Ex-Hedge Fund Manager Trades His $150M VWAP Strategy Live (Full Breakdown)

He is back. This is Robert Rother. He started trading at just 13 years old and built up to a hedge fund managing over $156 million. And today he trades a million and a half infunded capital across more than 20 proper accounts. But I flew home to me for one reason, to draw his strategy out on the chart, step by step, and then trade it live in front of me. >> And there's the target. >> All within how short how short of time was that? >> No, what I'm doing is a very simple concept. Yeah, I'm a VWAP trader. Yeah. If the market is moving away from VWAP, coming back to VWAP, then we can see a sort of reaction. Yeah. And this is what I'm going to trade. >> Three VWAPs, one liquidity map, a 10 tick stop, a 10 to 15 tick target, and an 80% win rate. But Robert didn't learn this from a course. He spent 30 years inside the industry building the same kind of algorithms he now trades against. And halfway through this session, he proved it. He pointed at a 600 lot order sitting in the book and predicted exactly what happened next. Why would they take it out? >> It's called spoofing. I mean, it's illegal. It's a stock exchange according to the rules and regulations. They take it out because they simply want to move the price. This is how you can manipulate situations. We started here at 55 and closed at 56. 1 minute. Yeah, that's my trade. That's what I do every day. >> In this episode, Robert reveals the exact VWAP scalping strategy behind his five figure months live on the chart, where the algorithms execute and the exact moment he enters. And then he breaks down the one most important rule to trade by. Nothing in this video is financial advice. We're just exploring the mind of someone who built a trading career up to 9 figures in managed capital. Now, let's see what Robert is made of. Robert, be brutally honest. Can a hardworking, determined trader today actually get rich off trading? >> I believe so. It's like in any job or any craft you're learning. Um, you need your time, you need your persistence to get the knowledge how to do it. And of course, you need the right connections and the right setup. By setup, I don't mean the trading strategy. I mean, um, the right people around you, for example, the right companies, the right business partners, and then if you're determined, yes, you can. Now, Robert, one of the biggest problems retail traders face is not having complete confidence that their strategy actually works. So, when losses start coming, they don't really know how to handle that or abandon the strategy entirely. So, how can a discretionary trader know that a strategy has earned their confidence? >> First of all, you must be comfortable with a strategy. Whatever it is, you must believe in it. Yeah. And you have to find a certain niche. And like I said, most of comfortable you must really it must match your character. There are strategies that I could never trade. There are strategies that I can trade in day trading. I'm a scalper. I like really short trades. I cannot hold my positions for like 3 four hours during the day. Difficult for me. It's my character. Other traders can do that. So find the strategy that matches your personal character. I want to unpack the character side because it's extremely relevant. But when the losses do start coming in on a strategy with a discretionary trader, how do they know okay this is normal and it's going to happen from okay this entire thing doesn't work or is falling apart? Um I think most of the traders when they are getting a losing street yeah uh they forget one thing and this is a volatility index or called VIX. So you must know what is the volatility about the markets and every time you take a trade you have to put the volatility index or VIX in comparison to that. If the VIX is at 15 okay I can trade my strategy very good and I can even increase my position size. If the volatility index is above 20 um there is a lot of fear in the market and your strategy is not wrong but you have to adjust your stop loss and your take profit for example. Yeah. >> Well, how did you arrive specifically at that rule set and those numbers for profit target, stop-loss and position size? >> Um well, it's experience after 30 years. Yeah. Um and actually every trade that I'm doing and all my market comments that I'm doing in my live tradings every day I will put them in AI. Um I'm using cloud everything is in that database and this database is also telling me okay now um how to adjust your position size how to adjust your um take profit and so on. There are now over like three years of actual data inside since I started. >> Interesting. So, how does someone validate a strategy without having to waste time or months and money trying to see if it works in trading? >> The problem most of the traders is if they follow a strategy and then the strategy has a losing series, they're going to switch to another one. So you will never know which strategy is really working. You have to understand your trading strategy, the niche and the idea behind it. I can put my trading strategy in one sentence. I simply detect when algorithms are going to buy and sell. That's what I do. Not more, not less. >> We've talked about your strategy before in the funded phase >> in a previous interview that we had. >> And um for anyone who hasn't seen that, I I did want to go over it again. >> Yeah. So what exactly do you use to trade prop firms? What strategy? >> Well, like you said on the challenge phase, I