 Hello everyone, can everyone hear me okay get going here in just a second I know you some of you guys are in the trading competition with book map. Hopefully what we're going to go over today Can help you in real time with that Today, we're going to get into speaking about you know all the trading challenges We have out there and and we have a solution for those It's called fact-based trading Yeah, before I get into it. Just want to go over a disclaimer Everything we're going over today is educational. So nothing that I go into today is going to be any trade recommendations. It's all You know knowledge for you to improve your skill set and If you are trading recommend that you are only using risk capital My name is John Slazas from Dharma Capital Trading I've been involved in trading for over 35 years as a former member of the Chicago mercantile exchange Basically, I'm from Chicago grew up and Around the exchange is my first job was to run around the exchange and you know kind of haven't left really, you know I've got the Got the need for speed and Started trading crypto in 2013 Really believe in the space, you know big fan of distributed ledger technology and what it can do and All about web 3.0 there, but today we're going to get in that involved talking about you know trading and The challenges and these day trading challenges are applicable to crypto futures equities Forex whatever you're trading and the solutions are the same, you know, it's day trading, you know every day is a new day It's you know, you know, they say you know markets don't repeat themselves, but they rhyme So these you know that the conditions are always changing You know tactics are limited you know, you've you design these great trading tactics and You know, they work really well in certain conditions and other conditions. They don't work well Some conditions you just get run over and there's always that uncertainty out there You know those those events that just come out of nowhere So you have to be prepared for that And you have to have a plan and so You know the challenge is the solution is to align your expectations, you know and line those expectations with facts You know to know what you know and what you do not know that is true knowledge And that's so and that is a great baseline You know being more aware of your blind spots Understanding those facts, you know, you get anchored on something at the start of the day You do all this work you put all this effort into analyzing the market and you come out with a positive forecast and then You get anchored on Only seeing positive things And you miss the truth So focusing on the truth is what it's all about Focusing on the facts and when you focus on the facts and you line your expectations with the facts You know, you're you're taking that uncertainty and you're lining with something that's more predictable. What's more likely to happen? What's more likely to occur and Instead of having you know, the subjective view is a specific bias You remain objective stay in the present stay in the moment You're not thinking what should happen. You know what should happen. You know, what's more likely to occur? And it's a huge huge piece And in fact, whenever I in my brain minutes, I have this thought I think this I immediately check myself I need I need to know If I'm if I'm thinking then I haven't done a big enough fact check Haven't really identified that foundation and when you don't do that and you are thinking And you are working from Subjectivity and you're aligning your expectations with that hope, you know And hope is really aligning your expectations to what is not likely to occur. You get yourself into trade Your stock your ego doesn't want to give it up And you start hoping You're like well the market broke out but of this or it produced this positive signal and I'm short But this one time it's it's it's not going to follow through and any time that occurs You need to flip that and focus on what the evidence is. What are the facts? And align the expectations to what is more likely to occur and then act make decisions Based on that and the you know pitfalls with hope and trading is it just distorts your reality You know, you end up holding on to losing positions because you have this unrealistic Expectation, you know, I mean how many times do you get sit down and pray? That the market will you know, you'll have a one uptick. That's not based on facts. It's based on your ego It's like on your ego's desire to be right and this can cloud your judgment and being aware of those Thoughts and emotions and biases is a great trigger to then go check the facts Because the facts are your you know, that's your statistical baseline. That's your benchmark That's you know, that's what you check all your opinions against and those biases and those emotions You know, sometimes it it's right to be fearful all the times. It's just the market's trying to shake you out So fact-based trading, you know emphasize the reliance on evidence and market data market truce So you have clear unbiased analysis leads to confident decision-making Because your body, you know, your egos Is make is in charge most of the time and you need to you need to get your body more involved You're subconscious because your subconscious is when you can really you know perform intuitively That's when you get into a state of flow because you're not thinking you're not egos not in charge and You're and you're subconscious and you know your body knows when you don't have the right facts It causes anxiety and when you do have facts, it's easier to get into that state of flow And it's a huge benefit Of fact-based trading. So the one way, you know Remove hope is to align your expectations With the facts they focused on the current conditions and facts What's the truth always search for the truth and anything? And then it's going to allow you to trust your instincts and act decisively You know, when you really have that that solid base, it's going to give you the ability to act more decisively Which is going to turn into profits So what we're talking about here is market-state awareness You know being aware of the foundation the truths of the foundation and we break those down and to basically Three segments we want to understand what the market-state is and what's the condition? What's the context? trending not trending extreme pivotal digestive corrective Accelerating we want to know the structure and what structure market structure means is it's where those parameters where the states will change Markets are always in a Transitioning from one state to the next So what what is the structure that that state's going to persist and? We're a break in that structural signal that the markets in a transitional state and if we are able to you know We've understanding what the state is and what the structure is You know that dynamic Provides, you know natural strategies that are optimal for when the markets going to