretty good. What about getting short here? What about getting short here? What about getting short here? Now that's Waller. There's no way but boom. What about getting short there? You see what I'm saying? What about getting short here? Or getting long here? Well, what's the right thing? So I would end up just bashing myself because I would think I'm just it's a counter rotation. It's a counter rotation. Well, in many ways, the whole thing is a counter rotation, but as day traders, I'd be trying to catch these wiggles and I'd be out of alignment stepping in front of it. Well, that could take a good day or a good morning and turn it into a bad morning. So I couldn't figure out and it's trying to pick highs and lows or something. I mean, no good at that. So I decided not to do that anymore. I decided to do something else. And that is try to get in alignment with it but not predict where it's going. And as soon as it violated some structure, it would put me on alert to look where the next behavior might happen. So once this happens, that's it. And this really cements it for the shorts right there. That took me off. The break here meant it had a clear this. So this is a short to hear. Once I can't get below there, I already know what's going on. You see? But I don't know until this happens. But I'm okay with that. You see? But now I know. I know I got along here. So I'm good. Up here? Hey, no clue. Fed Speaker, what do I know? As soon as this move is over, possibility underlined to come back here. This shifts down. This is why it's along back to there, back to the IB. Once I get to the IB, I'm either going to continue higher or I get my IBF and then I'm coming back here. I get under there. That's a short in the trader lab, back to there and back to there. Those are structure traits. I hope it makes sense. And I hope, you know, you can see how you might narrate the market. And this is what the trader lab is all about. It's about doing something different, not for the sake of difference, but for the sake of understanding what other retail traders do and the failure rate for retail traders as you guys already know. I don't have to tell you as over 90%. Of course, you have to vet that statistic like anything else for yourselves. And they're all doing the same thing. Let's think about gambling for a minute and casinos and how they work. They also understand gaming, which is what our business is, and they understand they only play games that have an edge. They play them exactly the same way. They don't make them up. They don't change the games. And the gamblers come and play their cards the same way, which is random. But the gamblers get paid also. So that's why they come back to the table. We take losses. The gamblers walk out with cash. But what do the casinos do? They don't start a new game or make up the next one or even change the current game because somebody walked out with a suitcase of cash. They build the cards. They play the same game. Why? Because it's an anchored inputs, in other words, exactly the same, so they can measure it. If they know they have a statistical edge, their job is just to play the game and let the edge come out over a random distribution of interaction with gamblers. That's the business of trading, my friends. It's probably not what you thought it was. The business of setups or structured trades that we do in the trader lab is about ferreting out the trades that align with you mentally and psychologically that you've done the work on to know where your trade shows up and that it has a positive expectancy or a statistical edge. In between, your job is to order your lunch, work on your crochet, or work on extracting the edge for your next structured trade. And you can build off the 60 PDFs I share in the trader lab of structured trades, reverse engineer, find what speaks to you that you can align with mentally and then act accordingly. So subject to your skill set, this is a potential long in the trader lab back here. Or you're in park or you're done. It's up to you. It still might come out here. I don't know. It's not my job. What do I know? The thing I truly know is this was too low. There. Now what they're going to do from here, if this is still too low, it's going to come back potentially here into the stops at the mid in the VWAP. Let's see if it does it. How does it get there by the way? It has to clear this volume right here, microstructure. So here's microvolgum, seller, pull back here, potential rotation to here. If it takes this out, it can go there and maybe below. If we can't clear this, then we're going to squeeze this. I'm going down in fractal and come up here, right there. So that's what I know. I don't know what it's going to do. So do high seller back here. Or you're short from here and you're flat. Or if you're in a short rotation, scalp at the area, short from there, only to there. Is that enough? It's up to you. I'm a little bit more of a, give me the broad stroke. Give me this. See you later. I don't care about this. And I'm going to say why not, Tom, if you could trade that. Because my stop needs to go here and I can enter here. I'd love to tell you I can, but I can't. I know the structure. So let's look. Let's go in. Electron microscope. This is called trading in fractals. Here's the volume right here. There's my seller. Now this is too high. High volume structure. This is the pullback to the volume, micro, seller, short. Now this is a theoretical short. And these, I don't call trades. I'm showing you structure. My stops got to be here. Well, look at my risk. Where am I going? This was my target. How can I trade this? Now, if you're not thinking in a, let's call it a full, in other words, if you get my OPIC and you only see this and you're not thinking risk reward, if I'm getting short over here, my stop is here. What is that? Almost four points. Why would I put four points of risk on? Where am I trying to go? I got to get scaled here. I can't take this trade. But we can look at it structurally. And one of the reasons I'd like to talk about structure is the market behavior is generic. If the range in this was six points, eight points, I'd have the same trade, except now I'd have the range. So I have too much risk to take this short because I can't enter here. I, you know, probably be short here. Well, I