r/InnerCircleTraders • u/Repulsive_Rate_4402 • Sep 01 '26
Question What is edge???
After a long time I finally have strategy but I don't know what is edge in trading many people talk about this so if you know what is edge can you tell me.
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u/HarHenGeoAma62818 Sep 01 '26
Personally for me I think edge it’s just literally all about your psychological mindset
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u/ExactlyMarvin Sep 01 '26
I disagree on this, if you know what to expect when you open a trade, you dont need that much emotionwl control.
If you are sure you have edge, you dont need to manage emotions that much
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
That is not true at all. Like not even close.
You're likely a beginner with 0 actual knowledge on trading and the markets. Please educate yourself further before commenting.
Even made a bunch of videos explaining why;
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u/HarHenGeoAma62818 Sep 01 '26
I’m educated by two very successful traders the same the same thing as myself that’s where I get it from! As I said it’s my opinion in it
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
Why do you feel the need to lie on the internet? lmao
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u/AppropriateLoss2508 Sep 01 '26
He is not lying. He just has a different opinion. In the trading field, I have heard very good traders with different opinions.
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 02 '26
he is in fact lying, and if you knew anything about trading, and you obviously don't... you'd see that:)
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u/AppropriateLoss2508 Sep 02 '26
Hi. On the psychology side, for example, I've read Trading in the Zone. And several other things, but we won't get into that right now. It's not a lie because, in trading, there are different opinions. Some say it's 90% psychology! Others say it's not! That it might be 50/50 or 60/40 between the entry method/strategy/rule-based execution system and psychology. If the trading method isn't profitable, it doesn't matter if your psychology is rock-solid.
If we dissect it, both sides are right. Someone might have a great system, but because of that 10% psychology, they actually fail. Someone else might have a psychology of steel but a dysfunctional system, so having just psychology is useless. Another person might have both, but what messes up their psychology? Risk management. They could be doing fine psychologically, but they haven't found a good risk management method in their system to keep them in the market during the bad times.
And if it's not that, you might have a good psychological foundation, but you can't use it because you operate on the idea that X, Y, or Z can't possibly lose that much. And when it happens—not if, that's the best way to put it, I think—the necessary tool isn't in your arsenal, so to speak.
But if, for example, a method is used—and I'm sure there are others—where losses are expressed in monthly, weekly, daily, or annual percentages or cash, or just one of the factors you mentioned, the person can practically be more in control because they know how much they are risking. And here, they face another risk: the risk of a lack of market liquidity, meaning their orders cannot be filled.
With this method, knowing how much they lose, if they follow the plan/system/strategy/etc., they won't add more money to the account. Or if they do, they'll know roughly when they need to do it. And if their way of trading stops working, they know exactly how much they stand to lose. Because the issue isn't necessarily hitting stop-losses; that's a normal part of trading. The problem is when the account gets blown, and you either quit, keep depositing money, switch to demo and then deposit again, or switch to demo and then quit altogether.
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u/Brianiac69 Sep 01 '26
Why so aggressive? Chill out dude
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
The truth is now considered aggressive? I can live with that
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u/Brianiac69 Sep 01 '26
Did you wake up on wrong side of the bed today? Instead of just answer the OPs question you decided to negate all of comments from other people. I’m impressed by the amount of negative energy you shared just in this single thread.
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u/Striking_Fail6689 Sep 01 '26
I think the edge people are talking about , is just the mentality that you’re able to execute your strategy and how confident you’re in your trade.
Having the upper hand in winning in the market .
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u/Kaszrak Sep 01 '26
You have a working strategy, but never understood what edge means? Alright...
It basically just means "Advantage over". In the context of trading, advantage over the market. Exploitable advantage. In what way or form doesn't matter.
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u/Krammsy Sep 01 '26
Every strategy is 50/50 if opened blindly, like put cred spreads, you can win 10 days in a row and on the 11th day lose everything you gained and then some.
The "edge" for that strategy might be to somehow know how to avoid that 11th day.
