TRU - In the Market (X Space) — ICT only

Date: 2026-08-27

ICT audio archive

TRU - In the Market (X Space) — ICT only

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[01:04:51] ICT: I was just listening to you. The only thing I heard when I came in was you were saying you have scar tissue and you have a lot of it. I don't know what was said before that.

[01:05:12] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Yes, okay. We were talking about scar tissue and how experience in the market shapes where and how you choose to learn. In your compendium, you lay that out almost like a choose-your-own-adventure. Throughout the different series, the trader gets to choose what they want to pursue and how they want to learn.

But at the same time, you’re trying to provide them with the benefit of experience. That’s the scar tissue I’m referring to, Michael. Some of us require that scar tissue—we have to go through those experiences ourselves—but some people don’t. They appreciate not having to go through all of it because they can benefit from the wisdom and foresight they get from listening to your mentorship.

Context Before Entry Mechanism

[01:06:13] ICT: Well, that’s an interesting take on it. I used to read those books as a kid where there were different pathways throughout the book. If you chose something for the character you were reading about, it would take you in a different direction. That’s an interesting way of looking at it.

But it is a very interactive and individual pursuit. I give you the tools, but I also give you a framework for how to take those tools and put them in their proper place and perspective. You don’t need a whole lot of stuff. Unfortunately, everybody who comes in thinks they have to do everything. They have to bring all these things together to make it work, and you don’t need that.

You just need to know where the market is likely to go. How should the market behave today? Is it likely to draw higher or lower? Is the economic calendar showing things that are conducive for price to behave in a way that supports higher or lower prices? What did the previous session do? How did it behave? Where is it obvious that they want to take liquidity? Then you simply need an entry mechanism.

It could be as simple as buying strength after price takes out a swing low when you think it’s going higher. Find a 15-second or 30-second swing high, put a buy stop above it, use the lowest intraday low, trade one micro, and you’ll make money with that. It’s not complex.

The hard part is getting everybody who comes to me to understand that you have to know what you’re looking for. That’s basically what you’re describing as well. What are you trying to do? Are you trying to be a day trader? Are you trying to trade once or twice a week? Are you trying to put something on that allows you to hold for a day or two? Are you holding for a couple of months as a position trader?

It depends greatly on what you’re trying to become. All of it is accessible. Nobody has any limitations placed on them. But you need to make a determination in the beginning, at least as a starting point: Where am I right now coming into trading?

A lot of people want to be day traders because they think those are the only people who make money. That’s not true. Day trading is for people who don’t want to hold risk for very long, know what they’re looking for, and want to get in, get out, and be done. But it doesn’t really gel with most people because, number one, you have to be comfortable in your own skin.

That means knowing what it feels like to be in a trade without the outcome being certain and submitting to that uncertainty. Over time, you become hardened by it. You become calloused to it. In the beginning, you’re soft-bellied. Everything hurts, everything stings, everything feels prickly. It’s like rubbing against a cactus. It’s not pleasant, and you have to condition yourself to go through that.

Over time, that callus develops. You say, *“Okay, my model says this. Even though my emotions would’ve told me the opposite months or years ago, the model says this, the rules say this, the order flow says this, and I’m not going to back down from what I’m adhering to. If I get stopped out, that’s okay, because I know this model isn’t broken simply because I took a stop loss.” *Simple as that.

So there are a whole lot of things that make this very expensive. Even though my material is free, it’s very expensive. It’s expensive because you have to spend a lot of your own time figuring out what makes you tick and what you’re actually pursuing.

It’s very quick and easy for someone else to say, “I’m going to help you. I’m going to go through all the videos for you and give you what works.” But that’s their interpretation of what works. That’s what works for them.

I have students who use pieces of everything I’ve taught. I don’t have many students who use everything the way I do. I have students who do exceptionally well with specific PD Arrays, and they’re not even the popular ones.

So you have to spend time figuring yourself out. What makes you self-destruct? What gets you motivated? What keeps you motivated? What are you looking for in the marketplace after you’ve been doing this for three months? Has it changed? Has it grown into something different? Are you stretching the boundaries of what you initially wanted to do and were already capable of doing because now you want to grow?

Well, growth has growing pains, and you have to condition yourself through them.

So it’s expensive even though you’re not spending money. It’s expensive because it takes effort and time, and you don’t get encouragement from yourself except through your journal.

[01:11:15] Rick T(@RIC_T_): Crash Party, I have a question since you’re there. I was comparing my charts between RTH and ETH, and I noticed something while I had multiple charts open and was looking at the NDX.

Using a 7-hour candle on RTH with the NQ contract, I’m able to visualize something similar to a daily candle. It’s not exactly a daily candle because RTH only has about 6 hours and 45 minutes, but when I look at it that way, I can see all these gaps on the chart being utilized.

Then I realized I couldn’t get the same kind of weekly-chart visualization from that. It reminded me of the November 2025 lesson where you showed how people trade stocks, which are full of gaps, and then you switched back to the weekly chart.

So I designed a script for myself—a TradingView indicator—that creates weekly candles based specifically on the RTH chart. That allows me to visualize things like PD Array inefficiencies that otherwise wouldn’t be visible on TradingView, or probably on other platforms either.

Do you think I’m investing my time properly by doing that, based on your experience?

[01:13:06] ICT: I don’t think the best way to pursue your study is by asking me whether you should do it, even though you’re looking to me as a mentor. I haven’t examined every possible thing on every time frame. I don’t have the time to do that. So if I were to tell you, “No, you shouldn’t do that,” that would be disingenuous as an instructor because you may find something useful by doing exactly what you’re describing. I’ll readily admit that I don’t do it, but I don’t want you to become discouraged and think, “Well, he doesn’t do it and doesn’t think it’s good, so I’m not going to pursue it.”

Studying Price Action Deeply

[01:13:45] You may discover that what you’re doing doesn’t ultimately produce the result you originally expected, but in the process you may uncover something else—an answer to a question you had that you couldn’t quite resolve. Sometimes deeper study of price action gives you answers to questions you weren’t even trying to solve.

I have many examples of that in my own journal work, and students still report the same thing to me today. I have 2016 Charter Members emailing me saying, “You’re not going to believe this, but I was just monkeying around with this, that, and the other thing, and I found something that answered a question I’d never really been satisfied with.” Maybe when I originally taught the concept, it didn’t quite give them what they were looking for. But later, by studying price action more deeply and seeing certain behaviors repeat, they found the answer themselves.

So I don’t want to discourage you simply because I honestly don’t do what you’re describing. Whatever is motivating you to explore it, do it and see where it takes you.

There’s no wasted time when you’re studying price action and looking at things like liquidity, time of day, how price books, how it defends certain levels through discount sensitivity and premium sensitivity, and all those related ideas. If you’re studying the market generically through that lens, there’s never wasted time. Ever. There’s no wasted time doing that.