am really I would say extreme gambler. Yeah. Because I know my odds and I don't want to waste time. Time is more for me more expensive than money in that case. So once I pass a bunch of propform accounts to the funded phase, then I'm using my VW strategy. I mean also during the challenge phase, but then I'm going all in. When I have the funded accounts, I am really focusing on consistency because that is what you need to get payouts. Prop firms don't like if you make um a home run one day and next day you lose everything. Yeah, it doesn't make any sense for your payout. So you must have best thing every day the same profit. This is what they want to see. This is how also the problems can make money. and um what they expect from a professional trader. So that I'm treating these accounts definitely carefully. Yeah. I have my risk parameters means my stop-loss, my take profits very um tight. Yeah. And then I'm building up the accounts and I I'm not really focusing on getting a pay payout within the I don't know next two or three days. No, I don't care about that. The market has to give you the opportunity. Sometimes it takes like one month to get a payout, sometimes 10 days. Yeah. Really, I cannot um influence this. If I want to influence this and I want to go more aggressive, I will lose. Now, Robert, I want to see exactly what this looks like on the chart. So, if we could go to the chart now and you draw this out for me step by step, that would be exceptional. >> Yes, of course. Only for you. Yeah. Now what I'm doing is a very simple concept. Yeah. I'm a VW trader. Yeah. What we can see here for example the yellow yellow line is the day VWAP um from today Thursday. Yeah. And if the market actually today we really do not have this huge moves here. If the market is moving away from VWAP, coming back to VWAP, then we can see a sort of reaction. Yeah. And this is what I'm going to trade. We can also see here many times right now the market is in a sideways movement. That's today. So, uh we have a fair value area around this um yellow line. This yellow yellow line is starting at um midnight European time or um 6:00 p.m. Eastern time when the um electronic trading hours are opening. This is probably the most important one for me. Then I have a second one that I really pay attention to that is the green one here. This one, this is the London VWAP opening of course with the London session. Yeah, that I like to trade especially for many European traders who are trading the precession. This can give you um good insights when to buy and want and when to sell. >> Now, Robert, here on your chart, a lot of traders just use the regular session VWOP. Now, you did just make the distinction that you use a different VWOP anchored from a different time period. Correct. >> Correct. I have um three main VWAPs. The first one I'm calling a day VWAP starting with the um extended trading hours. The second one is a London VWAP starting with London opening and the third one is the US session VWAP starting yeah regular trading hours. >> Is there any rule you have to distinguish between which one should be used? The strongest one for me is the day VWAP because this one contains most of the data. Since the VWAP is um derived from the price and volume. So, and it's more volume and more price information you have a stronger it becomes. But really, we have to figure out every day um each VW has a different function. And this is simply just by looking at a chart. Can we really see which V re V re V re V re V V V V V V V V V V V V V Weeb has the most respect? This can change from day to day and also are we moving in a sideways market? Are we moving upside? Today what we can see is a sideways market. There's no action at all. If we are going up then the strongest VIP is mostly the day V. But then sometimes you even don't get a chance to get in. So just to be clear then your trading strategy will be predicated on which VWAP is currently the most respected. >> Correct? Yes. >> And just to be clear, how do you determine which one is being the most respected? >> Um you can see if the price is moving around the VWAP, which one where are the prices going to stop or having a pullback? Yeah. So you simply were watching at it. Is there any kind of pattern that can come between these three VWOPs that would make you not trade at all? >> Um well if we come go a little bit into detail. I mean if you look here at the current situation this is today we are simply moving sideways. Yeah, if the market is moving sideways, we have a range and then um yeah, Europe is moving sideways, uh you do not trade them. This is actually a situation where I do not like to trade, where I do not get um A+ setups. >> Okay. So, once all the VWOPS are on the chart and you've determined which one is being the most respected, what is your next step? Um then I'm switching to bookmap. It's my favorite trading software. And I will uh look at liquidity levels. For example, this is the ES future. Where do we have big buyers and sellers? Yeah. In the market. So we can see here this red line for example is it's not a large order but we can see there are many buy limit orders. Everything what is green are buy limit orders. Everything what is red are sell limit orders >> and then we can determine okay where is the interest in that market. >> So when when you look at this on the right which is what you're talking about how do you know right now >> where the interest is like you had just said >> it's here at um 47745 on the upside. If we scroll a little