 Good morning book map. Woo. Good morning book map My name is Charles. I'm the founder of a company called pirate traders. We're a community for day traders We stay focused on the ES the NQ and the two-way auction process quick disclaimer all opinions this morning are my own and They are all just guesses. They're all just lucky guesses as to what's gonna come next in the market So don't take any trades based on anything I say But if you pay attention, you might learn a thing or two Let's get into it Good morning ebb and flow. Oh my camera Good morning ebb and flow and I trade welcome. Welcome. All right So we'll start with Jim Dalton's top-down approach We're gonna zoom all the way out and we're gonna take a look at the market on the monthly chart and the reason that We're gonna start with the monthly is it just gives us some perspective It gives us something that's a little different than our intraday look at the market to get an idea of what could be happening Okay, so first off bigger picture the market has rolled over to the upside and we've begun momentum to the upside We are seeing on the monthly chart that last month. We were just balancing off The excess from the previous month. So what are we thinking? Well, this could be a balance area, right? We might just need to go sideways in this range for however many months we have to before we can break higher We can see we we balance sideways in this range Before we broke higher we balance sideways in this range before we broke lower We balance sideways in this range before we broke higher So to assume that we might just get more balance in here on the monthly would make perfect sense All right, let's zoom in a little bit and take a look at the weekly Okay, so we're getting a little more information when we look at the weekly We're seeing that the market was smacked down right in the same place that it was previously Running out of momentum in that same zone We can see that we had a chance to balance off the most recent excess So this is a little more confusing. Let me zoom in a bit here So this move here was excess and we could have balanced that off either by just going sideways at higher prices But we couldn't so we had to pull back down We pulled back down filling the old gap giving us a chance to balance it off with price But now it would seem even that is not enough Which means we need to balance off larger excess which would be something more like the move up from here So that's very important to be aware of we may have been thinking at the end of last week that this was an area The market could find support and turn around But if we don't today well, then we might have a few more weeks of pullback ahead of us, right? Now let's zoom right in on the daily and see if we can get some more perspective there So what jumps out at me at the daily when I look at it several things one we have a channel clearly marked here on the chart That channel is a way for the market to balance It is just balancing in that range as opposed to balancing sideways like it did up here So that channel should be treated like a balance area when you head to one end You should turn around and head to the other if you can't break higher. You should turn around and head back down So Opening today right in the middle of that balance really doesn't help us at all But where the market moves once it's open could give us an indication Are we heading towards that balance area low or are we heading back up towards that balance area high? Okay, so that's an important thing to be aware of Whichever direction the momentum picks this morning. It's likely to get some continuation Because it's right in the middle of balance so it could go up or it could go down Okay, great Next thing I'm looking at is the previous resistance From back in June and July up here That is now acting as resistance once again on Thursday and on Friday Smacking the market back down so that is again as we saw on the weekly chart a sign that perhaps We need more price to pull back If that is going to be the case the next level that jumps out at me is that gap fill Down here at around Well, we'll just call it 42 50 Actually, sorry 42 80 You know, that's the direction we'd be going so if at first the momentum Sets in and its sellers we assume they're heading to that channel at the bottom of that channel But if they start to break below it We'll be looking for resistance for continuation lower Okay, so looking at the monthly looking at the weekly and looking at the daily I would describe myself as neutral to bearish Okay, meaning I believe the market will either go sideways or go down today So now I need to give myself some perspective of how I would know that that's happening How am I correct in my assumption? What are the levels that I want to watch? What is the information that I want to look for at those levels? so for that I'm going to zoom on in on the market profile here So first things first We've got this very large node of time and volume From the overnight Okay, that tapers off less time less volume less time less volume less time less volume that completely tapers off yesterday's high at Friday's high So that tells us that the overnight market over the weekend tried to go higher and the market was like no And just kept slapping it right back down So our assumption today should be that if the market's able to get back up there the same thing is going to happen again It's just going to get slapped right back down So to me the most important level to watch to the upside is this node right here around 4490 okay, we also have a set of single prints Let me see what day those are from no those of all the backfill never mind ignore those Boom okay, so we've got This node right here That is going to be the top of our chop zone. Okay, so that's where we assume if the market opens