persist in that state and Hedge strategies when the markets going to transition so a Dharma capital trading with JS analytics We identified the state structure and strategy and not just you know Trending non-trending we get into more detail in this example. I'm showing a bull trend correction So every trader is traded a bull trend correction You know when you come in but you know do you recognize that the start of the period or the end of the period? If you come at the start of the period you understand I'm the market is in a bull trend corrective state So understanding that fact foundation. What is the truth of that? You know, it's a trending market. That's having that's either about to or is having a sharp pullback So, you know those exhaustive, you know, this is the expectation of a bull trend correction. We have a sharp corrective move So understanding that so we don't get caught up in emotional when the market said it's At its low point we're more anxious to if anything to look to buy this thing to get out get on to the next extension higher And so when we we identify the structure of that bull trend correction We're able to identify those price points that define Those extremes and where we want to participate. And so this is what this becomes a risk management overlay You know, so no matter what? You base your trading decisions off of in the heat of the moment This is your underlying foundation your underlying risk foundation And because we're in this state and we have this structure, there's specific optimal strategies So for a bull trend correction the market that's you know, basically making higher moves higher highs Higher move highs. It's you're having this sharp corrective move To the low points of the last low of that underlying trend You know instead of you know catching a falling knife in that situation It's best to let the market exhaust for a moment You get that capitulation and you get that reversal and so, you know, this would be the an optimal strategy for this state Instructure So this is your fact foundation And this is our application that presents that fact foundation. We call it our playbook. I mean literally it's you know It's your guide for the trading period. It's it's here's the factual baseline for each trading day It gives you your market awareness we identify the state of the market and it you know it and These are all you know, these are this all this work is all quantitative and This is what you should strive for your own work if you don't align yourself with An analytics objective analytics group like I got like Dharma Capital Trading You want to you know really identify what is neutral. What does that mean? You know, that's an expectation of for more sideways trade. It's balance volatility is probably going to decrease But it's also the precursor to a breakout, you know markets digest consolidate and have a breakout So you need to have a plan for both so as you're coming into a market state that's in a digestive phase Absolutely, we need to identify the structure of that of that digestive phase So we understand where are those extremes? Where would this market potentially break out? Observing price action is price action performing to the expectation of the state Is it performing is it is it churning sideways and breaking structure left and right or is it holding structure? You know, those are all tells And again this playbook is just that this could be sitting on your coffee table because any any day any market Any asset class is in a neutral digestive state And has this structure then we're going to look for these strategies It's an if then statement If if this state and this structure then these strategies So what what are the best strategies for a market that's holding structure? Those are optimal and one of the best strategies that are breaking structure. Those are hedge So the key feature is that you know, this defines the technical state of the market And what's the benefit of that? It's improving your awareness It identifies key price levels What's the benefit of that it gives you this structure? Helps you to standardize your method and it presents a strategy expectation And so this is identifying what's most likely to occur So let's get into a little decision matrix when it kind of in real time right now breaking down You know the fact focus of a market You know the underlying before we get into any, you know Structure of a market is just economic events, you know current events. What's happening in the world? You know today is a Important day We've got FOMC coming out later this afternoon So that's going to align our expectations to you as we you know, that's kind of the base foundation We know that at two o'clock that the feds going to be coming out and speaking and the markets going to react Market gets you know, sometimes markets more get up than not on these releases or economic events. I Personally like to just look at the The largest ones for major, you know potential events and also on timing So let's take a look at We know that today's a FOMC day. So that's that's the underlying context. I've got a couple charts here I've got one that I'm looking more at daily This is a five minute chart and this is a 60 minute chart So this is kind of my kind of my weekly outlook and what I've done is I've you know segmented, you know, the previous week Here's the current week. Here's the previous week previous day and current day and So, you know just kind of building on a fact foundation get awareness I always like to look at you know What's how's the price action performing to the time frame the previous time period? So on a daily basis, this is you know the high of the previous day the low of the previous day the midpoint and the closing price of The day and this is the same for the week. So the high of the week the low of the week Close close of the week. This is off a little bit there and the midpoint So just to add a glance and with the fact focus we've got the markets trading above last week's high It's trading below yesterday's high, you know, we're just above yesterday's close We've got a slight positive net change and we're trading it above last week's close So let's take a look at the playbook. So we're looking at Bitcoin Looking at the perpetual. There's a playbook Here's a this is what we call our market grid these These tiles are color-coded. So red hues are you know more negative bear trend blue hues or positive trend bull trend Brown is more neutral The nice thing about the grid is if you have a tactic that you like to do you like to fade momentum, you know You know search out markets that are non-trending, you know, it's like a neutral non-trend is a non-trend state But also, you know a bear trend correction is a non-trend state, too It's markets, you know correcting that's going sideways. So you can align your your tactics with the Expectations of the state. So we're gonna focus on Bitcoin. We're gonna look at the Bitcoin