bit higher um there's not much interest here. Maybe a little bit at 61. So it's quite boring today. Yeah, there is no big surprise. I mean it's a normal day. Yeah. Okay. Now what we can see here is a larger order came just now into the market. This red line um with over 600 lots. It's not huge but it's a larger order I would say. Now the question is and that is what I like to look at it. Is this liquidity? I mean they are placed in the market. is buy limit orders. Are they going to manipulate the price because algorithms are going to detect this quantity? Are the prices now moving to this level and then stays the liquidity or are they going to take out the liquidity? >> Why would they take it out? >> It's called spoofing. I mean, it's illegal at the stock exchange according to the rules and regulations, but it's very difficult to prove. They take it out because they simply want to move the price. This is how you can manipulate situations. >> So how do they how does this move the price because there's a lot of perceived liquidity there and >> and then the algorithms they read the order book and then they know okay there's liquidity maybe we want to fill this so we have to move the price to this level >> but then it gets spoofed and pulled out. So what happens after? Well then the mostly um I don't know what's the big players really what the intention is but you can see that this liquidity will pop up in a different level probably a little bit lower so then the price will go down down down and down it >> the intention is not clear though would you say that this is another institution doing this >> yes I mean that's my right now we can see a lot of orders like this also there is another one coming up here at 62 2 and we can already see prices tending to go downwards here to this area. >> Now, is this something retail traders should be concerned with or try to avoid or >> it always depends on your time frame that you are trading. Since I'm a very short-term trader, I really have to pay attention to that to get also an understanding of the market situation right now. If you know trade on a daily basis, um, no, then it's not basically not of your interest. >> So, how do why do you need to be concerned with this though? How does you this change what you're going to do? >> Um, because I will know that somebody's trying to push the prices to a certain level. And if I know this, so for example, I would now choose to get a long trade somewhere here in this area. Let's say 57 for whatever reason, I would be wrong. Also, what we can see above here, this liquidity, this is what I was talking about. They put in this liquidity and you know the prices came up, then they put in the liquidity and they took it out again. Why are they doing that? Yeah. So this might have been a spoofed order. >> Correct. >> And you are saying that with this potential spoofed order here, you wouldn't want to buy above that bottom side liquidity right there. >> Um no, what we can see is right now the prices are moving now to the this liquidity and just now in this second as you were saying is liquidity disappearing what I told you. So they're manipulating the markets. Very obvious. It's very very clear. So price went down. That liquidity literally got pulled just now. No, we didn't set it up. >> But and again, you would have just not taken a trade though because of this. >> Yes, correct. Because I don't know what the intention is or where the prices should go and um they have a plan. They have more money than I have because if you can pull in there like 600 lots or whatever. So you trade larger size obviously and you can see how they manipulate the algorithms I told you. So liquidity came up here prices is moving down down down to this level taking out the liquidity. So this is market manipulation in its best case. Interesting. Now regardless of where the limit orders where you can see they're being placed big orders it looks like. What else are you actually seeing here on bookmap? >> Um liquidity is the most important part for me. Yeah. And then of course I have here the um VWAP US session VWAP for example. And if the market would go to this price level, I would consider it a short trade. Yeah. So there doesn't have to be any special indication on bookmap itself for you to take that short trade at >> you know I I try to find out a lot of um ways how to improve it. I mean, if there is really liquidity coming up at this level, of course, it's a stronger confirmation. In the end, I figured out now after 30 years, just take the trade. It's just a trade. Don't think about it. >> Just do it. >> Just to be clear for the audience, why is liquidity at VWAP extra confirmation? because then we already know that um there is interest from people >> to and in this situation if price moves up into VWAP from here >> liquidity stacked up there shows there's already sell limit orders sitting there right >> and this could feed into the micro pullback that you tried to do okay >> um the point is I mean the algorithms they know this and of course they also know their competitors or their other players they also know how the other algorithms thinking or acting and then they do not place their order here immediately. They will just take in the order when the market actually is at this price level >> with market orders. >> Um the algorithms uh mostly yes. Yes. >> So market order short in this case at VWAP to get a fill instead of >> not always a limit order just to be clear. Okay. >> What would and then from here what would be your