[01:13:45] ICT: You may find that what you’re doing doesn’t ultimately yield what you originally thought it would, but in the process you’ll discover things you didn’t understand before. You may have open-ended questions—something you’ve been struggling with and can’t quite figure out—and then, because you’re pursuing deeper study of price action, you’ll suddenly find an answer to something you weren’t even looking for.

I have many examples of that in my own journal work, and students still report the same thing to me today. I have 2016 Charter Members emailing me saying, “You’re not going to believe this, but I was just monkeying around with this, that, and the other thing, and I found something that answered a question I’d never really been satisfied with.” Maybe when I originally talked about it, they didn’t quite get the answer they were hoping for. But then they started seeing certain things occur on the chart and found the answer themselves.

So I don’t want to discourage you simply because, in all honesty, I don’t do what you’re describing. Whatever is motivating you to pursue it, just do it and see where it takes you. There’s no wasted time when you’re studying price action and looking at things like liquidity, time of day, how price books, how it defends certain levels through discount sensitivity and premium sensitivity, and all those related concepts. If you’re studying the market generically through that lens, there’s never wasted time doing that. Ever.

[01:15:21] Rick T(@RIC_T_): Thank you. And one more thing. I’ve been spending quite a bit of time studying the Charter content, particularly Model 5, where you use standard deviations and related measurements. I’ve reached a point where the standard TradingView Fib tool isn’t enough, so I coded my own standard deviation tools.

I’ve been measuring both the consolidation, which is the basis of Model 5, and specific times associated with reversals. When you overlap those standard deviations, you start seeing something similar to wave interference in physics. Imagine throwing two small rocks into a pond. Each creates its own ripple, and where those waves overlap, you get interference and areas where the crests converge. I’m seeing something similar to what you explain in Model 5.

I’m finding these confluences on the charts, and they’re appearing right around subsequent market reversals. It’s very interesting to investigate and study.

I also remember asking you on November 25th about Model 5 and how we would convert those pips into points. I eventually found the answer. It was buried in about three seconds of something you said in the Core Content. If someone is really paying attention, the answer is there—you explain how to do it.

Is Model 5 something you would consider teaching more about? Because it’s fascinating to study and work with.

[01:17:31] ICT: Yes. Hopefully we’ll start seeing more movement in Forex, because I’d like to go back to covering that market. Right now, it’s just not all that exciting. I suppose that may change soon, but I was hoping it would be busier than it is.

It needs more volatility. It needs to move around more. Right now, it’s basically efficiently delivering, and there isn’t a whole lot of inefficiency. Because of that, trading index futures is more my cup of tea. Even when it’s ugly, it’s still volatile.

There simply isn’t enough volatility in Forex right now to justify sitting there and talking about it because the ranges are too small. I’m not interested in doing that at the moment.

But I fully intend to go back to it because I need to close that book on Forex and how those tools are used for the Charter Members. Then everybody else will get to benefit from it as well.

[01:18:37] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): So the edge traders have from reading OHLC and being able to take measurements the way we do—that’s something people can’t take away from you once you know how to do it. That’s the beauty, the magic, and the mystery of how difficult trading is. But once you have it, once you know what that tastes like, seeing it in the hands of other people is beautiful. That’s one of the great things about a Colin show: bringing people together, talking about trading, and sharing this knowledge base and these tools.

One of my favorite tools is really looking at the 18:00 price and how much we displace below that from the weekly open, then measuring that distance and seeing how much of it ultimately becomes a wick. Then you see what happens with those gaps and that massive expansion higher. That was difficult too. That was a difficult price run for any intraday trader to engage with, Michael. They didn’t make it easy, but it’s textbook according to the schematics you’ve taught in Core Content Month 6, which deals more with swing trading.

Not everything has to be the High Probability Trading and intraday material from Month 8. It comes down to the individual and their personality and whether they’re suited to swing trading. The idea of swing trading, as you’re saying, is using a very small amount of leverage and then allowing the position to move in the anticipated direction over a higher time frame. That may be the type of trader some people actually are, while they’re busy trying to find themselves intraday when they may not be intraday traders at all. That’s the beauty of what you do—you help people discover and guide them toward becoming the type of trader they want to become.

Why One-Minute Charts Matter

[01:20:48] ICT: Well, the added benefit of teaching with intraday charts is this: you’ll hear people out there say silly things because they’ve never met someone who trades ES and NQ every day, all day, so they don’t believe it’s possible. Yet there are people literally bringing their receipts forward every single day, cash positive in real brokerage accounts.

Even if intraday trading doesn’t fit your personality, even if it doesn’t feel like what you want trading to become as a career, it’s still absolutely beneficial to study it. Whatever we’re doing on the lower time frames—sub-1-minute, 1-minute, under 15 minutes, under 4 hours—it’s the same stuff you’re going to see on a daily chart. It’s the same thing we’re looking at on a weekly chart.

It’s very frustrating when I see new people come in and think, “He only talks about NQ. He only talks about futures. He doesn’t talk about gold, so I don’t think it works in gold.” Then they want me to do tricks for them in gold.

Gold is an event-driven market. I couldn’t care less about gold. You can go out there and do the same things I’m doing with NQ in gold. The same thing. Despite people coming forward and saying you can’t do it, you can. But you have to know what you’re doing first. If you don’t know what you’re doing, clearly it’s not going to work in your hands.

So when you’re studying price action on a 1-minute time frame, forget the concern that it isn’t a time frame you could realistically sit in front of all day. That doesn’t matter. What you’re studying on the 1-minute chart gives you so many examples. You’re compressing what simply can’t be compressed as efficiently when you’re studying daily or 4-hour charts.

On a 1-minute chart, you have dozens of opportunities every day—dozens of observations you can make. Whereas if you’re trying to learn as a short-term trader using a daily chart, man, that’s a slow crawl. I tried it that way, folks. I tried.

I felt like I was missing all these opportunities to learn because I had to wait for the entire daily candlestick to close. I’d be out there working, filling vending machines and coffee machines, stressing about how that candle was going to end for the day. Back then, it was open, high, low, and close bars.

It doesn’t give you enough information to make the journey as fruitful. Sure, you can study old books and old charts, but it’s not the same. It’s not the same as watching these candles—or bars, if you still use them—being birthed.

When that candle opens, it’s born. Then you get to watch its entire lifespan unfold in 60 seconds. In those 60 seconds, you get a storyline telling you about that candlestick’s family tree—what preceded it, how it’s going to grow and flourish, and what it’s going to do.

Is it going to become a noteworthy candle that sends price aggressively higher, where everybody looks back and talks about the price run that one candlestick started? Or is it going to mark the end of something that’s already been underway?