perpetual You just move this over here. So as we come into the trading period understanding what a neutral digestive market state is We're talking about this, you know, it's we're expectations for a sideways environment with choppy trading conditions Well, yeah, that you know, that's a neutral digestion. We also have FOMC, which is gonna, you know Amplify that Sidewaysness because until we get those that news event and we and that leads into this Which is we could have a breakout today, which is it is self-evident And but you know, this also tells you that the context of the state is in alignment with a news event And if we look at, you know, the start of the trading period, you know, this is what's been happening So this is the other thing we want to do is we want to observe is Price action performing to expectation of a neutral digestion and this is real key Because if we're running that if we come in wherever we come in during the trading period You know, this is this is that, you know, we're looking at daily structure If we have a trend following system, we can't just come it You know, we don't want to just blindly come in and run it. The market is not showing it has the ability to trend today It's performing like a neutral digestion. It's going sideways So the next thing we want to take a look at what's the structure of that state? So we've we've outlined some structure here Where we know the previous days high and previous days low and those are going to be natural boundaries for any state Same with the clothes Same with the midpoint of that range But with our you know, now we're going to add some market structure to it and where are the boundaries of this neutral digestion? So we call this our critical range So you've got an upside pivot and a downside pivot This number down here is green nine is sentiment bias. So Markets positive above that price negative below it. That's always a good thing To take a look at from the get-go is just, you know, we're sentiment So sentiment below the market, you know, it's more of a by-break situation versus above the markets more of a Cell strength and if it's you know kind of balanced in the middle It's it's telling you that markets pivotal. So in this instance the we're in this neutral digestive Market state and structurally we've got sentiment below the market Which is telling us we have a positive bias and we know that our lower extremes are down here For Bitcoin at twenty six thousand seven fourteen and really this whole price band down here So if we do get some big volatility off the figure, how low can it go? Market can go down to twenty six thousand five hundred and one Where can go to the upside twenty seven thousand five sixty five And that's also the previous day's high We also have some other structural numbers that get it gives some insight to how the markets performing within this structure Call those minor levels and a lot of times when your markets trading within what we call this critical range And and that and that with the expectation in neutral digestion as we could really narrow that range a lot of times It'll narrow within these interior Levels like it it's doing here So when you have when you know for a fact FOMC is coming out in the afternoon You know for a fact that the markets in a neutral digestive state It makes you know as the markets pushing higher Early in the start of the session as it's coming up to this this price level twenty seven thousand three forty two You know the expectation is you know is this thing ready to run and break out Well, we have FOMC tomorrow probably not is it are we gonna exhaust here? Well, we're more likely gonna exhaust here or here and digest so if we exhausting here Where should it go? It should go to the opposite side You know kind of a symmetrical shift and so you have this rotation, you know within this these boundaries here Which is just coiling before a figure But this this structure helps you to define What's more likely to occur? You know if you're selling the market here based on one of your systems is selling it here This is telling you that you might have an issue with that sale If you have a system that's fading this move this is still identify Here's where above this metric boundary would be a good place for a stop And so we know the state we know the structure. What are the optimal things to do? Well Optimal things to do or you know to either fade momentum against this structure here the high point or What's even more interesting is if we get an opportunity to buy this break Either fading momentum into the sentiment Or accepting what we call a reversals Where the expectation is to have the market go below this Figure which would also be below yesterday's low point suck everybody in and then you get one of those kind of v Bounces that qualifies above here to give a reversal signal and to the day It's still neutral digestive So, you know, we're not expecting a lot of follow-through and the market's performing like it doesn't want to follow through So either a push to the upside or a push to the downside in this state and structure is more likely not to follow through So we have our fake we have our big foundation. We have our market state awareness. We can also Do this for fun. We're gonna here's the structure for the week, which is a little different than the day and We have the microstructure. So we kind of have bigger picture to the microstructure You know and for our decision matrix as we're going through and we have we've established our fact foundation of neutral digestion Sentiment below the market. So we're leaning on positive buy dips and sell rallies You know, what's more likely to occur? It's more likely. We need to get an upside breakout than a downside breakout with sentiment below the market You know, is the market performing to the characteristics of the state? Yes, it's not trending. It's having issues trending You know, is the market holding structure so far it is it's it's digesting within the critical range Is there a strategy theme in play? No, there's not. You know, our strategy themes are all occurring on the outside Out of parameters of the critical range and Currently The market is just rotating within those parameters. So we're still we're rotating within here So it's a bit of a mess. It's a tough trade. It's difficult to make money You know, that's where you know, these fade opportunities come into play in neutral digestion You do get you know, we call this the price movement between segments So this is a full segment move. This would be a half segment move and Then this would be two segments So you have a you know, half segment move, you know, basically what the structure also does it just gives you insight into You know the expectation of your targets You know, what's the market paying out? What's the market? What's the movement? And so Here's the expectation that you have a half segment move Full segment move half segment move half Half and