and it starts to push up Probably if it's going to go sideways or lower today as I predicted will That's where it's going to get smacked down right and only if they get through that level And then they come back down and they start to turn it into support Will I begin to think maybe we're going higher today, right? But until then my assumption is the market is going to get slapped down right in there and then turn around and head lower Okay, well, what about on the lower end? What am I looking for for support? Well, here's this area right here where we spent all this time and brought in all this volume on Friday and Then look what we have right next to it in the overnight Exact same area became support when those overnight traders tried to take it lower They spend very little time and brought in very little volume down there. Okay, so my assumption is you guessed it The same thing is going to happen again this morning if they try to take it down there They're gonna get slapped right back up So I'm gonna choose to see the market at the open this morning as a chop zone Meaning I believe it's just gonna grind up and down and up and down and up and down Inside this box between this node down here and this node up here It's just gonna go up and down now It will be incredibly hard to predict which way it's gonna break out of that chop zone While it's chopping the reason is because this will be the market figuring out what it's gonna do next It's not like the market knows It's not like the market already decided at 9 15 in the morning where it's gonna go today No, no, no, no, no, no, there are many participants that haven't even turned on their computer yet Right, they haven't even begun to decide what they want to do today. So the market will probably need some time Maybe it'll be five minutes. Maybe it'll be five hours It'll probably need some time to just go sideways to just play tug of war to let the buyers try to take it higher Let the sellers try to take it lower and then through that price Exploration the market will figure out where it wants to go today Does it want to go higher does it want to go lower or is it stuck just going sideways all day? Okay, so while the market is in that chop zone, I'm not gonna be trying to predict What's the bigger move here what I will be doing? Like a hawk, I will be just focused in on every single movement that the market is doing within that chop zone Not because I'm looking to enter trades excuse me Not because I'm looking to enter trades, but because I'm looking to understand what's happening I'm looking to understand who is in charge here the buyers or the sellers Who's bringing in more volume who is doing it at a faster tempo versus a slower tempo I'm just looking to have an understanding of what the market is doing Once I have an understanding once I feel like okay, the buyers are winning or the sellers are winning Now I know the market is either We're going back to the daily again The market is either gonna head up for that balance area high the top of the channel Or it's gonna head down for that balance area low the bottom of the channel Once I know where it's going And I have you know a Strong belief that I understand what's happening Then I'll look for opportunities to make money Then I'll say, okay How can I get in a trade to go down and test that balance area low? How do I get in a trade to go up and test that balance area high? But until then the best thing to do is to not try to force it to not try to decide right now At this moment where it's gonna go because then if the market starts to give me information For example, if I'm convinced we're heading down and the market starts to give me information that actually the the bulls are stepping in Well, I want to be aware of that But if I'm convinced that it's going to go down my brain will play a game on me Called confirmation bias and it will not let me see the information that's telling me I'm wrong So the best thing to do is be open to any possibility in this first half an hour hour of the day And to not feel in need to force my way into a trade. Oh my god, it's going up. I have to be long It's going down. I have to be short. Oh man. It went a whole five points without me. Who cares Who cares if you don't know what's happening. You don't have to be in a trade So that is my focus this morning I'm just going to sit back relax Sip on some coffee Watch the market chop around and look for an understanding of what comes next Any questions for the chat on that? Or anything for that matter We have 15 minutes to kill Good morning to debora bob Faces lucky guesses Yeah, so faces. You must be new here. You're about to have your mind blown How perfectly I will call support resistance and reversals and everything else But the trick is That in the beginning I'm not forcing it. I'm waiting for an understanding Pavel, good morning to you. Jay is here. Good to see you Tg. I am Scoob all in the house Thank you faces Oscar says I'm from Colombia, but my English is bad. That's all right Just do the best you can and I will do my best to interpret it No judgments here Gar, thank you for joining us Happy to have you jk. Good morning to you Anders welcome Frito in the house new culture is here So obviously as always one little trick I like to do at the beginning of the day with the book map is just zoom it all the way in just Shrink it all down as you can see here on the chart And just kind of from this perspective see where are those larger nodes of volume So knowing that there is this one massive node just kind of hanging out down here around looks like about 44 or 5 ish Um It's going to be a magnet to try to pull the market down there But if it magically disappears at some point in the day I want to note that because that's the market getting freedom to turn around and head back up Freedom