You have all of these observations available to pursue. It builds you as a trader, it builds you as an analyst, and it builds you as a tape reader. Those three things have to be in agreement when you sit down and watch price action.

It doesn’t matter what school of thought you use, whether it’s mine or somebody else’s. Without the benefit of studying short-term time frames, you’re creating a situation where your learning curve is much longer than it needs to be.

I wasted two years messing around on higher-time-frame charts and not going down to the lower time frames enough. My best learning came from the 1-minute time frame. I learned the most about price action through the lens of a 1-minute chart.

And there are going to be people out there arguing, saying, *“Don’t listen to this guy. Don’t do this. Don’t do that.” *Whatever, dude.

[01:25:14] ICT: I’m bringing it. I’m showing you that this stuff works. I use the same logic all the time, and I’m doing it on a 1-minute time frame.

[01:25:20] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Michael, for what it’s worth, within the community we refer to the 1-minute as Base 1. To echo what you’ve said in the past, for any naysayer, Base 1 is where you’re watching and seeing the market in high definition as it’s occurring in its 1-to-1 relationship with price and time. Period. That’s it. Base 1.

You really can’t do anything until you’ve spent at least a semester’s worth of time understanding that. That’s a position I’ve defended within the community. People will say, “Kit, I just can’t do the 1-minute. I don’t know how you trade the 1-minute.” And I’m thinking, “I honestly don’t know how you don’t use the 1-minute.” I have the 1-minute zoomed in on a nice screen, and I can see everything in HD. But again, to your point, Michael, I think it’s important for the community to understand that Base 1 is where you’re going to spend a semester, or multiple semesters, learning time and price.

FVGs Require Market Context

[01:26:20] ICT: The difficulty comes when people try to trade before they know how to read price action. That’s what they’re really saying when they say, “It doesn’t work,” “I can’t make it work,” or “It’s too complicated.” They haven’t studied enough. They haven’t done any backtesting. They have no idea what they’re looking for.

They see an imbalance and think, “If price goes down there, I’m going to buy it,” even though the market may be primed to sell off and reaching for a New Week Opening Gap 300 handles below where we are. But they see one up-close candlestick nestled between two other candles and naturally say, “That’s a Fair Value Gap. ICT would probably trade that.” So they push the button, try to get funded or pass a funded-account challenge, and they lose. Then they come to you, me, or one of my students who teaches and say, “This stuff doesn’t work. You’re all frauds,” when they never did anything to justify why they should have pushed the button in the first place.

Look at it this way.

[01:27:30] Imagine your physical body represents the monthly chart. You don’t feel right. Something is getting ready to create an imbalance in your life, or maybe you’re entering a new career that requires more physical exertion. So you go get a physical.

The physician looks at you. No obvious broken bones. You didn’t limp coming in. You didn’t complain about anything. Then they take your temperature. That’s the weekly chart—a little more information. They check your pulse. That’s the daily chart. Take a deep breath. Breathe in, breathe out. Great.

But then they order blood work and a urine sample. Where do you have to go to get that information? Below the daily chart. You have to zoom in with greater and greater magnification. Are there problems in the blood work? Is there an issue with the urinary tract? Is there blood in the urine? What’s the glucose doing? You can’t see those things from the outside, even though they may be much more important than what someone outwardly looks like.

There are people who are seriously sick, but you’d never know it by looking at them. Things are happening internally that haven’t manifested outwardly yet. So when people say you shouldn’t look at a 1-minute chart, they’re neophytes. You pity them because they don’t know that they don’t know yet, and arguing with them makes you a fool.

I might have fun sporting with them and teasing them, but when you encounter someone like that, simply ask, “What are you doing with it? What have you actually done with it?” Usually the conversation ends there. Or maybe they actually have something to contribute, and then it becomes a worthwhile conversation.

The 1-minute chart is absolutely essential.

Imagine you show up at Dr. ICT’s office. “Come in. Sit down. Piss in the cup. Give me your finger; I’m taking your blood.” I’m getting right to the point. You guys say I don’t get to the point—I’m already there. 1-minute chart. I need to know what’s going on.

I’ll know the pulse because I’m looking at the 1-minute chart. I know the blood work of the market. Is it bullish? Is it bearish? What does it want to go after? I can study the white blood cells of price action and how they’re going to attack foreign material in the blood.

Where do we find that? Above old highs and below old lows.

Price reaches out there, grabs that liquidity, and consumes it. I don’t need to monkey around on the higher-time-frame charts because I know my way around the body of a candle relative to price and time. It’s as simple as that, folks.

But when you complicate it by saying, “You shouldn’t do this,” or “I can’t do this,” the reality is that you just can’t do it right now. You can if you spend enough time doing it. I couldn’t do it either.

What you see me doing today? There’s no way in the world you could’ve told me when I was 20 years old that I’d eventually be able to do that. I didn’t think it was possible.

But when you say, “I don’t believe it. It’s not possible,” you’re right. Because with that mindset, it’s not possible for you.

[01:32:32] NikkiD (@NikkiDouglas8): Oh, Kit, mate, sorry. I’m on. Can you hear me, Kit?

[01:32:35] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Yeah, we can hear you. You had your hand up. I wasn’t sure if you had a question.

[01:32:38] NikkiD (@NikkiDouglas8): I did, mate, yeah. Michael, lovely to speak to you, mate, and great to hear what you were just saying as well. If you’d listened earlier, I was rattling on about how if you tell yourself you can’t do it, 100 times out of 100 you can’t do it because you put—

[01:32:53] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Hello? Oh yeah, no, we’re good. We’re good.

[01:32:55] NikkiD (@NikkiDouglas8): Sorry, mate. I thought I was getting a bit of feedback. What I wanted to ask is, when I’m grading all my ranges now, or inefficiencies, whatever I’m working with, I’m making sure I put the -0.5 level on the Fib. Ever since the lecture you did on the opening range—sorry, not the opening range—the first hour. What do you call it, Michael?

[01:33:28] ICT: First Hour’s Dealing Range.

[01:33:31] NikkiD (@NikkiDouglas8): Dealing Range, there you go. Ever since I watched that video, I’ve been obsessed with how you’re projecting that -0.5 level. Sorry if you can hear my dog barking in the background.

I also watched a recent video lecture today where you were projecting it again for the highs and lows of the day, and I just wanted to clarify something. I’ve only watched it once and need to watch it again, but while you’re here, I might as well ask since I have the opportunity.

The range you’re marking out with the Fib—is it that you get the initial Judas Swing off the 9:30 open, and then use the first pullback to define the range? I think that might have been it because I tried it today and got quite close to the high.

Range Projections and Liquidity

[01:34:23] ICT: The scope of answering that would require an entire chapter of discussion for when we’re looking for the high of the day, and another chapter for the low of the day. But I’ll say this: there’s a lot of understanding involved in terms of narrative—how price should book based on whether you think it’s reaching for buy-side or sell-side liquidity.

