You are right, Chef. This market being so thinly traded that any sort of big move cuts like a hot knife through butter. There simply isn't enough liquidity on either side to stop it and big moves snowball as traders all pile on.

That said, we are more stable than 2013 because the the market has better price discovery mechanisms: futures, leveraged long/shorts, skilled traders to take on whales, and more liquidity. Bitcoin will only be "stable" relative to current capital markets in 5-10 years, when its market cap is much higher and has millions more in liquidity on either side of the orderbooks. At that point, we may be trading in bits.

Until then, strap in or get off the bus because it's going to be a bumpy ride both ways.

Ha, they were Thai chiles I think. The little ones. They're hotter than Habaneros. Little buggers pack a punch.

fixed
 

Good traders are good because they know how to manage risk. They won't risk 100% or their account on a margin trade. 50% is max, so if you have 10btc in your trading account you risk 5. That's a 15btc position if you're on 3:1.

It's the psychology of a bull market. It'll happen again and again.

Sentiment-wise, the fact that the longs haven't really budged much may indicate that they are the strong hands in this case.

Strong hands = profitable traders, experienced chart readers, well-capitalized, logical, non-emotional
Weak hands = newb traders, gamblers, simple indicator-based analysis, panicky, easy to shake out

Low volume shakeout. This kind of activity allows for higher prices by forcing bears to show their hands.

Generally if the market explores a lower price area twice and the latter is on lower volume, it signals a successful test of that price area by the dominant interests and is a strong buy signal. If the volume is medium to high, it may go lower or they may test the area again in the future.

Long from $260 if anyone is interested. Holding steady.

Previous trades:

long $220-$290
short $290-$230
long $230-$280
short $270-$260
long $260-???

You're still here.

What do you all define as TA?

Support/resistance?

Indicators?

Elliot Wave?

Moon cycles?

There is a lot of "TA" out there. In fact, you can invent your own and call it TA. It is a very loose definition.

And members giving them what they want (attention) every time they post.

Whale takes a long position, smaller traders follow. I don't understand what you find surprising about this. Institutional investors and professional traders use all kind of tricks to collect coins without marking the price up: selling into bad news, shakeouts, selling in the open while buying in private... Unless they have more money than time, placing large market orders is the worst way to buy a significant position in such a thin market. Their methods usually involve placing buys lower and selling to scare down the market to get them filled.

What's interesting is that there hasn't much selling today to push it down, which should send a red light to anyone short. That's when the whales will smell a pump opportunity.

If you guys can resist quoting the trolls, maybe (just maybe) they'll go away. Jimbo I'm looking at you.

If you have above average intelligence, can learn quickly and have the patience to watch how and why the market moves, yes you can learn how to apply TA correctly and make money. There are professionals doing it every day.

Most people, however, are not open minded, of below average intelligence and are not patient. For them, TA does not work. Trading attracts some of the brightest minds around and the market will quickly take your money if you don't know what you're doing.

It doesn't mean anything, really, about the future direction of the market. A whale or two could margin call the "poorer" shorts or longs that are over-leveraged and trapped into $20-30 price difference, but the majority of them on that graph will take much more % price change. It's an indicator about what the vast majority of traders think about the market, and the market sometimes moves against that direction, sometimes not. Then again shorts were very high during the bear market and the price didn't rocket up because of that.

Market moves on supply and demand at a given time and little else.

Keep wishing that price down.

Well at least there's some USD coming in for swaps at finex. My bid well below market was taken today for a 30 day period.

For the uninitiated, there's a market-within-a-market at finex to manage your loans. Since many traders hold open trades for weeks (and months) this can save significant money if you lock in a good rate before everyone else piles on during a pump.

Me too, fwiw. I think you have me beat by a couple bucks though. Had a pretty nice short coming down, but long is the better trade in this kind of market (looking @ daily chart).

You must be fun at parties. Lighten up, crack a beer.