next step? simply waiting like a sniper waiting for his um chance to get the trade and sometimes you have to wait like 1 hour or one and a half hours you get your opportunity and then if you if I reach my take profit I'm out >> and your take profit is always >> um right now around 10 to 15 ticks um I can see now I have 11 ticks could be a little bit more because yeah ES is yet at 7,755 points. Uh my stop loss is always 10 ticks and take profit rise between 10 to 15 ticks right now. >> And what was your win rate with that >> 80% >> 80% with a 1.1 to one. >> Yeah, >> it's a very strong performance. >> Now you're almost executing this systematically instead of full discretion, right? Well, behind my discretionary trading is a fully um system in that I believe or that I think to know how algorithms working. I know it from my own company how they act and yeah this is what I'm using for my discretionary trading. >> Now when you take a trade at the VWAP is it all is it a market order? No, I for example now here in this case I just can take here now a limit order. So would be look like this sell limit order and I would simply wait >> and wait until it gets filled and VWAP is tested. Right. >> Exactly. And then this is the uh boring thing. Actually trading is quite boring for me. So I do other things on the side like building Lego. I have a huge Lego collection at open >> when the trade comes. Oh, hey, check that out. >> Now, >> now you know. So, are you watching the chart the entire time up until this trade is taken though? >> Well, I have one eye on the chart and the other one on my Lego collection. >> Now, between the time where price is where it is now and then moves up to your limit order, >> is there anything that would make you cancel this limit order? Yeah, for example, if we if the price is approaching the VWAP and let's say like two or three ticks before my order, the market is already getting this pullback and then I would take out the order because the second or third touch is always um not an A+ setup. Yeah, you can take it. Don't misunderstand me. Um you can take this trade but the risk for a loss is higher. >> So, okay, a little to unpack there then. So the first touch of VWAP is generally the A+ setup. >> Correct. >> Now is there a certain time period that price needs to be away from VWAP or like a certain number of ticks before we start saying oh the next touch will be the new first touch. Um I do not have a specific number for that but if I see the market for example in this case will come close to let's say here maybe 65 63.5 then it's for me considered uh a test >> this is based on experience discretion rather than a a fixed number >> yes no I do not ever because I don't this is sic discretionary part I do not believe in this fixed numbers it's uh never work for Maybe for a data analyst can kind works they can get something out of this but for me not >> you then said the pullback if it happens the pullback you're looking for to to exploit if it happens before price gets your limit order then you'll make you'll pull the order. >> Yes. And then I was unlucky. >> And how would you know that that pullback you're looking for fully materialized? Um for example, let's say we reach here um 64 market will go down to 61 then we have the um pullback. Yeah. >> And there's nothing else to this >> to this strategy. No, not much more. Very simple. >> You've been doing this for 30 years >> mostly. Yeah. This is um I call it my master account. I am trading my master account the smallest position size and then I have a trade syncer that will copy the trades on multiple platforms and then according to the um account balance I will multiply this order let's say with two contracts or three contracts or four contracts. >> This is across prop firms >> exactly private accounts and across multiple prop firms. >> So one trade goes everywhere. >> Yes. For my experience, I personally like to trade the 50K accounts because the um target are 3K and the um draw down is 2 and a halfK. So this ris reward to risk ratio is very good. If you trade like a 150k account, you have a different profit target and um different stop-loss rule. Yeah. So these are things that prop firms using smartly so they uh to make their money. I'm I'm honest here. So I I choose the most valuable option for me and these are always 50k accounts. Yeah. And then if I trade these 50k accounts and they reach the um trailing threshold limit so that the uh stop loss is fixed at these accounts then I can go yeah I would say I go aggressive in to scale them up. >> So do you ever max out the position size? Um seldomly actually not uh because then I will break the consistency rule mostly because then I will have probably a big winning day or big losing day. I try to tra um trade them very um yeah carefully I would say consistent. Yeah. To reach my payouts. >> So then is there like a target number of contracts you want to have exposure in across all the accounts? >> No, I do not think about contracts. No, I just think about um daily profit for each account. Yeah. >> And what's what's the target for that >> on a 50k account? For me right now, it's around about $250 a day >> on a single 50k account. >> Yes. >> And you can be running multiple. >> Exactly. >> So, if all of them work, great. >> Like 20 or 30 accounts. Yeah. And then people have to remember with the prop firms if it doesn't work your risk is still limited to the amount that you paid. >> Yeah. To get for and also very important you have to understand the rules and