You’re using the previous London session, you’re using the 7:00 to 9:00 a.m. range, and you’re looking for any range that’s really smooth—almost like a block of price action. If you go back to what I taught in the Core Content with Forex, where I discussed standard deviations using the Asian Range, FLOUT, Central Bank Dealers Range, and those types of things, you’re waiting for very specific characteristics to show their hand in price action.

Once they’re present, you’re simply measuring an outer boundary level that price should reach for. What that does is completely close out any pending orders above relative equal highs or a single high, or below relative equal lows or a single low. They’re actively purging liquidity, and price is going to reach that far out.

On large event days, it can extend to 1 standard deviation or 1.5 standard deviations. Beyond that, you’re talking about something like FOMC or Trump coming out and jawboning, where they use that as a catalyst. It’s not that he moves the market himself, but they’ll use it as an excuse to rip price in the opposite direction and knock everybody out.

On those days, you’re not going to know the exact extreme. You may have an idea of where price could go, but sometimes it’ll extend beyond that. If you don’t understand that, you’ll feel like the model doesn’t work simply because price exceeded the projection.

It’s going to take some time for me to teach these things. What you’ve seen recently was basically me flexing on the people who talk about me, while also trying to keep you guys encouraged because I have a lot more material. But it takes some lecturing to bring all of these concepts together.

This isn’t something where I can give you one or two paragraphs and say, “Here’s what you do, and it works like this every time.” There are specific conditions you have to look for. It’s an if-then process: if price does this, then you look at this. If that does what we’re expecting, then you use this and measure this range—or you measure that range.

The logic itself is simple, but I have to explain all of those conditions. I couldn’t articulate it properly in a short conversation here, or even in one single video.

[01:36:54] NikkiD (@NikkiDouglas8): Right, okay. I can see how it’s giving you an area to work with. Like you just said, you have to consider what happened in the previous session—whether it consolidated or trended—and then bring all of those pieces together. I suppose it’s really about assembling the puzzle.

I mainly wanted to clarify it because the precision you have with that is what blows my mind. You took that one pullback, knew that was the range you wanted to measure, and then price hit the -0.5 level. So obviously there’s something significant about those levels.

[01:37:31] ICT: There is.

**[01:37:32] NikkiD **(@NikkiDouglas8) The standard deviations. Right. Well, I’m going to dig even deeper into it now than I was before. Thank you very much, mate. I really appreciate it. And while I’ve got you, for everyone listening, I’d just like to say thank you on behalf of all of us for everything you do. Awesome. Thank you. Thanks a lot, Paul.

[01:37:54] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): One thing we were also saying earlier, Michael, is that everyone can look at the same chart and see something different. There was a young man talking about wanting to explain to his parents how passionate he is about price action. I think your material and the work you’ve provided make it possible for someone to genuinely say, “I see something different in the chart than other people see,” and that has everything to do with the amount of work they’ve put into your concepts.

For someone trying to explain that to their parents, part of the conversation was: have them sit down and listen to one of your lectures. To them, it’s probably going to sound like a calculus class. They won’t understand a word. Then explain, “This is something I’m genuinely passionate about. I’m not just randomly staring at charts. I see something here that other people don’t see, and I want to focus on learning it more deeply.” I don’t know if you want to speak on that, but it came up earlier and it was an interesting conversation about how someone might communicate that passion to their parents.

[01:39:36] ICT: Listening to you describe that, something jumped into my head, and I have to be thankful to the Lord. When I lost my grandfather, he was allowed to stay long enough to watch me graduate and walk across the stage. Six months later, cancer took him. Cancer is ugly. It devours you.

Looking back now, I’m actually thankful that my father was in prison and didn’t have much influence over me. I had different men in my life at different times—father figures, stepfathers, my uncle, obviously, who introduced me to trading. If my grandfather had still been alive when I was 20 years old and starting out—November 5th, 1992, sitting at 9:00 p.m. on my Aunt Barb’s couch in the family room, opening a trading book for the first time—I believe he would’ve talked me out of it.

I fell in love with the idea immediately. I didn’t know what I was going to do or how I was going to do it, but I knew that was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I felt like I was home. I had never had a job where I felt like that.

But if I had told my grandfather what I was going to pursue, his perception probably wouldn’t have allowed him to see the opportunity. He worked at Essex Lumberyard, moving lumber all day, making less than $300 a week. If I had told him, “I’m going to look at charts and learn to predict where price is likely to go,” he would’ve said, “That’s gambling. Don’t do that.”

And because I was very obedient to him, I would’ve listened. If I was outside playing and he called for me, I came running. Whatever he said carried weight with me. So I know he would’ve had enormous influence over me, and I probably never would’ve followed this path.

Even though my uncle had been talking about trading when I was 13 or 14 years old at Sunday dinners at my grandmother’s house, my grandfather’s influence still would’ve mattered. My uncle was like a broken record. You think I repeat myself? He always said the same thing: “Get yourself a good job.” He was an electronic technician for Westinghouse, worked on radar systems, saved his money, and traded on the side. He was already an adult and out on his own when he did it. Nobody was there telling him not to.

Once my grandfather was gone and I started reading about trading, I realized, “This is the same stuff my uncle used to talk about.” I could see how everything connected.

That’s why I tell you this. If you let your parents hear this part of my talk, they may look at you and say, “This guy sounds shady. Don’t listen to him.” But remember: you didn’t pay me. I’m not holding you hostage. I don’t ask anything from you except that you make an honest effort to study what I’m teaching. Either you see it in price action and it inspires you to continue, or you don’t. If you don’t, go do something else. Don’t touch it. That much costs you nothing.

I understand why people want to tell their parents. I grew up around friends who had both parents; I didn’t have that. So I can imagine how important it might feel to say, “Look at me. I’m getting ready to do something, and if I succeed, it’s going to be amazing. You’re going to be proud of me.”

But now, as a parent myself, I understand the other side too. My kids will tell me they want to invest in something, like Pokémon cards. Caleb had almost every Pokémon card when he was younger, then we moved and they disappeared. Who knows what those cards would be worth now? But today, if he tells me he wants to put more money into Pokémon cards, the dad in me says, “Don’t do that.” I might be wrong. Maybe they’ll explode in value. But as a parent, my instinct is to protect him from something I don’t understand or don’t trust.

So when you’re pursuing trading and you feel that urge to tell your mom, your dad, or even your spouse about it. Don’t.

[01:44:33] ICT: Because number one, unless they’re already doing exceptionally well in life, they’re probably not going to see it the way you do. They’re not going to look at it and think, “You’re striving for success.” Just like when people talk about the lottery, most people immediately say, “Nobody wins that. Don’t waste your money.” They’re going to respond from their own comfort zone, and because you’re their child or someone they love, they’re going to try to talk you out of it. They don’t want to watch you lose money and then have to help pull you back out of depression afterward.

