It's pretty rough out there. Lots of chop, lots of accumulation, lots of leverage on both sides. Poop and scoops left and right. Maybe try trading on a higher timeframe. Also don't get sucked into quick moves either way, there's usually a better entry point if you wait.

"When you want to bet the house, hands off the mouse."

A bunch of stops were hit right below $230. Finex groups them together into large market sells. The 267 sell @ $229.01 and 1025 sell @ $229.44 may have been the bulk (some panic sellers mixed in there too probably). But you can see how the buy walls immediately moved up after that to stop the selloff. A few large buys happened down there as well.

Absorb absorb absorb

I posted this before in the Wall Observer thread, but it bears repeating.

Dow Theory

I'm in. Let's start a fund.

Volume has been quite low since the correction of the ride to $300 ended. Not much selling but not a lot of buying either. Everyone's waiting, waiting waiting. From a market making perspective, this would be a great time to pump... market with most speculative selling removed + multiple failed dumps + great news on all fronts. Everyone's waiting on the ETN news. But the potential is there.

Ok I'm out. 20x leverage short.

Pack it up boys, it's been fun.

The pros I'm talking about trade as part of syndicates, or operate independently as part of interconnected rings. They are above hedge fund managers in the trader hierarchy.

No, there are simply too many lined up to buy. Bears want these prices about as bad as bulls wanted $10k in November 2013, which means it probably won't happen. Bad news would be needed to orchestrate it and give people a reason to sell. Obviously it's the opposite lately. $166 could have been it. But never say never, who knows if a crazy bear will short 30,000 bitcoins again George Soros style.

The end of a bear market typically occurs at a massive selling climax on really high volume. But the market doesn't turn right away--an accumulation zone forms for a few months as traders build big positions and trade the highs and lows of the range, which is what I have been doing since January. This area of the market cycle is akin to the "estate sale" if I'm continuing with the antique dealer analogy. If we start turning strong bull going into the summer and cross the 30 week MA on high volume, it will be very bullish for breaking out of the $200-300 range. Otherwise the rallies are liable to fail prematurely and the price will simply be rangebound, and one should limit his or her outlook to prices between strong support and resistance points, currently $210 and $310.

I trade these markets as a business so let's not mince words. I know what volume is

The market is manipulated from both sides in the sense that when the biggest moneyed interests take position, the price moves and others follow. I don't think we disagree on that--it's how a market is made. Their moves, however, are often designed to separate amateurs from their money. That is a fact if you have any experience in markets outside of Bitcoin. It is not a conspiracy, it is a business. And if you think that doesn't happen in such an easy market to take control of, I've got news for you. This is apart from organic buying and selling from the public, which actually happens less often than you might think.

Market tests are a very real thing--the difference is that before an upmove, they happen to the downside. Before a downmove, they happen to the upside... USUALLY. Afterwards the market will generally revert to its medium or longer-term trend. The reason is this: If the pervading forces of supply/demand have been pushed far enough out of alignment, usually happening at tops and bottoms, it is difficult to move the market against the natural direction no matter how much of the stock you sell or buy. At market tops, ease-of-movement is down. At bottoms, it is up. This why markets move in waves and cycles. I think some trading groups don't understand this, but they will when they lose money trying to trade against prevailing forces, or the "trade winds" as it were. Once enough traders feel this wind on a very long timeline, the bear market comes to a close, first gradually and then quickly and violently. Trading short at the potential bottom of a bear market is simply putting oneself at too much risk.

Interests are collecting coins while sentiment is low in the same way antiques dealers buy junk from estate sales when nobody else wants it, refinish it and sell at a profit. It's the same way that real estate investors buy land when nobody else is interested--to profit from future sale of this land. Of course the buying parties are going to downplay its importance to their friends and the media and keep things as secretive as possible for more profit. The public (who generally don't think independently and wait for "experts" to tell them what to do) will parrot this negative sentiment and do the opposite of what they should be doing: buying with the professional interests. The last thing they want is for the public to know what they're doing and how much money they will make. It is the same business model in the markets: professional interests are selling to the public during euphoric market tops (distribution) the same stock they bought from the same panicky public at the bottom (accumulation). This happens over and over and over again, yet human fear makes it difficult to recognize and act on the opportunity when it's staring you in the face.

Yeah big distribution area after $1200 top.

And pumping the price is manipulation too. Works both ways.

Well limit selling would raise a lot more with no slippage, so one wonders why they wouldn't do that if they need to raise fiat.

The only reason for big, orderly market sells is manipulation to lower the price, which means shorting, which means covering those shorts at some point by buying back in. Or they could be taking a big loss each time, who knows. Seems silly if that's the case.

I'm in agreement. The guys dumping now are just interested in scaring the market and running stops, etc., to increase their own stash. This has been occurring for months and months but will not work indefinitely.

The remaining bears are getting frothy over on finex. I wonder how long it will take before they realize most of their friends have gone home.

Never again? You haven't been around long enough. Things are just getting started

Being short 80% from all time highs is the riskier trade. That's why not very many people are doing it now. There's an off-chance that we'll see $200 again, but taking risks like that is how you blow up your trading account.

Traders are analysts too

Ideally you'd move your stop to breakeven. In reality Bitcoin is such a choppy market that stops in obvious places will probably get hit unless the trend is super strong in one direction. Just pay attention as most stop-hunting takes place on relatively low volume and use discretion.

Once your target is hit you can move the stop up closer to the price and let it take you out (or use a trailing stop), that way you can take advantage of any additional price rises.

I hear you and I do appreciate your analysis. I make money too. It's just that a)bitcoin is a very thinly traded market with a handful of interests doing the heavy lifting and b)there are a lot of green traders trying to keep their heads above water. The I think it's probably not so hard for the big whales to keep an eye on the most popular and influential technicians' work from a perspective that they look for every opportunity to better their positions. Making money in markets is a serious business. I do enjoy helping people out but there is that inherent risk of making certain information public which is why I do not share most of my analysis. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

It seems like every time the market moves there is a new crop of traders hungry for information but provided with a lot of misdirection. The basics of money and risk management are not obvious to them and the market is quick to take their money. Trading is so much more than simply going short or long at xyz price. Technicians are quick to talk their book but short on information about how they keep from losing their profits. This is what I'd like to see taught. Unfortunately crowd behavior is prevalent and I fear it would be a futile endeavor for all but a small number of traders. People just don't want to put in the work. But keep on keepin' on, I do enjoy learning about EW as I'm more of a price/volume guy.

Next hurdle is the 200 day / 30 week MA. That's a biggie for the pro technical traders out there.