regulations of prop firm. Different prop firms have different rules, different payout rules, different consistency rules, different um stop-loss rules. So you also have to put this into consideration and read them very very carefully. So, it doesn't actually make sense to get like $5,000 profit on a 50k account because you cannot get $5,000 out of it. Mostly only like 2K. >> So, this is and even 2K is not my target. If I reach like a profit limit of $500 or $1,000, I immediately apply from for payout. I'm only thinking um from payout to payout. What I saw with many traders, they really fell in love with their accounts and oh yeah, I want to make it big and blah blah blah. And for me, that's the wrong approach. It's just an account. If you blow it, don't think about it. Open a new one. Do it aggressive again, again, again. Only thing from payout to payout. >> It's exploiting the math, right? Don't get married to the account is what you're saying. Don't think I'm going to take this capital and grow it into millions and millions and millions. >> Uh don't feel bad if you blow accounts. It's part of the game. It's a business. You cannot always make money. And if you blow accounts, um many traders really take it really personally, but for me just it's business. I mean you blowing a I mean you can stupidly blow accounts. Yeah. But we see strange market movements sometimes that they come out of nothing and then you really have to take care of your position size. So keep your position size very low. If you get a market sweep I mean if you get a slippage that means the stop loss and the real execution that you get sometimes huge big like something like double of your stop loss >> and you have to know how to handle that. >> Do you what how do you handle that? because I decrease my position size. I'm not trading um normally I would trade like three to four contracts but since Iran and so on I'm only trading one or two. >> So you still fall victim of that slippage. >> Of course yes yes >> not not avoidable >> uh unavoidable you bad luck. I I know it will happen. It's unavoidable in my trading style. So you have to be prepared for that. Is there anything that makes you close a position earlier than when it hits your target or stop? Though >> seldomly um if I get a bad feeling then I will just reduce my loss and if I do not get my pullback fast enough then I will be yeah I will take the >> is there any sort of any sort of rules for that or would you say it is still based on discretion? discretion. Yeah. No, I do not have this fixed rules. Um, I just see it and I can see how the market is moving. Can we get this quick pullback? Yes or not? >> What is an example of when you had a bad feeling then and close the position? >> Uh, if the market is just playing around VWAP, for example, here something like this. Yeah, I do not like this sort of um moving around VWAP. I want to see something like I mean in this case market did not go to Viva but we see this pullback quickly quick move in and out and for the limit order that you have here it is slightly below the VWAP. Yeah, because viewer is moving. So, I have to simply move my order. Also, I'm doing this manually. Also, we developed um tools that actually can execute the trades automatically. We did everything just software things differently than a human being. For example, was at the beginning it was a disaster. uh market came to VWAP and you have like 100 executions here at VWAB within a millisecond and then I had blown up all my accounts because they for every touch of the VB they also bought a contract for me. So I mean these are mistakes from from our programming side. >> Yeah. Uh you have to think differently if you try to automate this. So yeah, with this limit entry, um it did you specifically put it right under the certain amount of ticks under the VWAP or is it still more >> basically it's exactly at VWAP? Yeah. >> Okay. >> So now also we we know if Okay, now I'm here maybe one tick below or I can even put the order here because I know if the market will go up, VWAP will go down and we at the same level. And on the the automation side, >> yeah, >> have you tried this before? >> Uh, many times over many years, we invested a lot of money in automating this and finding new ways to improve this, but we were not successful. >> Why not? >> Um, the market has different conditions. Is the market moving sideways or in a trending market? This is what you have to detect and for us uh that was the biggest issue how to execute the um VBA strategy because we need a certain market environment. Now system cannot understand this. >> So the system had trouble distinguishing between a sideways market and >> yeah and a trending >> trending market. >> I mean I do a lot of programming. I can vouch that that is very difficult to do. >> Yes. I mean, in the past, if you look at the chart, it looks very easy, >> but to predict it and to assume it, it's um mission impossible. >> Now, you specifically want to avoid a ranging market with this strategy. >> Yes. >> Right. And you'd like a trending market, pull back into the VWAP, >> and then >> take a >> continue the trend. Yeah. Now just with your experience and your eyes then is is there any way that you do mark or classify a sideways market? >> I'm simply simply betting on it. Yeah. I mean we cannot look into the future. So I just bet on it that this could be a sideways market that we have an high, we have a low and the market will stay in this range. So if market is staying within some previous high and previous