So telling your parents, your loved ones, or your coworkers what you’re going to do is mistake number one. They’re not going to see it the way you do, and you’re going to spend more time trying to sell the idea to them than studying, becoming a better trader, becoming a better analyst, and becoming a better tape reader. I don’t think it’s a good decision to tell anybody what you’re doing.

And as a father, I can hear myself saying that and think, “Well, that sounds a little shady. Who cares more about my kid—you, ICT, or me as the parent?” Clearly, you do. You’re the one feeding them. If they’re outside in the cold, you’re bringing them into your house. They’re not coming to mine. I have plenty of rooms, but you’re not sleeping here.

If you’re deciding whether to tell your parents or loved ones what you’re pursuing, not telling them has a major benefit. The downside is basically the same either way. If you lose money, you lost money. They’re not going to reimburse you. But if you don’t tell them, it frees your mind from having to perform to some standard just to make them see it your way.

If you tell them, “This is what I’m learning,” now they’re going to hold you accountable because they love you and don’t want to see you get scammed or hurt. That’s honorable. That’s exactly how I feel about my kids. But there’s no harm to you if you’re not using real money, because that’s exactly what I tell you not to do. Don’t use real money. Learn how to read price action. Don’t rush to make money. That’s where people make mistakes. They think they’re ready before they are.

When you’re actually ready, you won’t be lying awake at night excited about opening an account. You’ll simply know, “I’ve been doing this long enough. It works in my favor more often than it doesn’t. When I make a mistake, I don’t lose my edge and I don’t lose my mind over it. Losses are realistic. They’re going to happen sometimes.” You don’t need to share those decisions with everybody else.

Think of the thing you’re building as a sole proprietorship. You don’t have a board of directors. Your parents aren’t board members. If you’re an adult, they’re not part of your company. But the human side of us wants to bring everybody in like it’s some kumbaya moment around the fire roasting marshmallows. That’s not how it works. They’ll be asking, “Why are you putting that in the fire? You’re going to burn yourself. Don’t eat that.” They’ll give you every reason not to have the s’more.

And that can cheat you out of a wonderful experience. Trading shouldn’t be consumed every single day either. Just like a s’more isn’t part of a healthy daily diet, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying one occasionally. Trading needs to be guarded.

That’s also why you don’t owe these jackasses on the internet anything. “Show me your P&L. Show me your statements. Show me this. Show me that.” Go look at Rips. The guy literally shows his AMP account, logs in, shows his P&L, and still gets flak. People still come after him. Why? Because that’s human nature. Some people simply can’t accept evidence.

That’s why I’ve never felt inclined to do all of that. I don’t need to prove it that way. My money isn’t your money. Your passion, your direction, and even your decision to pursue this are nobody else’s business. That includes your spouse, provided you’re not risking the money you jointly own as a married household.

If you’re simply learning, then from their perspective it’s a hobby. They don’t know what you’re doing when you’re staring at these charts. If your spouse looks over your shoulder and asks, “What are you looking at?” you can simply say, “I’m looking at these charts and trying to understand what these guys on the internet are talking about. I’m seeing if there’s anything to it.” That’s it. Completely diffused.

Now compare that with saying, “I’m glad you asked, honey. This is how we’re going to buy our vacation home. Instead of saving for little Timmy’s college, I’m going to put some of that money into an account because this video says if I make 6% a month, I can double the money. By the time Timmy goes to college, we’ll be retired and maybe he won’t even need college.”

Can you imagine how that conversation is going to go?Totally different.

So you have to learn how to manage the people around you, and unfortunately life doesn’t give you an instruction manual for that. That’s why listening to people who’ve been successful, who have already gone through these things and learned the hard way, can be valuable. When we say things like this, it can sound suspicious if family members hear it. It sounds like, “You’re getting ready to be scammed.”

But remind yourself: you’re not paying me. You’re not paying for anything. You’re not putting money into an account. You’re learning how to read price action.

It’s no different from watching people play football every week. They put on their little uniforms and chase a dead pigskin around while getting paid absurd amounts of money. You emotionally invest in those teams as if you’re somehow part of them. Sometimes you even bet on them. Why? Because you’ve watched one team play enough times against another that you believe the stronger team is going to win.

Trading is the same basic observation. **Where is price right now? Should it stay there or continue? If it’s going to continue, whose liquidity is it likely to attack next? Boom—next liquidity. **That’s the opportunity.

What time frame? That’s your decision. What entry model? That’s your decision. What liquidity? Whatever is on the chart that you’ve identified at the time.

But your skill and observation will never become as sharp if you’re constantly plagued by the opinions of your significant other or family. I can tell you this right now: I love my wife to death, but if I had been married to her while I was first learning, I probably never would’ve become ICT. Even today, she thinks this is basically a video game. It doesn’t matter how much money comes from it. To her, it doesn’t make sense, so therefore it’s a video game.

That’s why I’m telling you this. When you bring your development as a trader into your personal relationships and allow people to give input when they have no understanding of what you’re doing, what useful information can they really contribute? They aren’t motivated to study it themselves. They don’t know what we do here. They don’t even understand the language. Like Kit said, it may sound like calculus to them.

Maybe they never studied calculus. Maybe they did and forgot it. It doesn’t matter. Their opinion is still coming from the outside looking in.

This isn’t the same as saying, “I’m going to the gym. I want to lose 20 pounds and get healthier.” People will say, “Good for you. I hope you stick with it.” The next time they see you, they’re probably not going to say, “Hey, didn’t you say you were going to lose 20 pounds? I don’t see it.”

But when you tell people you’re going to make money, now you’re talking about doing something they may never have had the opportunity to pursue themselves. Life doesn’t teach these things. It doesn’t teach rich people’s plans or rich people’s ideas. And it certainly doesn’t normally give people someone teaching it for free and demonstrating the same logic every day.

So to conclude, my advice—and this is simply my opinion—is that if I were brand new, I wouldn’t tell anybody what I was pursuing.

Treat it like a hobby in the beginning. Look into it loosely with no expectations. Don’t hold yourself to some outcome. Just say, “Let me see what this looks like if I spend some time studying it.”

Then let the information and the evidence you observe become the thing that motivates you to continue.

[01:55:06] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): I love that, and I just want to build on what you’re saying quickly. If you’re going to come to the table, really focus on being a student. Instead of incorporating all these other people into what you call trading and trying to immediately identify yourself as a trader, approach it as an academic study, an opportunity for research and development.

That research and development eventually becomes research on yourself in a broader sense. But in the more immediate sense, when people are peeking over your shoulder left and right, if you’re not putting capital at risk, then you’re simply studying. And being a student is okay. Allowing yourself the time and effort required to be a student is also okay. I just wanted to add that because I think it builds on what you’re saying, Michael.