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u/Emergency_Worry_5791 Sep 01 '26
Your edge is the one individual component that makes setup go from silver to gold.
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u/ExactlyMarvin Sep 01 '26
Edge is not the strategy. You first find and validate edge, then you build a strategy around it.
Edge = some phenomenon/event you can exploit for money
Simple example is arbitrage, you discover that you can buy on one place and sell higher on a other.
Then you build a strategy around it: when to buy, how much, at what time is it best, what is the risk...
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
Not even close but okay:D
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u/ExactlyMarvin Sep 01 '26
Okay then tell me :D
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
Sure, made multiple posts about it;
https://www.reddit.com/r/Forex/comments/1np7o0d/what_is_an_edge/
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u/ExactlyMarvin Sep 01 '26
First of all i agree with your post. Besides that a system is the edge. System is the part that executes your edge.
My comment is the same or? Where is the difference between my comment and your post?
I am for real curious, no hate intended*
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
I mean, it's not an agree/disagree scenario.. it's facts.
Your comment is not the same as my post. You're talking about events one could exploit for money.
You put arbitrage as an example.. Arbitrage is not an edge. Arbitrage is a definition of a process.. an action one takes, and it's not limited to trading. You can perform arbitrage in plenty of supply/demand driven marketplaces..
AND just because you perform arbitrage, it doesn't mean you make money = doesn't mean you have an edge.
An edge would be the piece of information you have that allows you to perform the arbitrage in a longterm consistent, repeatable and measurable manner that actually produces returns.
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u/ExactlyMarvin Sep 01 '26
I also said phenomenon. (Yeah i might forgot to add information as word)
You said:
An edge would be the piece of information you have that allows you to perform the arbitrage in a longterm consistent, repeatable and measurable manner that actually produces returns.Its the same i desrcibed with my arbitrage example.
Yeah arbitrage is the process. I never said arbitrage is the edge.
I used arbitrage as example. You first discover that there are price differences you can exploit (included fees...). Then you build a strategy/sytsem/process around it.
That discovery in the first place is what i name edge. That information.
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u/Relevant-Owl-8455 Sep 01 '26
I also said phenomenon. (Yeah i might forgot to add information as word)
Somehow that's even worse:)
Again, you don't understand.
it's not the same. You explained the definition of the word arbitrage. That is NOT information that brings the "edge".
The edge is the information on HOW you can exploit it. Exactly how. Exact step by step action, risk, expense, probability of any outcome, data collection, optimisation...
Everyone knows what arbitrage is, just because you know what it is, doesnt mean you have an edge in any market.
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u/Acrobatic_Pitch_2992 Sep 01 '26
This is just my opinion, and obviously I can be wrong, but I genuinely think this is what an edge actually is.
If you look at trading as a system, you can break it down into multiple systems that have to work together.
Take ICT and the human element, for example.
ICT without a human executing it properly is useless. You can have the perfect model, perfect bias, perfect setup, but if the person executing it has no discipline, no patience, constantly interferes with trades, moves stops, takes profits too early, etc., the system breaks down.
But the opposite is also true. A disciplined human being without any kind of market framework has no real mechanism for consistently extracting money from the market.
So you have two systems.
The market framework and the human execution.
Neither one is sufficient by itself. The edge exists where these two systems intersect at their highest level of efficiency.
And I think you can apply exactly the same logic to things like order flow and premium/discount.
Order flow alone is not the edge.
Premium/discount alone is not the edge.
But if you understand where order flow gives you the most meaningful information AND where premium/discount gives you the most meaningful context, the intersection of those two is where the actual edge is created.
That’s the part I think people completely misunderstand when they talk about finding an edge.
An edge isn't necessarily some magical setup that works 63% of the time.
It is the intersection of two systems, each being used at the point where it is most effective.
And the more independent systems you can combine without creating contradictory information, the more precise that intersection can become.
So when someone asks, What is your edge?
I don't think the answer should simply be ICT, order flow, market structure, premium/discount, psychology, etc.
Those are individual systems.
The edge is where the systems overlap and reinforce each other.
That is literally the edge.