can put my stop closer. I could put my stop here, but there's a good chance it'll get picked off. You know, the proper place to have it is above this outside edge. The volume in here, let me show it to you a little differently. Now remember, I don't call trades and I'm not saying you can't trade this. I'm just showing you structure. Kind of what I do. Too high in the microstructure. I'm going to take you in a little deeper. This is a microstructure. Chop, chop, chop, high volume. There's your seller. There's your seller. In the little store down the street, your convenience store. This price was too high. Sellers, they leave the store, but you like shopping at that store. You come back and you check the retail price. Can everybody see the fractal? I'm not paying that volume. Seller, fractal. I come back and I check the volume. I'm not paying that seller. See this? So you can kind of see the sequence of behavior, right? Too high, seller. Check it. Too high, seller. Come back. Check it. Too high, seller. Break. Check it. If you're trading with a tweezer, they're all short. I'm not saying they're short. I'm just saying they could be. But I just want you to read it. Too high, relative to the volume. I'm out of here. Too high, relative to the volume. I'm out of here. Does everybody track in the microstructure what I'm doing here? Are you guys getting something from this as far as me reading this microstructure for you guys? Too high, microstructure. Mid. Fine. Where's the stops? Mid and VWAP. Where'd we go by the way? Did we get under the IB? I'm losing my place. No, we did. So the target was here. This is the next target, right? So let's go a little further. Now remember, part of this process was coming down and taking the stops here. That's your fuel. That gives you, I don't want to use the term confidence. How about potential? Break here. This is too high. This is too high. This is too high. Break. Too high. This is too low. That's why this is a target. You could see the reaction. This is too high. Micro high volume. Potential short, right? Then where? And this is a problem because of the range, right? I think this is the one I was just narrating for you guys. Here. Is that correct? I lose my place. Seller. Volume. Pullback. Seller. Volume. Short. You could be taking these if you can manage to operate in these ranges. All up to you. I have no opinion for what you do. But I think if you want to understand or at least if you want to learn how to operate in this, the shorter the time frame, the more accurate you must be and the more competence you must have developed to act in a timely fashion. Because as you go down in fractal or time frame, you've got to be good because if you're executing here, your risk is going to be out here. So for me, if I'm going to trade these time frames and in the trader lab, I don't really go into this too much except you need to be able to operate in a broad stroke to be able to get into the fractals. And the fractals think Russian dolls. So what I'm showing you is the thing that I'm showing you that happened up here, the short that was up above somewhere where it was, is the same as what I'm showing you right here. It's all the same. The thing is your range is compressed here and your risk is the same. And that's the part I really want you guys to understand. You may find that even though you can read this, your expectancy is too low. I find for me, I'm really more inclined and it's not that I can't trade this stuff. My risk is somewhat constant, but my reward is going down because of the range I'm trading. Now, and then the next thing is, and this takes reflection, are you trading for action? Are you trading for profit? Are you trading just to make it to be a professional and a business? Or are you getting an adrenaline rush? I mean, everybody has a different thing, you know, and it's a question because we're all different, you know. Now, by the way, if you're interested in this process and understanding the Trader Lab, the Trader Lab is a community of like-minded traders. And everybody is different. You know, we all bring different things, different ideas to the table, and there's not a right way to trade. I mean, this is the thing. I get this all the time, Tom, what's the right way to trade? I'm going to say, well, start out with what doesn't work and then kind of work backwards from there. Start eliminating the things that don't work, not trying to fix the things that might be defective. I call it Trader Groundhog Day, and it was something I kind of coined for myself. And the catch-22 of what we do is that we are operating in a random environment. Gamblers play the cards and they walk out with cash. That keeps them coming back to the table, doesn't it? But the casino, though, doesn't change their game. They play them the same way because they only extract the dollars from the gamblers by being constant and consistent, not making it up or changing it. They don't have Casino Groundhog Day. The gamblers have Groundhog Day. When they lose, then they want to change something, tweak something, or maybe they do the same thing. But the beauty for the house is, if you're sitting at a blackjack table and there's five players or whatever the number is at that table, that random input of the randomness of the players creates the random behavior overall. You know, someone takes the card you need, somebody does this or that, who knows, somebody calls, whatever goes on, right? All this random action on the gambler side of the table. What is the house doing? It's just doing the same exact thing. So in randomness, the house creates its edge because it has an anchored process. That's why the dollars over a random distribution of outcomes or interactions with the gamblers flows from the gamblers to the house. That's the business we're in. Trader Groundhog Day was trying to take the random behaviors of the market and the other participants in the market. The Algos, the hedge funds, market maker behavior, you name it, you know, Louis with the one lot, you know, who comes in there, other retail traders, ETFs, doesn't matter, whoever's doing what, where, doesn't matter, Fed speakers, somebody trips over the court at the CME. All those random inputs are part of the mix that none of us have control over. What do we control? One thing