low not consistently making higher highs and higher lows or lower highs and lows. >> Yes, correct. And then I just sell the high and buy the low >> and trending market would be just higher highs, lower lows. >> Um yeah, I would just wait. The market is moving one direction. When it comes back to VWAP, I would enter. And do you do any sort of top- down analysis for this strategy? >> Um well yes of course I'm looking at daily chart um hourly chart and so on to get a big picture of the market situation. Yeah the normal chart analysis for me personally to understand where are we right now? >> Could do you have an example that you could show us? >> Then I go back to trading view. >> Ever thought about getting into prop trading? Perfect timing. Right now we have a huge offer for you. You can grab a 50K futures challenge for just 9 bucks. Or if that's still too much, the 10K crypto challenge for only a single dollar. Links in the description. And now back to the video. >> Oh, I like this simple, easy software. And here I'm going to the daily chart. And we can see nicely. Oh, here's also a nice example. This is the anchor VB from the low. Here you can see how the market is trailing above VWAP and then touching VWAB and fire free. >> Why do you use the anchored VWAP? >> I mean I told you before I had three standard VWs that I'm using every day like day, London and um US session VWAP and these anchor VWAPS. I put them at um certain high and low levels. These determine a trend and as long as the market is now staying above this VP line, we are in a long trend. And if market comes back to this area, well, you could see like here that we have well new buyers. Well, just to be clear now, we do know obviously algorithms, execution algorithms, buy and sell at VWOP, it's used as a benchmark for a good fill, right? Fair value. >> So this anchored VWAP though, does it have that same respect? >> Yes. In a trend. Yes. Yeah. So then this would mean that algorithms or institution are institutions I'm sorry are specifically concerned with VWOPS from market turning points. >> Yes. And this is also for example let's look at this picture here a trend started. So now the question is when I should enter the trend. Yeah. Every time the beginning we have here a turning point. Then market is doing basically already here the pullback to VWAP and fire free and now the question is when to enter this trend. Yeah, >> I've never heard this part before. So I am genu genuinely curious >> if this specific low with this anchored VWOP is of concern to the algorithms execution algorithms are they internally calculating anchored VWOPs all over the market? Yes, they do. >> They are. >> Yes. Because the algorithm considers the VWAP as a fair value price. So if I want to go long, let's say I'm telling my algorithm I have to buy like 100,000 shares and the question is when to buy and what is a fair price to buy. So they will gets the reference. Okay, we're at the VWAP right now and this is a fair price where to buy. So the they usually use the session VWOP though, right? Not particularly a anchored VWOP from a low in the past. >> No, you have to think differently. Big institutions like pension funds or hedge funds, day trading is not their business. Yeah. If you're pension fund, you want to invest for a longer time period. So they think over months, years. Yeah. So they have to find um suitable entry points. So they might use longer period VWOPS for that. >> Exactly. Yeah. >> Now, not just to actually get filled, but also to figure out what a good fill price is. >> Yes. Especially in trends. Yeah. >> And back back on bookmap. >> Still didn't. And still didn't get any fill here. So yeah, we are still waiting for a trade here. Well, we didn't get the pullback here to VWAP. So I'm going to take out this order. But what we can see is here liquidity is on the downside and we had also again another yeah I would say fake liquidity here. I mean fake is wrong because the liquidity was in the market. We could see it they just take it out and it looks like they want to drag the market a little bit lower. Question is if you look on a bigger time frame where can we go taking out the low here at 34. You know, I like to buy lows and um we're talking about a range. So, you have to assume there might be a range or that there can be a range in this area here. So, well, I'm already here. One second too late. We have the liquidity here. So, we just put ourself in front of the liquidity. We have this last liquidity in front of there. And let's see if we can catch this. I like to get this market sweep, catch the liquidity and betting on the pullback. >> So, so your entry is in this deep liquidity concentration. >> Exactly. And we also see on the longer time frame that we have the low or low is around here and people like to buy the low. >> So this deep liquidity concentration is sitting at a basically a swing low. >> Yes, you would say. >> Yeah. And again they took it out here also and market is turning around. So I will put my order one tick lower here at this liquidity. But we can see the market is already turning. >> So you're looking to be part of the liquidity here. >> Yes. Because um this is where traders want to execute and the price should go there until the business is finished. Yeah. You have buyers, you have sellers, they want to meet, they want to exchange. And when everybody is happy, uh the market can turn. >> So basically, everyone gets filled, market reverses. >> Yeah. And if nothing is coming up here on the downside, looks