So, certainly. We’ve got Real Marcel FX. Good evening, buddy.

[01:56:25] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): Good evening, Michael. Based on what Michael was talking about, I want to explain my own situation. My parents supported me through school all the way through university. I graduated this year, and they have very high expectations for me. One reason is that I’m their only son, and here in Nigeria we have a family business that I’m expected to eventually take over from my father.

Growing up, I was involved in that business from a young age. I had a passion for it then and was always around it. But eventually I became interested in trading. I already had a passion for trading before I discovered ICT. I found ICT around 2020 or 2021 while I was still in school, but at the time I didn’t really have enough time to study properly. I traded with real money in 2020, and later someone really showed me how to use ICT concepts, so I started studying more seriously.

Now I’ve graduated and I’m back home living with my parents. As a young man in Nigeria, I feel like everybody is looking at me. I have a lot of responsibility on my shoulders. There’s this family business I’m supposed to take over. My sisters are involved in it, but I don’t have the passion for it anymore. Trading is what I’m passionate about. I’ll wake up at 3:00 a.m. to study and work on this.

So there’s a lot of pressure on me when it comes to choosing my own career. We’ve talked about it at home, and even when my dad says, “Okay, that’s fine,” I can still tell that he’s angry about it. My mom asks why I can’t just do what they expect. Sometimes I feel like I just want to move out, but I don’t have the resources to do that right now.

Another thing is that my dad recently gave me some money to start something for myself through trading, and that adds even more pressure. On top of that, last year I lost about $4,000 of my in-laws’ money. My younger sister is married, and there has been discussion that I’ll begin paying that money back next year.

All of it is eating me up. I’m trying to stay composed and do what I need to do, but I’m confused. I have a lot on my shoulders.

[01:59:37] ICT: Well, I can tell you this: you’re very fortunate to have a family business, and you’re fortunate to have parents who want to let you run the company. It doesn’t matter if you enjoy running the business. You’re providing a service not only for yourself but for your family, and you’re honoring your parents by doing what they want. They’re trusting you with their company.

I know a lot of entrepreneurs who run businesses they hate, but the businesses are profitable. It doesn’t make sense to throw that away because it’s guaranteed income. Having that business isn’t going to prevent you from trading if you know how to trade. It doesn’t keep you from being a trader.

I wouldn’t be in a hurry to walk away from a sure thing—a profitable business that your mother and father, who I’m sure are getting older, worked very hard to build. They want the comfort of knowing you’re going to honor them by taking care of what they built and entrusted to you. That kind of opportunity doesn’t fall into many people’s hands.

That’s security. It’s a very secure position to be in. You have your parents’ support, and they understand the business. If there are disagreements, you’ll have to find a way to communicate with them. But as far as becoming a trader while running the business, there’s nothing preventing you from doing both.

The second thing I’ll tell you: it sounded like you started learning about trading around 2022. Did I hear you correctly?

[02:01:32] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Yes, 2021, 2022.

[02:01:34] ICT: Okay. If you haven’t been profitable for a number of years, with each year making more money, you really had no business taking somebody else’s money under your wing to manage or trade with.

I understand the feeling because, as a young man, I wanted to get all my friends involved too. One of my aunts asked what I was doing and how I was affording everything, so I got her into trading. She opened an account, and I said, “Okay, we’re going to put a trade on.”

The first trade we took was a loss. Then we entered another trade that was profitable, but she didn’t know that yet. A statement arrived in the mail showing $1,500 less in the account. She spent a long time trying to get someone on the phone and eventually reached the trading desk.

She told them, “I want my money.”

They asked, “Do you want us to close the trade you’re currently in?”

She said, “What? I’m in a trade? Yeah, get me out of everything. I want all my money.”

So they closed everything and wired the money back to her. She freaked out because she couldn’t tolerate a loss. She exited a trade that would’ve made another $7,000 that day.

So I know what it feels like to want to help everybody, but you really can’t. It’s a good quality to want to help other people, but you have to know what you’re doing first.

Once you bring somebody else’s money into trading, they’re not going to have the same tolerance you have. If it’s your own money, you might be able to accept a loss or two. You might tolerate some drawdown.

But they’re not going to become—

[02:03:12] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): Michael, I got scammed. Sorry for cutting you short. I didn’t use the money to trade. I got scammed through Bybit while I was trying to sell the coin.

And regarding the family business, I’ve been involved in it for a very long time. Let me explain how difficult it is. You wake up at 7:00 a.m. and have to be there taking inventory, dealing with the warehouse, and everything else. Most days you don’t get back home until 9:00 p.m., sometimes 10:00 p.m. When you finally get home, you’re exhausted and your body aches. This isn’t something I want to spend my life doing.

I’ve told my dad, “This is how we could improve the business. This is how we could make things easier for you.” He has a warehouse and three shops, and I’ve suggested ways we could make everything more efficient. But my dad is stubborn, sorry to say. I’ve tried and tried to communicate with him. Everything is just—

[02:04:45] ICT: Well, I can say this: I don’t have all the answers for your situation. But what you just described—you have to be there at 7:00 in the morning? That sounds like 7:00 to 9:00 to me.

[02:04:56] You have to take inventory. That sounds like going through the price charts looking for PD Arrays. “What do I have to work with today? What do I have on hand right now?” That sounds like trading to me.

Then you said you don’t get home until 9:00 at night. That sounds like somebody trading Asia too.

When you start making money trading, guess what you’re going to start doing? You’re going to be working all the time. You’ll want to get up in the morning and trade London. You’ll be thinking about trading Asia. You’ll trade the New York AM session, the PM session, the afternoon, and the close. You’ll want to do all of it because you’ll see opportunities everywhere.

And you’ll be tired then too.

The difference is that you’ll be motivated because it’s something you want to do.

So the way you need to manage yourself is to find a way to make trading fit around what you already have going on. You’re helping your family, and you’re helping yourself even if you don’t realize it. You have obligations to your family. Your parents have trusted you with this responsibility.

Does the business make money?

[02:05:57] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): Yes, we do.

[02:06:03] ICT: Okay. Then that’s almost guaranteed income.

Trading, with whatever experience you currently have, is not guaranteed. There’s no guarantee that my next trade is going to pan out. None.

But when you’re running a profitable business, chances are there’s going to be revenue at the end of the week that you can live on.

When you’re so focused on, “I have to get out of this. This isn’t what I want to do,” you’re not looking at it from the perspective of being a family member and a son whose parents trusted him with something they built.

You should appreciate that, number one, because they love you and they’ve given you that responsibility. They didn’t give it to everybody. They gave it to you.

Sometimes we interpret that responsibility as punishment when it really isn’t. It’s an honor to be trusted with what you’re doing.