And as far as getting a little closer to price here The liquidity that's wrapped around price above and below I'm not going to put too much insights into this liquidity below right now I have a feeling all of that will disappear once the market starts to push down there So I'm really just laser focused on these two levels And how the market bounces between them Suffice to say as we push down into support. I bet a lot of this liquidity disappears And a whole bunch of new liquidity starts to pop up up here Oh, you know before I draw the chops on let's take a look at the nq as well The nq in a channel channel af Okay, so same thing with the es The lack of support on the smaller pullback with price, right? We would have thought okay They were trying to go sideways to balance off the momentum up there when that failed we assumed they're pulling back But the fact that they are not finding support increases the odds They too are going for that next gap below So I would describe myself as neutral to bearish on the nq as well Looking at the daily We are opening inside friday's range and exact exactly the same as the es All the momentum died above friday's high and all the momentum died below friday's low So I suspect it's gonna be a chop zone chop it up, baby A little choppy choppy chop I would even give it a little bit of a tighter chop zone here. I would say like 15 445 through 15 15 5 That's your chop zone So they're likely to just play tug of war like crazy up and down in here pull push pull push pull push But whichever side breaks We'll look for a pullback to turn into support Or a pullback to turn into resistance and then continuation in that direction Again, my guess is sideways to lower, but we'll have to wait and see Andrew says I just signed up a friend of mine have been here for a while and told me your stream helped him so much Well, thank you and thank you to your friend So for those of you that are new and don't understand who I am or what's going on here basically I do something called trading the two-way auction process And what that means is I simplify everything down to a very very simple way of looking at the market The less I look at The easier it is for me to understand what's going on So I'm really focused on just a few simple things. You're going to hear me repeat them a thousand times over I'm going to say we've got support. We've got resistance. There's buyers stepping in here. The tempo is slow I'll be saying like the same things over and over again. This could mean that that could mean this This could mean that and I'm just going to keep throwing out ideas of what could happen next in the market Well, this new selling here could lead to the market going here This new buying here could lead to that if we don't get buying here It's going to lead to this and I'll just be throwing out ideas. It could be this it could be that it could be that right That is how I think all day every day. I'm essentially just thinking out loud to you guys I am every minute of every day asking myself two very simple questions What is the market trying to do? And how good of a job is it doing of it? That's all I really care about is just I want to know Looking at the charts looking at the information the market is giving me What do I think it's doing? Is it trying to go up? Is it trying to go down? Or is it just going sideways? It really is that simple And then how good of a job is it doing if it's trying to go down but The minute we get into this note of support the market finds support and turns around well Then it's not doing a very good job and it's probably not going to keep going down So there's nothing for me to do there But if it goes down and it breaks through that node Well, then I can say okay, it's definitely trying to go down Then if it comes back up and it turns that node into resistance Then I can go okay now. I know what the market's doing It's trying to go lower and it's doing a good job of it. It broke through support It's now turning support into resistance. So now I can look for opportunities to go short Because I have confidence. I understand what the market is doing The only way I can do that the only way I can play that game is to always have a scenario in my mind Of what it would look like if the market went up If the market went sideways If the market didn't find support here or it did find resistance I have to always have all of the ideas of what could happen In my mind so that whatever information the market gives me. I know how to use it Ooh, that tells me it's going down. So it must be going down. Ooh, that tells me it's going up. So it must be going up And so you'll hear me constantly throwing out ideas Maybe we find support here support here would lead to this Maybe we find resistance here resistance would lead to a pullback. Da da da da da and the way you can use the stream is to look for Things that you're seeing in the chart that you would trade normally Do they Agree with what I'm saying, right? If I'm saying I think the market's going to find support here And we're just going to chop sideways, but you're looking to get short Maybe you could say to yourself. All right, should I jump in my short? Should I wait for a pullback? Should I sell up at resistance at a higher level? You know, just use it to sort of manage your understanding of what's going on And I think you will find Tons of help in the clarity that comes from the way I'm able to just simplify the process Four minutes to mark it open So I'll just tell you right now. This is going to be annoying to hear to me It feels like they're setting up for a big move up The reason is because they're opening right on that chop's own low Right, and they're piling all this liquidity in here This to me is not what they would do if they actually wanted to fill orders down here Then they would use