like this um could be the end. Of course, there's no guarantee for this. Yeah. I don't have to tell you that. Just right now, we don't see anything below. So maybe just take out liquidity. Sellers are happy, buyers are happy, liquidity coming in here again at 32. So now we have to be a little bit patient. >> Well, there's a lot of liquidity, it looks like. Or am I wrong here? >> Um, well, yeah, it's not a lot, but it's it's more than on the other levels. If there is like 2,000 lots, then we talk about a lot. So, right now, like 140 or 150, but also look at the time. We have now um 5:40 p.m. Central European time. It's not the time where markets are really making big moves. And again, market already assumed and is already doing the correction. >> And why is there so much liquidity on the downside right now rather than the upside? >> People like to buy lows. People think, okay, this might be the bottom, so let's buy. Also you could reverse engineer this um okay many retail traders put their stop loss below a low. Yeah. So then are the other guys they're waiting to that the stop loss is getting triggered so we can buy and get in and get liquidity. >> Right. So in that case it is a stop-loss cascade effect. Right. >> Yes. >> Where stops trigger and this is liquidity. This is filled orders for >> execution algorithms. >> Yeah. Always if you want to take a transaction, you must find the counterpart. Yeah. So you see, I want to buy, but I don't get a chance. I want to sell, I don't get a chance. Nobody likes me here. And there's nothing that you can do. Yeah. It's just simply patient, waiting, waiting, patience. Normally, I would build my Lego bricks right now or talk to my community members. It's no joke, you know. I have all stuff from LIGO. It really it keeps you busy, but you're also still focusing on the chart and um you have something to do and it's a good relaxation. Yeah. >> So, your approach is very simple and do you think that simple approaches are what pretty much every trader should try to stick to? >> Keep it as simple as possible. Kiss me. Yeah. Keep it simple and stupid. I mean what I'm showing you here right now is the experience of 30 years of trading as a hedge fund manager and I know where to look at actually to get this information to know what I am looking for. Most of the tra traders have never heard about it. Yeah. >> Mhm. >> So I try to make my life as simple as possible. I'm a lazy person. I do not like to over complicated things and I'm only trading to make money not for enjoyment. >> So why do some traders seem to just absolutely over complicate it with indicators and theories and stories and >> they're gamblers. They want to find the holy grail. >> Wouldn't that make it harder? Of course, definitely for them, they will never find it. I mean, it's an endless search for something that is so simple. This is where most of the people fail and then they completely forget to look inside themselves. Who am I? I know many of these people. And then again, I come back, I ask them, are you trading futures? Yeah. Can you explain to me what is a futures contract? >> Uh uh uh uh uh yeah, >> I think a lot of people would struggle with that question. Yeah, >> I could write a huge book about that. Actually, I already did the beginner's guide for futures trading. >> Oh, >> where I explain every contract on the CME that you can trade and also relate to what news are important, what you have to look at and which front months you have to trade. I mean, if you trade different markets like metals, energies, uh you have to look at different contracts. So you were sick of people not knowing what a futures contract is. >> Yeah. So I just I wrote it and um well I have to say I gave all my information into my AI to my system and um let it write and there's now three years of uh at least knowledge that I implemented into um my claude. So I don't need to do much anymore. Just copy paste and I get it according to my own knowledge, my experience that I gave into it. >> So maybe we can get a trade now. And already you can see the liquidity was taken out here again spoofing order. So can we get a chance you know this lower liquidity level >> now? In under no circumstances would you ever take a trade early here, right? Never. >> Uh I mean this is my own funded account that I'm trading. Yeah. So no. >> So I mean I can I like I I I know people want to see and like big trades and all these YouTube videos and Instagram videos where they show you how to make um huge amounts and show their borrowed Ferraris or whatever. um believe me I have everything behind me. I had my own racing team. Uh Lemo racing series and yeah this is uh you really have to be disciplined. You have to stay cool. Do not let yourself be distracted from other circumstances. And also what I have to say here this is not I'm just here sitting in front of my laptop. This is not my normal trading office. This is completely different. Then I also have a different um infrastructure, different screens where I can do completely different things. Yeah. >> What would you do in your trading office? >> Uh first of all, um right now I would do my live trainings. Yeah. Mostly with my community. they can watch what I'm doing, answering their questions, um, feeding my AI and probably looking at five, six markets at the same time, which I cannot do here. This is, uh, not possible to find maybe other opportunities. Actually, the most important thing is just waiting. And this is very trading is people saying, "Oh, yeah, you're the day