The fact that you’re uncomfortable doesn’t necessarily mean the business itself is the problem. You’re uncomfortable because you’re not also doing what you want to do.

Both can be accomplished, but you need to spend more time figuring out how to make trading work within the responsibilities and demands of your parents’ business and your role in it.

[02:07:25] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Wow, that was powerful, Marcel. What time frames are you trading right now? I’m asking because maybe there’s a way to separate your real-life obligations from your chart time. Could you come to the market at a different time where there would be fewer conflicts? Is that achievable?

[02:07:52] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): No, not achievable.

[02:07:57] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): So you’re saying that if you stay involved in the family business, you can’t be a trader?

[02:08:05] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): Precisely.

[02:08:08] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Well then, that sounds like a swing trader to me. You can never really be excluded from being a trader, mate. You just have to figure out what type of trader fits your life. The charts aren’t going anywhere, and you’re still going to see what you see in price. So could you see yourself becoming a swing trader while continuing to do what you’re doing now?

[02:08:30] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): Doing what I’m doing?

[02:08:36] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Yes, doing what you’re doing—working in your family’s business, which is obviously a priority. You’re not trying to shirk that responsibility, right?

[02:08:51] ICT: If I can cut in for a second, what markets are you trying to trade?

[02:08:59] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): I’m trading NQ right now, and I’m always trading the New York session, which is around 1:00 p.m. That was going to be my next question.

[02:09:07] ICT: What time is 9:30 a.m. Eastern Time in your local time?

[02:09:15] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx): That’s around 2:30 p.m.

9:30 Opening-Price Execution

[02:09:18] ICT: Okay, so here’s what you have to do: a Working-Class Hero Model. That means you’re going to trade with the smallest leverage possible. Whatever the smallest leverage available is, that’s what you’re going to use.

Wait for your analysis on the daily chart to tell you whether you think the market is going higher or lower. Then you’re aiming for a previous high or previous low based on whether you’re bullish or bearish. If you’re bullish, you’re looking for an old high. It could be yesterday’s high, last week’s high, or something similar, but it needs to be something above where price is right now.

Then at 9:30, it only takes a second. I don’t care what business you’re running. Your father and mother could be standing over your shoulder. You can pull out your phone and check the 9:30 opening price.

If you’re bullish, look at that opening price and wait 5 to 10 minutes to see whether price trades below it. If it does, place a buy stop 5 handles above the 9:30 opening price.

Then, if you get an alert on your phone that it filled—yes, you’re going to be— You there?

[02:10:34] ICT: Looks like somebody dropped off. Anyway, you’ll wait for an alert from your broker telling you that you got filled. Then you put your stop at the intraday low of the day and just let it cook.

If your analysis is right, you’re buying strength after price has already traded lower. That 9:30 opening price gives you the framework to do that with one micro, or the smallest equivalent position size available. Then you hold it for the rest of the day.

I don’t care what Trump tweets—you’re not going to get wrecked trading one micro. If one micro can wreck you, then you’re not sufficiently capitalized to trade. That may be another factor in your situation; I don’t know.

But this is the approach I tell people who come to me saying, *“I’m running a business. I’m a university student. I have a 9-to-5. I can’t afford to leave my job yet. What would you do if I can’t sit in front of the charts all day?” *I ask them one question: “Do you have a phone?”

[02:11:33] At 9:30, get the opening price. If you’re bullish, wait five or ten minutes and see whether price trades below that opening price. If it does, place a buy stop five handles above the 9:30 opening price and wait for the fill.

Once you’re filled, put the stop loss below the low of the day and let the trade go. If it stops you out, that’s a loss. You come back tomorrow and do the same thing.

If the situation you described means that’s all you can realistically do, then you’re dealing with the same limitation a lot of people in the United States deal with. They have jobs. They can’t sit in front of intraday charts all day, so they assume it’s impossible to participate or make money. That’s not true.

You just have to reduce your leverage and participate in a way that doesn’t require you to babysit every minor intraday fluctuation.

[02:12:24] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx) Thank you very much. That was very insightful.

[02:12:40] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): So, you think that helps, Marcel?

[02:12:46] Realmarcel_Fx (@Realmarcel_Fx) Yes, that helps. It really helps a lot. That’s probably what I’ll work toward. I’ve been trying something similar already. Usually I’ll look at the charts around 12:00 p.m. my time, which is about 7:00 a.m. Eastern, and then maybe again around 1:00 p.m. my time, which is about 8:00 a.m. Eastern.

The problem is that my dad hates seeing me on my phone looking at charts. If he comes over and sees me doing it, it irritates him. That’s really the issue.

[02:13:27] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Your dad gets really pissed when he sees you trading on your phone, doesn’t he?

[02:13:37] ICT: Then always excuse yourself to the bathroom. At 9:30, he’s not in the stall with you. And if he is, then you’ve got a different conversation to have with Dad.

[02:13:45] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): You just gotta take long shit breaks, buddy, right around 9:30. “I’ll be back.” It’s just the volatility at 9:30—you never know. You can make it work. Pippy’s got his hand up. What’s up, buddy? Pippi Banks.

**[02:14:04] Pippy Banks **(@BanksPippy): Hey, what’s up, guys? How we doing?

[02:14:07] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Excellent. How about yourself, buddy?

[02:14:09] Pippy Banks (@BanksPippy): Chilling, chilling. I’ll make this real quick. I’ve been trying to ask this question for the past couple of roundups. In regard to macros, Michael, you specifically say the last hour of trading has four macros, right? I’ve been trying to figure out what the fourth one is.

Obviously, you’ve gone over three of them a lot: 2:50 to 3:10, 3:15 to 3:45, and then Market on Close, 3:50 to 4:10. So what am I missing? Is the entire last hour, 3:00 to 4:00, considered one complete macro? Or are you looking at something more specific, like the bond market closing at 3:00, and using that as a macro because the bond market essentially moves everything? I’m just trying to get some clarification on that.

Final-Hour Macro Progression

[02:15:30] ICT: Yeah, that’s incorporated into the 2:50 to 3:10 macro. The bond close is incorporated into that.

But if you don’t get a reaction or a run based on the bond close, then you’re looking at 3:15 to 3:45. That’s the 30-minute window where we’re looking for something to set up for a run on liquidity.

If nothing materializes there, you’re looking at the last 20 minutes, 3:40 to 4:00. If nothing is moving between 3:40 and 3:50, then you know the final 10 minutes are going to be Murder on Close, and that’s where the move is going to occur. So there are your four macros.

[02:16:19] Pippy Banks (@BanksPippy): Okay, so you’re looking at 3:40 to the close, basically that last—

[02:16:26] ICT: Yeah. That’s the only one you didn’t mention, but that’s it.