icebergs and they would hide it This to me is them trying to trick traders right at the open Into going short so that they can come down and just rip their faces off And bring it right back up So we'll keep an eye on this liquidity sitting in the books here between like 4460 and 4467 And we'll just see what happens when price starts to poke down there My guess is it all disappears And right when it disappears and I do mean at the exact moment suddenly new liquidity will start appearing up here above price And then we'll know what game they're playing crank says In the chart on the left with the stacked orders also by book map No, so the one that you see on the right side of the screen is book map The one you see on the left with the black background that is market profile software also referred to as tpo charts The company that I use is called window trader But if you just google whatever broker you use and tpo charts, you find out if they have it You certainly don't have to use window trader Good morning 200 dogs Scott in the house Scott says do I have a discount code for book map? It's a great question. I do but only on my streams Not on their streams So you'd have to um You have to click on the link in one of my streams later It's a good question though All right market is open So right out the gate As soon as that opening bell rings, we know to just sit back relax This market's going to go up and down and up and down. It's going to go all over the place Trying to fool traders The key thing I'll be watching is any level that could be support or resistance above So we've got some potential resistance right here around 77 78 We've got some resistance up here around 81 We've got some up here around 87 And then we've got some up here around 90 So i'll just be asking myself what happens when we get there does the market get smacked down? Or is it able to stay up there and grind through The next thing I will watch is the half back The half back is the level That you see with the little white line right here That is halfway between the high and the low of the range Can that become support? So if we push up into resistance And we come back down and turn it into support. I'll assume we're heading up for the next resistance If not, we're heading down for the next support And I'll just let it chop up chop down chop up chop down chop up chop down as many times as it needs to And just keep watching what's happening at support. What's happening at resistance? That will tell me which way we're likely to break out of this range Trading donkey in the house Jonathan is here Arjit welcome nap good morning to you es trade monkey good morning Mike who thinks is here. Good morning to you If you have not yet, please smash that thumbs up Got 120 brave souls hanging out Only 23 thumbs up Okay, so we pushed up We we got some resistance came back down. No support at the halfback. So we went right through We then found support pushed back up. No resistance at halfback. So we go right through So this is setting up for chop Choppy choppy chopping broccoli Mike says I'm muted. I don't think so Okay, so that is a little bit bearish to see what just happened was the market worked its way back up Through that open, but they barely got anything for it They got like just a few points of a bounce and then they did not turn halfback into support So that is a sign the sellers are beginning to build some momentum here Now, of course, it's still a chop zone. That's not a reason to go short But in the idea of building a narrative That is a first tick on the bearish train Okay passing back through the Halfback a sign the chop will continue Charles, this is so boring This is all you do you just wait Just watch it go up watch it go down and just wait. Oh, yeah Plenty of opportunities to come once we break out But right now they're just trying to decide which side's gonna win I'll leave that to the short-term gamblers to figure out I'll let them pick each other's pockets and drive each other mad Thank you, john. Appreciate you patience Great for trading terrible for live streaming. It's my slogan Oh Great for your wallet terrible for your desire to be entertained Okay, so what are we seeing over in the book map? As the liquidity is starting to get thinner down here The colors are getting less and less dark Suddenly new colors are starting to pop up up here So that just tells us that this liquidity that we're seeing is not both above and below is not real orders that want to fill It is just spoofing It is just the market trying to cause the chop They were trying to pull it down when it stopped working now. They're trying to pull it up Once it gets up there that'll disappear and this will start to get dark orange again And they'll try to pull it back down So this is how chop zones work This green dot that you see right here That is sellers getting squeezed people who were going short in here thinking the market was going to go lower They just got stopped out So then the market goes up it starts to build some support And guess what all those short-term traders do they go long looking for continuation higher and then at the exact same level They take out a bunch of buyers Squeeze them short squeeze them long And they'll just keep playing that game as long as it keeps working All right, we're pushing up into some resistance here around 78 Looking for the market to pull back down And see what happens at that half back Um ebay buy and sell Well, you got to buy and sell come on, baby It's a two-way process says um bear divergence um No, I I'm not talking about a bearish divergence. I'm just talking about The delta between the buyers and sellers So to get the green dot there had to be way more buyers there than sellers To get the red dot there had to be way more sellers than buyers But because it was on the way up and