we're on our way to potentially another full segment moves So, you know, it just identifies, you know, if you're getting into an opportunity here and you know, you have to risk this Your minimum expectations, we're gonna see a half segment move. Is it worth it? Yes, it is If you start to get involved outside these metric boundaries, it starts to be more expensive And so this is, you know, come that's your risk management overlay. So we've got no strategy theme that's in play This is this tool this part of the analytics is what we call our price map and We have it integrated into book map in the cloud notes section As well as other charting platforms and as we go through our fact focus and Our decision matrix You know, this is, you know, we have our foundation neutral digestion We know sentiments below the market. So it's neutral, but you know with more of a positive lean You know, is the market performing, you know Every day, this is what you do as a trader. You just is the market performed the expectation of the state Period. Is it holding structure? If it is, yes, it is then we want to look to participate in the optimal strategy themes So it's currently the market's holding structure where fading moves in Bitcoin, you know, if the market wasn't if you know, if the market is Performing to a transitional expectations breaking structure, you know, then we're gonna look to participate in the head strategy themes So it's really it's really straightforward. You know, you don't need to think a lot Which we've talked about we don't want to think we want to perform we want to act We want to trade in the flow. We want to we want to get in sync with what is more likely to occur and execute That's what we want to do when we're trading. We don't want to think We want to know what's true and we want to act So if the market's for holding structure, which it is What's, you know, what, you know, trading right now is dangerous because we're trading it's in the middle Are there things to do? Definitely Are they more aggressive? Yes. Should we trade small? Yes When when market trip gets to the optimal themes, these are the trade trading opportunities that we want to trade bigger at Because the market's in alignment. It's at structure in the middle This is where the HFTs live and they're gonna chew you up and the where the markets transition from one state to the next This is where the funds participate. There's what this is where there's more liquidity And since we're holding state and we're in line with structure. This is going to be the optimal thing to do Or this fade momentum into the extremes with more of a lean to the upside So buying dips is more favorable than selling rallies Only because sentiment is below the market Hey, Bruce Good At 8 a.m. And then it finishes Friday is this competition on crypto Bitcoin Awesome So I don't know did you sign up for the competition? I did not I was I didn't I wasn't sure I was gonna be in town this week Well, yeah, we're just getting into talking about you know decision matrix on Aligning your expectations really so, you know traders you know, they get into a situation and They align their expectations a lot of times with hope, you know, they they they get into a trade and you know They're hoping that you know the market's breaking their structure and their egos trying to keep them in their position And they're saying to themselves, you know this one time that this breakouts not gonna work, you know And they're talking themselves into their position. They're just hoping and they end up taking bigger losses, you know Versus aligning your you know your expectations with the facts and knowing that okay, Mark is breaking structure I need to act I need to get out. So you end up taking, you know, you might take a lot of little losses You know, then the market may have come back and then ended up you would have made money But end of the day, you know more times than not you're you're taking a loss Versus taking a scratch and you know, and then if then when you are aligned with the expectations of the state and Structure, you know, when you do hit it you hit it big and so instead of making back losses You're actually at new equity highs, you know, because you're gonna treading water treading router boom treading water treading water boom Versus taking a loss setback setback rally and you're kind of you know, you're kind of breaking even and so by Aligning your expectations with facts It sets up that you know, that's that's kind of your your foundation You're always in line with what's more likely to occur. And so that's what we're getting into it Just, you know, now we're talking just talking about the decision matrix of you know Got kind of going through the motions looking what you need to look at looking at the integrations with They playbook and in book map and you know focusing, you know, we're getting to talk about, you know kind of the microstructure now of That decision matrix Yeah Yeah, I was just what I was just showing here right now is Kind of the big picture. This is kind of the weekly to the daily and now into the microstructure and You know, so today we've got FOMC You know, it's pretty much a waiting game You know Based on the bigger picture, you know, we're you're basically right here is the net change for the day and you know, the market currently is above the VWAP and We have some, you know, we have some buyers and some liquidity building up looking, you know Like the market wants to you know, make a positive push So we're looking for this liquidity to start to build up. We have some imbalance here that we could see You know a movement you we've got liquidity. It's building up here. That's in alignment with the upper structure So it's right now. It's pretty thin, you know, you can just It's it's and that's what I mentioned before. It's a bit of a dangerous trade at the moment You know, but this is using this structure and having this structure right at your eyeballs within within the heat map Can give you some insight, you know, where are those exhaustive moves going to happen So currently the market's trying to rotate back up, but we already basically had our consolidation. We're just kind of Zeroing in on two o'clock here. We got another hour before our in 20 minutes or so before Paul's gonna speak. So Yeah, no, it's just you know, the biggest thing that I just wanted to go over today with you know with the FOMC is You know, how do you align your expectations? You know, what what's going through your head when you've got your trade on and You know as you set your you know, you start from the bigger picture and you go into the microstructure You know, here's where you're at in the moment and these are these are these are your facts at the moment and so You know, these are the real-time facts that can really help, you know to anticipate can help you You know with your size management, you know where your risk is at is the is are the is the current