trader. You have this exciting life and so on." If day trading is for you, exciting, go to the casino. There you can have excitement, you can have fun. Go to Las Vegas, a lot of fun, a lot of beautiful girls and whatsoever. There you can let it go. But trading must become boring and then you become successful and you make a living from it. >> And how long did it take you to figure that out? >> Couple years. Yeah. I I mean I was lucky. I mean when I started I started trading at the age of 13 since I inherited some money from my um passed away father and then I became quite famous in a young age here during the '9s in Germany. Then two partners came to me and I quit school. Yeah. Then I moved to Frankfurt and they were teaching me how the full investment business is working not trading. and how to run your hedge fund, how to manage accounts, how to run private equity and so on. Yeah. So, it's completely full stack. Then I sold my shares in that company and I moved to China where I did it again and just on a different scale where I managed up to 156 million US. So now again here market also turning around before my entry point. This is really really >> now liquidity does look like it's starting to build higher right. >> Yeah we had some liquidity coming up here. Um this was again rejected this liquid they took it out so market is moving up went to this liquidity we really have to say um we have now August. Yeah, that's also very important to understand as a trader in July, August, um people on vacation on my island where I live, we have a lot of tourists and nobody's working >> except retail traders, right? >> Most. >> Yeah, some of them. Yeah. Well, actually also not not them. They also are making holidays. Yeah. At least they all M incredible m I wanted to get in here and the market is going up. So and this is the point where most of the tri traders become then uncomfortable and they think okay the market is going up going down I must do a trade I have to get in here no matter what and this is where you're going to screw up your performance. >> Maybe not the account but at least you >> So you see you see a move like this to the upside and it doesn't phase you. >> No. No, it's just let me just actually so to say makes me tired. Yeah, this is the idea behind was right here. It was right there. It just did not get the fill. >> So the market came pretty close to your fill. >> Yeah. >> And then completely reversed. >> Yeah. As there are these days this is just unlucky. Yeah. That level of discipline is hard to achieve though. You know, a lot of traders would chase >> after the price and everything. I know. This is why I'm telling more somehow to get rid of your addiction. Go to the casino, take some cash and gamble or do some other gambling activities, whatever you like, play poker or play the dice or whatever. And then you get rid of this emotion. And then these moves will let you simply you ignore them. >> Now if you did have to pick out where the next opportunity is. >> Still same level here in this area and again still same level here. Now we are really in the middle of nowhere. So I would again entering a trade at this liquidity level here at 29.5 be interesting and this also again is the low level here now 20. >> Now it looks you do have VWAP deviation bands up here. >> Um yes I do have them. They are mostly for me as um indication of a trend. If they're moving sideways, we are in a sideways market. If they start to spread, one is going up, one is going down, it means that we starting a trend. Some traders and also me sometime I'm trading this deviation bands. You can do that as also pullback zone. It's not an A+ setup for me. It definitely more risk, but it can also be very reward rewardful. It always depends on your um trading style that you want to take. Yeah. >> So, no them as targets really. No, not them as stops. You don't use the deviation bands in that way. >> No, for me it's an in that case. No, no deviation bands you really have to see them from a different point and that really tells you when is volatility coming into the market. So, if they spread, volatility is coming in. >> Well, it looks like this might actually come. We will get it. Okay. >> And there's our Phil. >> Yeah, Phil. >> Now, what do you see happening here? >> Um, yeah. No, I just waiting here to see to get my take profit to get the pullback. Yeah, market took the liquidity. Liquidity is out. And well, now the question is really is the market continuing to the downside or are we getting the pullback? Yeah, it's just wait. >> And you would never like close early or anything. is just always wait >> for this target or this limit. >> Just wait. Yeah. Because I tried to um do many things around this and um I never could improve it. Actually, when I influenced it by myself, uh the performance didn't go better. >> Okay. >> And there's the target. >> All within how short how short of time was that? >> Yeah, I can tell you that. Um, we started here at 55 and closed at 56. 1 minute. Yeah, that's my trade. That's what I do every day. Be patient. Do your thing. >> Pretty much snipe the low. >> Yeah. So, actually, this is 275 on every 50K account times 20. Yeah. >> Are are we able to see all the profit for them? Uh I cannot show you this here on that screen. This is um a funded account. Yeah. From Bulinox. Yeah. 275. >> Robert, thank you so much. IQ Capital, you can start your first challenge for as little as $1. >> And you can do the same thing. >> Terms and conditions apply. Built by traders for traders.