[02:16:30] Pippy Banks (@BanksPippy): Yes. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you for the clarification.

[02:16:35] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Oh, saucy. Saucy conversation right there.

[02:16:41] ICT: It’s a matter of progression, though. That’s the main thing. The move could begin during the 2:50 to 3:10 macro and just start running from there. If there’s a rush to get all the business done for the day in that final portion of trading, it can start right then.

But if nothing really begins to materialize during that 20-minute window—the last 10 minutes of the 2:00 hour and the first 10 minutes of the 3:00 hour—then you move on.

Now you’re really hawking price between 3:15 and 3:45. Usually, something sets up really cleanly during that 30-minute window, and then price runs for the objective during the final 20 minutes.

[02:17:17] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): The 3:15 to 3:45 window—that impulse you taught in past lectures, past conversations, and some of the more nuanced material in your compendium—was definitely one I grabbed onto and kept as a trader. I highly suggest other traders do the same. There’s a lot that happens between 3:15 and 3:45.

Another one you’ve taught, Michael, that I don’t think enough people pay attention to is 1:10 to 1:40. These are macros you’ve already taught in previous lectures that people either forget or don’t recall. As your student, whenever someone cites or references these things, my reaction is simply, “Yeah, Michael already taught that.”

[02:18:21] ICT: I don’t want to call 3:15 to 3:45 a catch-all because technically it isn’t, but most of the time the framework for whatever is going to run out the final portion of Regular Trading Hours is going to form inside that window.

If nothing is really in play or properly set up by 3:45, then you’re already inside that 3:40 to 4:00, 20-minute window. And if nothing happens between 3:40 and 3:50, then you know what’s likely coming in the final 10 minutes. It’s going to become a flurry—price rushing toward the high or low that’s been formed or left outstanding.

So think of it like a countdown. The earlier the move begins setting up, the larger and more prolonged the move can be. If it starts during the 2:50 to 3:10 macro, it can continue all the way into the close. You know those days where you think, “There’s no way it can keep going,” but price just keeps running higher and higher, or lower and lower? Those moves generally begin around the 2:50 to 3:10 macro.

But most of the time—around 80% of the time—you’re going to see the 3:15 to 3:45 p.m. macro establish the framework for the move into the close. The setup is usually found inside that 30-minute window, from a quarter past 3:00 to a quarter before 4:00.

If it still hasn’t materialized by then, you’re already in the final 20 minutes. That tends to supercharge the last 10 minutes. Whatever move you’re going to get will be fast, sudden, and you may only get one opportunity to participate.

Whereas with the 2:50 to 3:10 or 3:15 to 3:45 macros, you may get a couple of different opportunities to engage with the move.

[02:20:08] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): So one kind of cascades in one direction, and then the other one takes it out. That’s kind of what I heard you say.

[02:20:19] ICT: Yeah. If nothing is materializing by 3:50, then you know it’s going to be a real quick flash in the pan. Boom, boom, boom. It’s done. Real quick, sudden—there it is. But if price starts running off the framework established during the 2:50 to 3:10 macro, then it can become a sustained price run that just keeps going. Then you’ll get the final blow-off of a move that’s already been running throughout the entire final hour of trading, from 3:00 to 4:00. So it’s a matter of measuring what you’re expecting to see. Where’s your draw? That’s what you’re looking for the entire time.

[02:20:53] It may not be clear to you. It may not be obvious. But the more time you spend studying that final hour, you’ll see that it’s really saving the best for last. That’s what it’s doing. And it’s going to target somebody that needs it. They need a humbling. Obviously, this isn’t something you’re going to see happen exactly like this every single day. But the framework I just outlined is what I’m using whenever I’m studying the final hour.

[02:21:24] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): That’s a great schematic, the way you described it. And Pippi, great question. Charter is always reaching for advanced concepts, looking for more chapters and layers to this. Michael, you know this—every time Pippi comes in, he’s coming Charter deep. He’s not asking simple questions.

I know people in the community listening appreciate that. There are probably high fives going around like, “Yeah, that’s my boy Pippi!” Not every conversation has to be for the newbie or someone brand new to your material. Some people have been here for a while, and it’s nice that they get to ask those longstanding questions and let these ideas percolate. So I thought that was a great question. Great question.

[02:22:19] ICT: I just don’t know if my answer was helpful. I don’t know if it actually addressed his question in a way that brought him what he was looking for.

[02:22:25] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): Oh dude, that was a phenomenal answer, Michael. Are you kidding me? You could go back and record that. That was a textbook answer. There’s nothing to worry about. It literally was a textbook answer.

[02:22:34] Pippy Banks (@BanksPippy): Yeah, you can’t get any better than that. It was straight to the point. Like Kit said, that schematic is simply a guideline to follow. You’re not going to see the same delivery every single day. It’s not going to happen exactly like that. So having that schematic as a guideline is extremely useful, and if price doesn’t follow it, then you have an idea of what to look for next.

[02:23:02] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): And then that leads you straight into the 18:00 open. Speaking of the Working-Class Hero trader, Pippy is literally a mechanic in New York. He’s busy working on other people’s cars and dealing with everything that comes with that during traditional New York trading hours. So for him, 18:00 is like 9:30. He’s adapted his trading around that.

He finishes work and then gets to observe the volatility around 18:00. He treats the 18:00 open in Gold the way an NQ trader treats the 9:30 open, and he does very well with it. It fits his lifestyle—his work, when he has to pick up his son, and everything else going on in his life.

That’s what’s beautiful about the adaptability of your concepts, Michael. I often see students who eventually step away from their teacher and find success in markets or commodities they know you don’t personally teach. In fact, sometimes that’s exactly why they choose those markets: they want to discover something for themselves.

Gold has become that for quite a few ICT Concepts traders. People have found their own way with Gold in exactly the spirit I think you want them to.

[02:24:35] ICT: It doesn’t matter what market you’re trading. I have plenty of students who trade crypto. I would never touch that stuff. But you bring your skill set to whatever market you want to pursue.

If you understand price, price is price. It doesn’t matter what vehicle you’re using. It’s still going to be the same open, high, low, close.

[02:24:53] Kitt(@ICT_Concepts): And your personality as a mentor helps convey that message clearly, but the concepts themselves are bigger than the mentor’s personal thoughts or opinions. The concepts are the concepts, and they work. They work on Gold.

Your students essentially get to champion their own graduation. In Trader Roundup, I often describe Gold as a kind of capstone for traders who’ve studied with you. They’ve spent so much time studying your weekly reviews, your analysis, and how you approach everything throughout the mentorship. Then they step out on their own and apply those concepts independently.

That’s very common here. I’d say Gold has become the capstone for a lot of traders.

[02:25:42] ICT: **Independent thought is the goal. **Not being tethered to me is the success and graduation. Which is cool.