because it was on the way down those were stops getting squeezed out So it's literally just the business that took place right there at that moment But that tells me psychologically what's happening with the participants That the people that are going long and going short right now are not like Deep pocketed long-term investors or like, you know, big swing traders This is just day traders and algorithms picking each other's pockets. No one knows what's happening They're just guessing it'll go up guessing it'll go down And so as long as that's happening, I know I don't want to participate. I want to leave it to them Faces says nq is moving. Let's take a look No, sir nq is still in that chop zone So remember the chop zone is going to be this node right here and this node right here Okay, as long as they're between those two it'll go up and then it'll come down and it'll go down and it'll come up And it'll go up and it'll come down and come down and go It'll drive you nuts But if they can get above this node and turn it into supports Well, then there's an opportunity To go long for the bigger move that's going to happen Or if they can get below this node and turn it into a resistance, which obviously they could not Um, but if they can turn that into resistance, well, then there's an opportunity to go short and make some money but right now They're just shopping it up speaking of which nq pushing into some resistance right here around 15 to 25 ish Look for a pullback to the halfback Which will be at about 15 080 at that point. Oh, what do you know? Look took out a bunch of more buyers at exactly the same level I'm telling you those short-term traders got to stop using those tight stops They're begging for it every time um new culture says It would be a chill day if they chop chop chop the whole day Um, I don't think that's going to happen You know, we started the day looking at the daily I do believe You know since they spent the whole weekend Chopping that they're going to pick a direction today and make a bit of a move Um, obviously my guess is to the downside, but we just have to wait until they break out to be sure If they are going to go sideways all day We'll want them to at least try to pick a direction first and then we can get cessation Um, it would not be ideal to have a humongous initial balance and then be stuck in it all day Because that just messes up the probabilities But again, we just got to wait and see too early to make that call Okay moment of truth testing this half back. Can they hold it or do we pass right back through? And we pass right back through More chop Scoobal says FOMO in FOMO out sometimes it works sometimes not I don't know why um Are you talking about for yourself? I never find FOMO works for me If I look at my trading journal And I look at all the trades where I made the most money With the minimal risk It is always something I saw coming way ahead of time. I planned for it I was like if the market can come here if it can turn us into support Then I'll buy it. Those are always the trades I do the best in The ones where I just feel the need to like fuck. I got to get in I got to go those ones Sometimes they work sometimes they don't oh you're talking about the scalpers. Yeah, I mean that's what they do And they when they win they feel like king of the world like yay. Look at me. I'm a winner I look at this money I made but then the next day they give it all back and then they win again And then they give it back and then they win and then they give it back and they're like oh trading is so hard Okay, so I'm marking the high here at uh 44 78 as a low volume high The reason is because they had less than a hundred contracts trade up there Generally if there's less than a hundred contracts to trade at the higher the low of the day This is for the es obviously um The market will come back and visit that level again So being that we're in a chop zone And we have a weak reference. I would say there's pretty good odds. We'll visit that level again So of course now i'm laser focused on that half back at 44 74 If they can hold that half back, they'll likely head back up to test that week that low volume high Anthony says the nq is moving a lot differently today No, sir. They are both doing the exact same thing. They're in lockstep They are both just bouncing around inside that overnight range Looking to cause two-sided trade to get the scalpers long get them short then they'll pull it back down They'll squeeze them out then they'll get them back long. They'll bring it back up They'll squeeze them. They'll squeeze them and they'll squeeze them again So both markets are essentially playing tug of war right now Neither market knows where wants to go today. We're finding it out Based on who can win the tug of war who's stronger Okay, so now we're testing that half back can they Hold it So do you guys when you're looking at the book map here? Can you see what i'm talking about? So you've got these dark red nodes right here. Okay What happens as soon as they disappear? Red up here, right? What happens as soon as that disappears? Red down here. What happens as soon as that disappears? Red up here Okay, so that's the the liquidity in the market telling you it doesn't really want to go anywhere It just wants to pull it down as far as it can then pull it up as far as it can and vice versa One more reason to look for chop All right, so the half back is holding for support increasing the odds. We're heading back up for that low volume high And then we're looking for the market to get smacked down once again Because it's a chop zone chopping it up Can I explain the half back? Easiest one in the world to explain it's literally halfway between the high and the low of the range So if the range which right now is like whatever A little less than 10 points. So it's