liquidity in the marketplace In alignment with what you want to do is it is it helping you? Tell you now's the time or do I want to just wait for the the order book to realign in my favor The competition in years or something. Yeah over 35 years. I did orders and Yeah, sir, no, I mean, that's a huge that's a huge piece Bruce. I'm you know Absolutely, you know You know people that you that don't understand crypto and are naive to it I've been like I mentioned before I've been trading crypto since 2013 You know, and I started out in the in the futures, you know You know on the trading floor in the in the 80s, you know And I learned from all the you got in the top traders on the floors and yeah What I lived in the the Merck library and you know, what did I have? I had technical analysis. So, you know, I was in there all, you know hours and hours every day learning and I'm you know, you know Learned all the different technical analytical tools You know and the markets changed and you know in the 90s and you know, and they really started to go more quantitative and A lot of the big players they they don't really care about That, you know, they you know, it's and and a lot of people that still believe that you can apply a lot of these things In her day and you really can't and especially with crypto You know it crypto trades more like a seismograph, you know, so you Absolutely, they'll doubt those markets will go to the extremes immediately and they'll stop You know, there's you I mean just looking at our structure here. You can just see it Just it goes to the extreme it stops and just turns goes to the next extreme You know and and you get a lot of that, you know, you get a lot of noise You know, here's the same situation the market breaks out here. Where's the risk the risk here? Where's it go? It goes right to it, you know, and so You know, you have to be You know, you really have to be prepared in crypto and you need to have an exit plan There you know, I'm not a big believer in break-even stops. I mean, I'm a big believer in taking money off the table You know, so when the markets, you know coming up, it should fall through then it better go and that in as soon as you get that trigger You better be jamming up your your your your profit give back trail Real tight because they do this all the time, you know, they'll make This Yeah, and you and then it's even worse when you trade, you know on the specific exchanges, you know I trade OTC and I recommend anyone that's trading crypto should have an OTC account You know the the individual exchanges you got to remember, you know there's only so many market makers that are on those exchanges and Some of these exchanges have their own market makers on there So you basically have the exchange trading against you too You know and and they you know and when you get in there There's all these elbows that are playing games with you on your order. You put a resting order there They're just gonna game you and move their move the bid I know the offer a little bit farther a little bit farther away So you that then you end up paying up and then it immediately it switches back, you know And it and it just there's just less participants in all these different exchanges You know the good, you know what book map does a great job with you know having the consolidated order books So you can actually see, you know, what the consolidated orders are for over multiple exchanges You get a better idea of where liquidity is And then you know, but Which is which is great food just fantastic insight, you know because without it You know, you're just getting the liquidity of you know one You know, it's just a few a handful of market makers Yeah, no, definitely, you know and that it helps you to You know combining the the longer-term structure with the micro structure That allows you to anticipate where you want to act, you know So you can take advantage of other, you know, other traders that are just blowing out, you know That's that's basically what's happening at these these extremes as the market is Is exhausting and it's blowing out, you know Understanding that you know, we've got a liquidity building up here on the upside, you know if pal comes out and And says something and Bitcoin gets all excited. Well, we already know, you know, based on, you know, just the decision makers that we've gone through Hey, it's yesterday's high point. We've got a the structure point. It's a high point of neutral digestions and we've got liquidity building up here You know, there's and and it's building up in front of the figure This is how I like to use Especially on the liquidity and resting paper to help me identify Okay, well, I know if I've got some You know some size building up here over multiple exchanges, you know, that's telling me that this area is more important than here So if I want to get something off, I mean, I'm going to need to get in front of this You know, and the same thing for stops, you know, a lot of times liquidity will build up, you know Maybe through the figure and so That'll give me it also gives you confidence too because I know this is the figure But I I have this backstop of liquidity. Let's say if it was building up here Um, that it's more likely it's going to take me out. So if it is taking me out, I'm not I'm not freaking out about it I'm like, it's it that I'm expected it's I'm expected the market wants to go gravitate towards that liquidity Um, and then we're you know, and then then it also gives me it more of a sense of where where should I put my stop So You know in a situation like On this I if I if I'm looking so based off You're looking for that as You know, so for me, I like to just I like to go for the biggest bang for the buck So I want to risk the least and make the most and trade as big as I can at those opportunities So I'm not so interested in I'm not such a junkie that I have to be doing something all the time Most of the time, you know, I have a some kind of position now, but I you know so Based on the current structure of the market and based on the market state I know we're in neutral. I know that the structure with this type of structure I know the opportunities are at the extremes. So that's really what I I want to save my money Um, I this is where I want to spend my money. I want to spend my money on these opportunities so um I want to wait and I know that you know, so I know this is an opportunity And the market is I know that the market's starting to you know, it's it's firming up here So I might that opportunity might come into play Um, and so how do I want to play this? How do I want to my position myself for this? Um, you know, if I start if I'm buying the market here, what do I have to risk? Well, I have to risk below here And what am I looking to make well before pal comes out the markets already told me that this structure is good And this structure is good. So I if I buy it here, I know I have to risk this and I'm