A Strange Pattern in My Futures Trades — Does Anyone Else Experience This?

[Short2win]

I have been working online for years, and I achieved good success in several projects. However, the moment I entered the trading world — especially futures trading — everything changed in a very strange and unexpected way.

I fully understand that futures trading is extremely risky and I am not blaming anyone for my losses. This post is simply to share my experience and see if anyone here has gone through something similar.


What happened to me

Every time I open a position — whether long or short — the market immediately moves in the opposite direction.
Not after a few minutes… instantly.

It feels as if the market is “waiting” for me to enter before reversing.

This has happened many times, even when my position size was small (around $2,000 to $3,000).
No greed, no over-leveraging, no chasing trades.
Just normal entries.

But the moment I place an order, the price suddenly spikes or drops sharply against me and wipes my position almost immediately.

I don’t know if this is:

just bad luck,

normal market volatility,

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

Why I am confused

I previously succeeded in different projects and online businesses.
But in futures trading I lose everything the moment I step into the market.
The reaction is so fast and so direct that it makes me question whether this is common or if I'm missing something important.

My question to the community

Does anyone here trade futures regularly?
Have you experienced something similar — where the market reacts instantly against your position?

I am not advising anyone to trade futures.
In fact, based on my experience, I don’t recommend it at all, because the losses can be extremely fast and emotionally difficult to handle.

A final note about my situation

During the last two years, I have lost more than $40,000 in futures trading.
These losses pushed me into debt, and I now owe money to several people.
Because of this, I decided today to completely stop trading futures forever.

I am not asking for anything here — I will handle my situation myself — but I really hope others can avoid reaching the point I reached.
If my story can help even one person stay safe and protect their money, then sharing it was worth it.

I would appreciate any opinions or explanations from experienced traders.

[Rruchi man]

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

Since you are not making profit, then obviously there is something wrong with your strategy, maybe not with determining market direction because it may be small pullbacks taking you out of the market before finally going the direction you predicted, maybe it is a problem with your entry strategy, you are likely entering the market at the wrong time and that is why you are making losses.

When it comes to trading too, don’t become too overconfident in yourself because you have been successful in doing some other things online, the market does not care about your profile, it will humble you again and again until you learn.

[EL MOHA]

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

Since you are not making profit, then obviously there is something wrong with your strategy, maybe not with determining market direction because it may be small pullbacks taking you out of the market before finally going the direction you predicted, maybe it is a problem with your entry strategy, you are likely entering the market at the wrong time and that is why you are making losses.

When this happens all the time it simply means there is nothing like a strategy around rather the OP might be someone who enters the market because they think it should go into certain directions without any proper analysis, people have actually viewed trading as a lucky house like gambling where they sometimes just use their emotions to trade only, they simply long trade because they feel the market has stayed down for bit and doing like this is never Any strategy and almost all the time the market will be against you because there I no analysis behind your decision,

For me there is no strategy here and if there is then will say OP needs to drop that strategy or better still starts to look into the strategy again because there’s no actually strategy.

[coinlary]

Every time I open a position — whether long or short — the market immediately moves in the opposite direction.
Not after a few minutes… instantly.

It feels as if the market is “waiting” for me to enter before reversing.

How about just trading the opposite of your  analysis

Eazzy Monyyy huh!

Lol! That was btw, but the market isn't waiting for anything. It's just a coincidence that you always got caught up at a reversal point, unless you're in some sort of simulation, which doesn't add up .

Hence, it could be you're trying to scalp. The reversal in short time frames is as short as its name implies, so you could experience multiple reversals if you leverage high using a short time frame.

During the last two years, I have lost more than $40,000 in futures trading.
These losses pushed me into debt, and I now owe money to several people.

Now, imagine how much you could have made if you had just BUY and HODL it.
Sorry for your  loss though.

[BitMaxz]

I do trade regularly in futures, but not every day. I always trade when there's a potential high win rate position.

In your story, that's what I experienced before, where the market always wants to take you out immediately from the market. I was thinking before that they might be monitoring all my trades because they always hit my SL.

I fixed that issue because there are many big players out there who do stop-loss hunts. I do think in advance. If you know how the liquidity sweep works, you should be aware of those before you make an entry. Plus, I fixed my issue to drop my size and don't put a too tight SL because they can easily manipulate the price if they see you have a very tight SL.

Sometimes that's the opportunity to enter where your SL is supposed to be placed. Think smart because big players always do stop-loss hunt.

[AVE5]

But the moment I place an order, the price suddenly spikes or drops sharply against me and wipes my position almost immediately.