going to be five points like halfway between it Is going to be right where that half back is and essentially the way I try to describe it like Conceptually is it's like when a store puts something on 50 off So if you wanted to go long up here but you felt like You were chasing the trade. Where are you going to be okay with getting in? Once they put the market of 50 off, right? Then you're like, okay I would buy this thing now just like at a store, right? You might walk by a store a hundred times and not think about buying that jacket or whatever But then you see it's on sale and suddenly you're like, okay Well, I like the jacket enough to buy it on sale So it's like that half back is the level where Those traders who want to get long But are too afraid to foam ball in at the high That's where they'll buy is that pullback and vice versa It's also important to note. It doesn't work exactly to a ticker support You really want to think about it more just like that general area So it can go a point above or below and that still kind of counts. It's just is it reversing in the middle of the range Don't think about it as having to stop exactly to a tick on it. Uh, mr Can and fodder are you entering a low volume high as an a period is about to end? No So whilst Seeing the support at the half pack back increases the odds in my mind that we're going to test that high Not enough to get into a trade and that is because I can't know for sure Right. I can I can answer the question. What is the market trying to do? We're trying to do more chop. Look at that. We found support at the half back We've got a low volume high. We're probably going to chop up for that high But it doesn't answer the question of it's doing a good job and like enough for me to feel confident getting into a trade So no, I mean, that's not an unreasonable trade setup You know to get in there with like a tight stop And to target that repair But I just don't I'm not able to calculate the probability that it'll work So I just don't get into trades. I don't have confidence will work Um, yeah, no, the reason I entered it is because of the 22 contracts that traded at that level Not because the b period was coming Okay, so there's the test. They just turned it into a poor high So they put another magnet there Okay, now it's repaired All right, so now the market's giving us some insights, right? We we created a weak high came back down found support came back and repaired it So the buyers are trying to take control now. That's not enough for me to get long But now I'm looking to test that half back once again If they can find support at the half back now They'll likely head up to that next resistance So I can start to get a little more bullish. Let's see what happens there And then when they come back to half back and so on and so forth But as long as we're inside the chop zone At least for the first hour It would be guessing If I'm entering a trade Okay, so I got to leave you guys here and head on over to hang out with the cool kids in the brigade But just to give you a little bit of an insight to move forward with today I remain neutral to bearish on the daily So I still believe the higher probability is that we're either going to go sideways or lower today Like throughout the day bigger picture But for now the chop zone is building momentum to the upside So we're going to have to just keep watching the resistance levels. What happens when we get there? Do we blow right through them or do we do they become resistance and smack us back down? Okay If we can just blow through all these resistance, no problem. Well, then I'm probably wrong Right, if we just keep bouncing and just going right through them and never pulling back Well, then probably I I'm wrong on my neutral to bearish take for the day But if they keep getting slapped down, I'm still right And then the next thing we watch for is support Can they turn it into support as long as they keep finding support at the half back? They'll head up to the next one smack down next one smack down Okay They'd have to get through all that And then find new support above 4490 for me to get bullish today Okay, otherwise any Smacking down any sideways moving inside that range to me is just setting up to take the market lower They're just convincing as many people as they can to go long So they have more liquidity for the move lower later in the day So at this point we have an initial balance The initial balance is the a period low to the b period high I would say whenever that breaks. It might be in the c period. It might be later in the day That momentum will be reliable for continuation But for now it's just more chop Let's take a look at the es. I'm sorry the nq Yeah, same thing. So I would say the node to watch is 15 156 Right here as long as they keep getting smack down Coming back to half back getting smack down coming back to half back. It's still just chop But if they can get above that node And turn it into buyers you could look for continuation higher The nq looks a little bit more bullish than the es Because the value is overlapping to higher than the previous day And it's pushing up against the high of the day But the es it's inside the previous day So uncertainty Wish I could give you more insights, but that's all I got right now Thank you all very very much Bro, this is a great slogan nor auto trading says five minutes a day with charles keeps your day job away There you go, man Gar Where's the link to the brigade? You're just gonna have to there's no link But you can just if you look at the top of the screen you'll see if you type in pirate traders.io Forward slash join you can sign up there All right with that, I will say goodbye. Thank you all very very much and I look forward to seeing you here next monday morning Members of the brigade. Let's Birkin set sail Bye