only making this And and and one to one one and a half to one isn't interesting to me I'm I'm I'm I want to get myself into at least one to three's um risk one to make three So what book map helps me do here that tells me yeah, there's the momentum is building up I better be prepared if this thing if when he if he comes out and speaks and it's going to accelerate I might want to start working into my trade a little earlier because I've got this resting paper here I I also may not want to risk too much Um, because I have the liquidity building up in front of the figure so typically In I know, you know based on the fact foundation neutral digestion. What does that mean? Well, it means things should consolidate It means things should Narrow it means that if the market does rally here and I'm looking to fade that momentum It should this figure should hold And if this figure doesn't hold That tells me something else that tells me maybe we're breaking structure. Maybe we're breaking out of this neutral digestion So the expectation anyways that this rally is going to fade somewhere In front of here and based on this liquidity. It might just fade here and since this is yesterday's high Maybe we're only going to take it out by a tick. Maybe we're just going to you know stall here And and that's all we're going to get on any kind of surge. So I'm more, you know, right now I'm more looking at okay. What's how do I want to position myself for an opportunity? I see Yeah, well you certainly nailed your zone. Yeah, no, and that's this is what so that's why I was getting into the presentation It's like observing price action within structure And is it performing to the expectations of the state, you know, and here here's this is what and you can see with Here's how you use bookmap too. So you've got We know where neutral digestion we're not expecting the market to go anywhere We know that that the markets when they are digesting, they're going to you know, they want to tighten the coil Like I said, you know, I want to fade in front of this, you know, so I'm winding up here Um, so maybe the coils already been tightened and if we do get up here, we're going to break out um, but what's interesting at these extremes Is this you know these you can see these volume dots you see the the market got all excited here in front of the figure So I I definitely like to look at those opportunities when the market is is you know People are puking out of their of their trades in front of structure So, you know, it's it uh, these are kind of good highlights for me to look for that, you know, the market you get some big exhaustive orders coming into structure Versus I'm getting those big orders through Structure because then that's then that that's going to give more validity to those dots, you know, these volume dots here that are coming in Yeah, they you know, these people are just they're getting squeezed out It's the thin trade, you know, and it was a thin trade too, right? So you got this spike into here um You know at the market is um This this this volume dot here. They're it's happening in front of this figure plus it's kept coming right into the previous day's close um You know these guys immediately turn you know, they caught some of that but then they keep selling it and they're pressing it to The downside and they're pressing it right into structure So, you know having having, you know buying above here like this is giving me insight that okay You know, we already you know, we pushed higher in the day We couldn't follow through we pushed lower in the day. We couldn't follow through. We're digesting now You know, we retested the close and now we're getting some buying here And we're getting and you can see the order book starting to shift up You know, it the markets it looks like it wants is is leaning for a positive push, which you know Like we talked about earlier, which is in alignment with sentiment. So, you know, it's more of a Bybreak bias in bitcoin um Is this all we're going to get to the downside? We're going to make a push up to here You know, that's what the that's what the you know, what's happening currently and we've got, you know, the event Economic news coming out and you can see the order book starting to push that up So that's six hours there. So you got like 15 hours or something. Yeah, so it's aligns back to here Is this something like I've noticed in a structural area it will go all the way to the other side And then also, you know spike above that and then in this case here you see this structure Uh as being bullish, uh, because it's gone through into The yellow it's retested below the yellow it's back up above it and it kind of like built and coiled up there a little bit You know, if you're kind of uh, uh, 20 27 119 line there And then it but it's above it though. Yeah, no, that's that's that's exactly what you know You know line in your expectations is what the whole presentation is about and we're observing price action Within structure in the context of the state. So we know we're So when you're coming in here, is the market going to perform to expectation and go sideways? Are we going to trend and break out? So you have this move here and this is all, you know, this is exciting like, oh my gosh, we're going to break out to the upside No, we're not, you know, we fail and now we rotate back through the directional And then You know, okay, now we're going to start trending. We're going to at least make a play for sentiment No, we're not but we hold this this extreme here and we hold below the previous day's close So this could just be a normal, you know, wave extension here and now we're going to have this lower wave extension And so this and what's also important about this high here is it held this metric boundary? So it's telling us that this this, you know, this directional Level is important. Then we get below the midpoint. That's negative two, but now we can't take out that low And then we come above here. So this is the positive signal And this is the squeeze So the market told us here, you know, first it comes out in the in the morning and says we're going higher And this is all just noise to get us back to where we are right now So and and here was another tell where they held this This is a clear signal that this market if it's going to build negative structure lower lows Lower lows lower highs This is a great price point and the market needs to take out those lows and it couldn't do it And so now when we shift back to here now, we're building positive structure And we were, you know, this is your net change. This is a classic crypto squeeze play Because where's your if you're buying this breakout? Where's your risk? It's here Below the midpoint and below this metric then they hold that perfectly And so then when they're getting back up here This is more, you know, this is more tell another another additional insight that hey, the market wants to go higher And where's