I don’t know if this is:

just bad luck,

normal market volatility,

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

Why I am confused

If only you'll first consider and agree with me that in as much as trading is a prediction market, it's likely to be attached with luck because at most times nomatter what highest of your strategies you applies in the market and how strongly your emotions maybe that you're sure of winning, if luck is not on your side, you'll fail.
So there's nothing you should be confused about Op else, you may keep getting it wrongly. Just know that your applied strategy didn't match with your predictions and if you are think winning in the is primarily on luck, there you'll get it wrong because you may end up trying just luck the luck without knowing that the volatility is ought to be a case studied before trading because you also don't lean your winning on luck but also what you strategies.

[maydna]

It seems you need to learn more about market analysis. From your story, you make a wrong analysis and choose the other side of the market move. If you have skills, you will not take action if you are not sure and will wait for more.

Perhaps trading is not for you so you need to figure out what other ways to make a profit. Investment for example. You don't need to focus on the analysis but only follow your plan to buy so you don't have to lose as you trade.

Learning trading is not easy and takes time. You can lower your capital to trade rush to without place your orders.

[slaman29]

That is purely psychological. How many trades did you do to see this? 100? 1000? Because anything below 1000 is a bad sample size You know, statistics, you need to be able to see replication of results.

$2000 is not 'small' I would say, btw

And check the spot history. Same as futures?

[Roseline492]

Have you learn anything about trading before? Or did you have any strategy in mind before you open those positions?, because if you went as a completely novice to the market it will be common to experience what have seen in those times you have open those positions, I don't have the skills to do trading but everybody both non and traders knows that trading has a lot of downs than ups so if you took the position with empty mindset or understanding it will be hard to expect anything. However if those  $2k and  $3k was the amount you use on each of your position don't you think it was much considering the trading level you are?.

[wozzek23]

You contradicted yourself by first saying that there is no greed or over-leveraging involved, and then you said that the market goes against you immediately and almost wipes your position out. How can your position get wiped if you are not over-leveraging?

Because a slight move of the coin or token you are trading is not going to liquidate your position if you are using low leverage and have no greed or are not chasing quick profits. So, either you are making all this up, or you are lying about not being greedy.

That being said, what you are experiencing is nothing abnormal; the market has to move in one direction every second, so if you are making a trade and the market is moving against you immediately, it doesn't mean anything. If that's causing problems for you and you are constantly getting liquidated because of this, then you should refrain from using large leverage, so that small market movements against your trade doesn't get it liquidated and you should get more time.

[rbynxx]

Every time I open a position — whether long or short — the market immediately moves in the opposite direction.
Not after a few minutes… instantly.

It feels like you need to include here the exchange you trade with as well as your username so we can counter trade you and it will be us that will be profitable lol. To be honest, just plan your targets set S/L and T/P and don't watch the market while you place your orders because the sudden pumps and dumps will surely make you emotional.

Well, it looks like you're leaving for good. Take it as a lesson and if ever you step into it again, you're now ready and got more experience than ever before or invest more on knowledge that will make it enhance your trading journey. It's just an expensive lesson though after all these years your trading with futures.

[rat03gopoh]

Every trader experiences this, and I don't think it's unusual in the crypto market.

• OP, can't you even afford a $1 loss?
• What timeframe do you use to monitor the charts when you have an open position(s)?
• What leverage do you typically use, and what percentage of your total account balance (not total wealth) is each entry??
• Are your entries based on analysis or just FOMO?
• How frequently do you trade daily?

I hope you can answer the above questions, OP. I think this is a psychological issue in trading.

[Jatiluhung]

What happened to me

Every time I open a position — whether long or short — the market immediately moves in the opposite direction.
Not after a few minutes… instantly.

It feels as if the market is “waiting” for me to enter before reversing.

This has happened many times, even when my position size was small (around $2,000 to $3,000).
No greed, no over-leveraging, no chasing trades.
Just normal entries.

But the moment I place an order, the price suddenly spikes or drops sharply against me and wipes my position almost immediately.

I don’t know if this is:

just bad luck,

normal market volatility,

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

This is a common experience felt by every beginner when they start futures trading. Even in the spot market, the same thing happens. I experienced this situation when I first started learning about crypto trading. But I learned and tried to understand market patterns more carefully and waited for the right moment to enter (not rushing in), and that helped me get out of that situation. I even learned from someone who could be considered my mentor in trading. From there, I began to understand where I was going wrong. And actually, it's not that the market is waiting for us to enter and seems to always be against us there. But we are being influenced by the psychology of the market itself. I forget the term for it. But if you ask all futures traders, most of them have probably experienced the same situation you described. When you go long, the market seems to reverse direction, and vice versa. Actually, that only happens when we are impatient and don't wait for the right moment to enter. But personally, I don't trade much in the futures market. To be honest, it's more mentally exhausting. Trading in the futures market requires us to spend more time, especially if we use significant leverage. I prefer the spot market to the futures market.