only, ourselves, hopefully, and only trading when we have a vetted edge. That's how the casinos can afford to give you the cocktails, give you the ticket to the buffet, send you to Seattle if you're a roller, comp your hotel room, fly you in, give you the limo, throw a party in your suite, whatever it is, and still build larger and better casinos. Can we learn from them? This is what the Trader Lab is about. Understanding the business of trading and also understanding the business of gambling. Understanding that random inputs create random output and that retail traders are continually trying to create certainty in a random environment. It just doesn't exist. Instead, in my opinion, at least my experience, what does exist is the opportunity to create a consistent process that can extract an edge, and the key, of course, can you execute that edge? Remember where our targets are here and here. Now, let's go look a little further. These are now trade recommendations. What do we have down here? Potential target outside edge, not a recommendation. Maybe now, not ever, never. This is an outside edge also. This has a 29% probability in past performance, not in future results that we're going to take this out. So, neither here nor there. Doesn't matter, does it? What would you do if you did take this short here? Well, first of all, you'd be using a shoehorn. You'd have to be managing aggressively. You'd be scaling out if you're in the Trader Lab to get risk neutral so you could keep your stop away from the noise and you'd be just managing your trade. I'm not saying you can't do it. I'm saying is do you have an edge if you do it? And by the way, if you're interested in the Trader Lab and what we do, it's a community of like-minded traders looking to leverage their collective experience. Everybody, we've all gone down similar and diverse paths. Most of us end up in the same place, no matter what, and that's because of Trader Groundhog Day. There's 60 PDFs of these structured trades. You can download. It looks like this. You know, circles arrows. You can reverse engineer them. I'm not a vendor. There's no trading course. You don't have to be a Bookmap subscriber. Bookmap will never solicit you now or ever. And there's a lot of additional education on order flow and other streamers that, you know, do their own thing. Stocks options, crypto, algorithmic behavior, and of course order flow with the high tier tool like Bookmap. And you're all welcome to visit the Trader Lab. There's a link in the bottom of YouTube. If you're interested to visit the Trader Lab, it's a great community of like-minded traders with diverse backgrounds approaches. There's no one right way to trade. No one's going to say right or wrong. Wrong doesn't exist. Random is what exists. And if you're experiencing Trader Groundhog Day, multiple time frames, multiple indicators, tweaking, tuning, welcome the curve fitting, and you're going to, if you're continually waking up trying to fix something, it is potentially because your process is defective. And it's not because of what you're doing. It's because the process has to fit the environment. We are in a random environment and we're operating in a gaming environment like the casinos do. That's the thing we all need, I think, to understand and then change our approach to match the environment that we're in. I hope that makes some sense. If you're interested, check out the Trader Lab. There's a link in the bottom of YouTube. Click on that. It'll take you over to the Bookmap server and Discord. Say hello. Come over to Trader Lab. Download the 60 PDFs of structured trades so you can reverse engineer them. Also, there's a library of webinars. Start with the primer webinar. It'll give you a high-level overview of this process. And there's a whole, in fact, let me see if I can get this link in there if you're in YouTube. This is the primer webinar. It's got about 27,000 views. Kind of surprising to me, actually, because I'm not a vendor or anything. But take a look at that. I just posted the link. It's about an hour long. It'll give you just a high-level overview of this process, a little bit about my background, which is either here or there. But take a look at that. And if you find that it resonates with you, visit the Trader Lab. It's a great community of like-minded traders. It's a serious community. There's no nonsense. It is professional. Everyone there is serious. There's a lot of research being done and sharing. Trading is somewhat of an isolated business. It's easy to live under a rock in this business, but you really need a community. Hope you got something out of this. If you're in YouTube, please give a thumb up. Subscribe to the channel so you'll get notification when there's other things that might be of interest to you. I want to thank everybody for visiting today. And also, this stream is available exclusively, the Bookmap Discord Trader Lab participants, as well as the library of webinars that I've done. Sum up the four hours long of real-time narration. It's one thing to see this. I always start at the beginning and go over the development because if you can understand context, you have a better opportunity to try to stay in alignment. It's dynamic. It changes. Nobody stays in alignment. What we try to do is adjust to the change in alignment. That's the key piece. Then it's having structured trades that are in alignment with the perceived context. Trade management, targeting statistical probabilities, playing the game, if you will, like the casinos do. Only interacting with the participants when you have a statistical edge. And then over time, just like the casinos, if you're disciplined and have a vetted plan, extracting the dollars from the other participants who sit on the other side of the table. Thanks for visiting the Trader Lab, guys. Look forward to seeing you tomorrow. Thumb up in YouTube, please. And watch that primer webinar. I posted the link in there in YouTube if you're interested in getting some more information. Thanks again, guys. Hope you got something out of today. And if you're in the Trader Lab, guys, post some feedback. I asked for feedback on the streams, what I can do to make it better and be more specific to what you guys need. Thanks again. See you guys soon. Inch always. Trade safe and have a trade plan.