the risk? Well, yeah, the ultimate risk is here, but we've got this positive price structure It really shouldn't trade back below You know here You know, and if it goes below here, you know, we know that this thing's over But, you know, we're we're in the middle of a f o m c and, you know And we're still we're still we're still, you know, basically it's just all noise in this consolidation within this within this, you know This interior or the critical range So that's why it's like, you know, when we get if we get some event Do we get to move down to this area or we get to move up to this area? That's when it really gets interesting because that's going to be the tell that, you know, are we um Are we going to hold the structure of this neutral digestive state or are we going to break structure? And I like this play too where Because right now it's just all noise And but I loved I like the VWAP Um Yeah, it's just a good barometer and whenever the VWAP gets in alignment with a good structure point like, you know, this 27 119 area Um You know, those are always great in areas of confluence Looking at the just the regular VWAP for the day I mean, you know, I like, you know, the regular VWAP for the day and the previous day's close They're great, you know, great tools I mean, this is just, you know, that's, you know, I Talk I'm all about fact-based trading, you know, focus on the facts You know, what, you know, if the market's higher or lower on the day, you know If the market's above the previous day's high, that's tells you something, you know Do you really want to be short? It's below the previous day's low. Do you really want to be long? You know, those are just kind of real simple basic things that most traders Don't even look at they're looking at some other You know, something that's happened in the inner day And You know, bottom line are they above the midpoint of the day or below the midpoint of the day? That's what's that's what's interesting to me. Um Yeah, I mean bottom line is, you know You know, line in your expectations, you know, take your profit sooner today Don't, you know, don't have an expectation of follow-through today The market's not showing it wants to trend. Could we have a big spike move? Yes Is it more likely a fade? Yes Yeah, no, it's a tough. It's a tough day. So, you know, again, you know For me personally, I like to wait for the market to be in alignment at extremes and I like to align The higher time frames with the lower time frames and then use the The microstructure to, you know, help me put get my position on and help manage it, you know, in the You know in the decision time, you know, when I'm right here, it also helps me to You know with my risk management, so understanding that, you know, where the liquidity is in the marketplace How tight do I want to have my stop? You know, where do I want to get out? You know, where do I want my orders to get in or to get out? Based on liquidity in the marketplace, you know, is it is it ready? You know, it you know when the market breaks out Do I get the liquidity to support it or is it just, you know, is it too soon and I don't have it? Thanks, Bruce Yeah, you know, it's it's you keep it when you keep it into more when you when you focus on the facts And you focus on what's true and you break things into a more of an if then situation It's more calming, you know, you don't have this what if what that I'm hoping this, you know It's you know, you have a better understanding what things mean. I mean, that's why, you know You know, I'm obviously I'm a big fan of our work and I put it, you know years of development into this this methodology Of you know, just the state understand the state foundation the structure of that state what strategy themes You know then observing price action within structure To you know to understand are we performing to expectation or not if we are then then that's your story and you're sticking to it Don't you don't need to think about, you know, what's happening because the market's telling you what it's doing It's telling we're going sideways. We're in neutral. We're going sideways when we're coiling and digesting Uh, and these are the extremes that are really going to validate any kind of breakout So until that happens, you know, you know, you sell vol, you know So if you get a volatility spike into an extreme, we're going to fade it You know, you know, you're trying to you know, and then then, you know, the backdrop today is you've got the fomc to deal with So, you know, once that shakes out Um, you know observing that, you know, the price action within structure is going to give you better insight And then you use the microstructure to to manage your trade Well, I love your I mean the book maps. I mean, I don't understand how people can trade without bookman Tell you the truth. I mean to me, you know, I was never A guy who just could watch the dome And just and get into that flow because it was too it's too microstructure to, you know, I don't really believe in scalping I I you know, I I trade in the pit So I I know what scalping is and then when you have the and then now if you try to compete with with, uh Machines on the scalping aspect, you're you know, forget about it. It doesn't make any sense. It hasn't made sense for years and you know, so Without this visual and to be able to see all the activity in the order book going on You know It's I told you guys this from day one. You guys, you know, every every system is gonna, you know Every order book is going to look like this because you just need this information basically, I mean Very similar to the exact same thing except I'm just taking the liquidity and place it on Yeah, that I mean, otherwise you're you're remembering it this way you can plug right in Well, I think that's how you you developed it off of high frequency trading, uh, you know hedge fund, right? So, you know, basically all the funds that's what I'm saying, you know, people don't really understand it High frequency trading has had this technology for a long time and and you guys brought it, you know To the you know to the average trader that doesn't have this, you know that infrastructure to create this You know, and so that's the and the high frequency guys are actually even looking at it's even, you know, such Smaller microstructure, you know, they're they're they're down to the, you know Microseconds and You know, they're they're they're monitoring that the machines are monitoring that, you know as your orders are going in I mean, it's just kind of crazy, you know, it's like the flash, you know, they just they slow it you know, they slow down the um The world and uh, they get put their orders in front I think a lot of people don't really understand that the high frequency trading is super small size too And you know, it's designed to pick off, you know, a lot of small opportunities, you know, that's why Understanding where the big structure is This is where, you