[palle11]

I don’t know if this is:

just bad luck,

No. You need to use a shorter time frame to enter the market. That is the major correction you have to make.

normal market volatility,

Yes

or if I am doing something fundamentally wrong without realizing it.

Yes you are doing something wrong. If you make an order at the wrong time and at wrong direction, you will be burnt

Why I am confused

I previously succeeded in different projects and online businesses.
But in futures trading I lose everything the moment I step into the market.
The reaction is so fast and so direct that it makes me question whether this is common or if I'm missing something important.

Trading and other online business is not the same thing. Buying and selling are not operated the way futures is. Futures is controlled by unseen market forces beyond your control but to buy and sell products in demand and delivery are quite different from online futures trading.

[bangjoe]

I honestly don't know how you analyze before making a decision to go long or shirt on your trade...

First you have to understand that trading requires a calm mentality, maybe in other fields you are great because you have experience, but in trading you need a lot of time to build a calm mentality and good self-control.
I see you are too hasty to take a position before your analysis is on target, you must understand the technicals and assess the entry zone that you can take, of course, with the opportunities that you can get, after that have SL and TP settings to limit losses and also take profits, don't think about delaying it if it has reached the minimum upside target, then the time frame you use must match what you are analyzing, the shorter the trading time frame, the more volatile the candle.

You must know the price trend, although in altcoins you have to see in advance how bitcoin moves because it can affect the overall movement of altcoins, so it is necessary to pay close attention so that your trading can be calmer in the next few minutes.
In trading also do not take random positions, if you don't see an opportunity then it's better not to take any position, wait until you see a much better potential that you can maximize, a professional trading they don't trade every day, they trade only when there are opportunities that they can already see, otherwise, they just stand still and wait for market movements.

[Alphakilo]

You know you could opt for other types of trading or even spot trading and be almost immune to this much loss you have experienced so far, OP.
To trade futures takes guts because it involves buying or selling futures contracts at a certain price you think and at specific dates in the future, unless am getting it all wrong.
However, one great thing to always do is to try to prevent losses by practicing risk management effectively.

You have got to learn to control the leverage you use, try to use the emergency brake also known as stop loss, adopt the 1-2% rule, instead you could also diversify or hedge against a strong currency or hodl, but if still willing to stick to futures trading you could also do well not to forget to manage your margin effectively, because this is all it takes in risk management to stay on top and at least win some trades instead of always recording more losses than anticipated.

[crwth]

If you think that's strange, then you probably don't understand trading at all. Maybe you can check the different timeframes first, especially the lower ones, to see how much it moves per second. You would grasp the idea that it can move immediately on the opposite direction or in your bias side. It's always been like that.

Maybe find a resource first and understand how much change could happen and do not over leverage. Losing $40,000 is too much IMO and it shouldn't be like that. You could afford a lesson or a mentor with that kind of money.

Or stick to SPOT markets.

[Stepstowealth]

Losing $40,000 is too much IMO and it shouldn't be like that. You could afford a lesson or a mentor with that kind of money.

Some people interested in trading and have the money to actually afford a mentor or get good resources may think that they do not need to pay anyone and can learn trading on their own. The money they will loose in the process of trying to learn on their own will be a lot more than what they will loose if they actually have paid for good mentorship that do not only share lessons with them but also experience. After learning from a mentor, you will still loose some trades, but not as much as you would have on your own because a good mentor will teach you some key information on trading. To many persons who loose such an amount of money in trading, they may not be interested in trading anymore, some, this kind of huge loss will push them to try to learn trading the proper way.

[bettercrypto]

If you don’t know how to determine bias first, and you look at the structure you’re going to use for your analysis, you really won’t be able to make the correct entry in your trading operation. Because if you’re only relying on a single timeframe as your basis for action, no wonder you’ll always end up losing in actual trades.

As a trader, you should know how to determine the bias that is, understand what trend you’re reading on the chart. Once you’ve identified the bias, you then look at other timeframes to see what structures might play out. From there, you’ll also be able to determine where to enter in another timeframe. I hope you understand what I’m saying.

[LastKiss]

~snip~
Does anyone here trade futures regularly?
Have you experienced something similar — where the market reacts instantly against your position?
~snip~

Yesterday I tried to open a futures position while Bitcoin was hovering around $90k. My patience ran out because my gut told me it would sweep $87k first before moving up. So I closed at break-even and an hour later it pumped straight to $94k. I feel like, man.. if I just patience a little more. But remember, it’s not just you everyone feels like the market moves against their position sometimes. Some days are just bad trading days.

I also noticed you’ve taken a loss of more than $40k in futures. It might be a good idea to reduce your leverage or even step away from futures altogether for a while. The market has a way of hunting high-leverage positions.