know, the real liquidity is coming into the market This is where the fund managers are really coming in and making decisions. They're not doing stuff here Which is, you know, which where all the algos are happening Okay Yeah, no, I we cut we pretty much covered it. Um, you know, so I I I'll probably just wrap it wrap it up just And then, uh, yeah, then I'll check out the I'll check out the competition Sounds good Thanks for stopping in bruce Well, that was nice Bookmark guys are great, you know, that's uh, it's such a special product, you know, I definitely highly recommend it um You know You know, just going back to presentations talking about align your expectations with facts You know you know part of the Part of that process, you know identifying, you know, is the market perform the expectation We want then we shouldn't expect it to do otherwise if the market is breaking structure and not perform to expectation Something's up and we shouldn't hope that that that expectation is going to continue We need to change our tactics and if the market can't hold as you The State structure and and it and it breaks structure for the hedge theme as well It's a tell that the market's going to do nothing It's a tell that you're going to have one of those terrible non-event days and it's a tell that, you know Don't trade go find something else to do or just sell vault Uh because you know, that's really what you come in and do every day is you identify Is the market performing the expectation of the state? Is it breaking the structure and transitioning or is it not able to do either those those are the tells that say Hey, we're going sideways And you know the you know having the playbook having the price map structure You know, it's going to allow you to you know, standardize your entries You know stay away from the middle where the algos are going to eat you up It's you know understanding the structure is going to Standardize your trade selection. So you're always in you're in alignment. It's what's more likely to occur And by doing that you can standardize your size management, you know where you want to spend your money Where you want to put your capital at risk You know, you can't make money trading trading the same size You have to trade bigger when the odds are in your favor and trade smaller when they're not You know, when you have opportunity big opportunities, you need to go big And you need to force yourself to go big and when you're when you're fading What's more likely to occur you need to force yourself to deleverage You know, that's an easy thing to do too when you when you find yourself in a situation where you're building up anxiety and you start to notice things that You know aren't really as they should be and in alignment Just deleverage With crypto, it's easy That's a beauty of crypto. You can trade micro size just start selling if you're long and and and market's starting to break structure Just sell a little bit a little bit. You can always put it back on You know when the market realigns in your favor, but deleverage I do that all the time I you know, you put trying to get into a big opportunity a lot of times you're getting squeezed But you know what? I'll just deleverage I'll keep them a smaller position and if things start to realign in my favor I'll jump back in and if they don't then i'm out But I already started to get out of some and i'm not stuck if there is an event And things just you know liquidity just vaporizes and there's nothing there I'm already starting to you know anticipate that the things aren't performing to the expectation So I need to start to to lighten up You know and you know with our work we have our metrics and you can really optimize your tactics You know working within those metrics, but it's all about having a fact focus and You know we have you know, we have the tools to provide that It's this is a weapon You know You can you can align your tactics with states you can immediately get to the the markets that have it If you're just focused on one market. It's it's in line. It gives you that Quantitative baseline to align your expectations with The structure is giving you the not only the structure of the the context of the state, but also the sentiment You know where where is that sentiment bias of that state? And that structure is going to identify where do you want to spend your money? This these are the big trades. This is where you're you know, if you're looking at size management Units of one to three, you know anywhere or not at structure is a one Anywhere at structure is a two And anywhere at sentiment is a three It's that simple because the sentiment bias is is the one line in the sand for that trade period Positive above negative below so it's always where all the liquidity The most of liquidity of the day is going to come in at that price point if it happens At least the fun guys are going to come in and trade there Otherwise, it's the the structure points and in the middle It's you know, it's if you have to do something or if you're trading off of a minor structure And the strategy themes are going to help to identify, you know, what's the bigger picture? What's happening, you know for if we're in neutral digestion Yeah, you want to wait till the market's at an extreme are there is there opportunity for transitional moves? Yes, what's the issue? It's hard to define your risk So you need to trade smaller And when the market does break structure These you know, it should just fall through right away. These are both breakout strategies On a in a hedge strategy theme for a neutral digestion and so the market should just go It should hold price structure to the upside or to the downside and just go and if it doesn't That's a tell that it's that this market's going to fall into a non-event trade and it's going to go sideways since it can be terrible So, you know, that's another part of understanding the really the foundation of the state and how it transitions And so that way if it's not performing to the state gives you better awareness That out of you want to adjust your position? And then having this integration built into book map In the mic, you know, so you have the microstructure view and then you also have You know additional integrations To give you the bigger view It really, you know, all of a sudden you have more clarity And you have the bigger picture clarity of what what's more likely to occur And then you have the microstructure of what's occurring currently and this and then you're acting You know, what's more likely to occur and you're acting on it. You're not hoping for something to occur Or or you're not reacting and waiting for something waiting for a signal. You're anticipating opportunity So if you'd like to test drive some of these tools come to dharma capital dot trade I feel free to email me directly if you have any questions at js at dharma capital dot trade And we will see you next week Enjoy your day Cheers