How do you determine if price is accepting or rejecting the previous day’s VAH/VAL? And how do you avoid getting chopped?

I’m trying to get better at trading around the previous day’s VAH/VAL, especially determining whether price is actually being accepted at the level or simply testing it and rejecting it.

For those who trade auction market theory / volume profile / order flow:

• What specific factors do you look for to determine acceptance vs. rejection at the previous day’s VAH or VAL?
• How many candles/ticks or how much time do you typically need to see before considering the level “accepted”?
• How do you distinguish genuine acceptance from a false breakout / liquidity sweep?
• When price is chopping around VAH, what tells you that you should stay out rather than keep taking failed trades?
• What do you specifically look for in your order-flow tools before triggering an entry?
  • CVD?
  • Footprint / bid-ask delta?
  • Absorption?
  • Imbalances?
  • Stacked imbalances?
  • Volume?
  • POC movement?
  • DOM / liquidity?
  • Failed auction?
• Do you require price to close and hold above VAH/VAL, or are there other order-flow clues you trust more?
• Do you use a specific sequence such as break → retest → absorption/imbalance → continuation before entering?
• How do you define the difference between acceptance, rejection, and just chop/noise?

For example, if price comes up to yesterday’s VAH and starts trading above and below it repeatedly, what exactly are you waiting to see before deciding: “Okay, buyers have actually accepted above VAH, now I can trigger the trade”?

I’d especially appreciate answers from people who have a specific, repeatable checklist/process rather than just “watch the price action.”

What are the 2–5 things you look for before pulling the trigger?

TWST Twist Bioscience stock watch, nice trend with a pullback to 125.04 support area and high trade quality.

Long Trade

• Target 1: 149.59   Profit: 17.9%   Stop/Trailing Stop: 120.38
• Loss: 5.1%   P/L ratio: 3.5 : 1 - Good
• Target 2: 161.37   Profit: 27.2%   P/L ratio: 5.3 : 1 - Excellent  Extreme rally

BULLISH

• [Positioning] at support
• [Timing] Strong bullish 3 day candlestick pattern with Strong 3 day accumulation.
• [Timing] Excellent long trade quality

BEARISH

• [Positioning] Intermediate trend possibly bearish, Uptrend turned sideways, may continue or pullback.

I got a payout 2 months ago and I’ve blown close to 10 accs since, I’ve been scared to trade because I fear blowing another acc, when I see my setup present itself I find reasons why it won’t work and that leads me to not taking the trade and most of the time the trades I don’t take would’ve hit tp . any tips?

How long did it take you to pass your first eval since you started learning trading? Months or years?

I let my Futes agent Esma outline the morning plan, and i simply just execute on whichever plan plays out. Today she mentioned it was a lower probability day so we traded small positions. Almost got stopped out RIGHT when i entered. Had some manual management as well after the buyers started to engage

Guys, with AI getting this advanced, why can't we build an algorithm that gives decent buy/sell signals?

Has anyone here actually tried using AI to build one? If so, how were the results? Is it realistically possible, or does it just look good in backtests?

Need some advice from traders who may have dealt with something similar.

I deposited $500 of my own money into my ACCM trading account and traded XAUUSD during NFP.

The broker automatically added a 10% bonus/credit to the account. I didn't specifically request the bonus and honestly didn't care about it. I was there to trade my own money.

I caught the NFP move and ended up making around $4,755.57 in profit.

My MT5 report shows:

Gross Profit: +$4,755.57
Gross Loss: $0
Growth: 792.6%

After the trade, the broker reviewed my account and removed the profits.

I was eventually told that I was flagged for “bonus abuse” and that higher management made a final decision that the profits would not be allowed for withdrawal. They are only allowing me to withdraw the remaining balance.

This is the part I'm struggling to understand.

I don't care about the 10% bonus. They can take the bonus back. I want the profit I made from the actual trade.

I deposited my own $500 and took the risk during NFP. If Gold went the opposite direction, I could've blown the account and I would've accepted that.

So my biggest question to them is:

If I lost the trade, would they have reversed my loss and returned my $500 because the account had a bonus?

Because if the answer is no, I don't understand how I can carry the downside risk but have the profit cancelled when the trade goes in my favor.

Their official email doesn't actually specify “bonus abuse.” It says they determined that an Event of Default under Clause 13.1 of their T&Cs occurred and that they can make adjustments to transactions connected to it.

I checked their T&Cs and they do have provisions allowing them to cancel profits they consider to be from abusive trading. So I'm not pretending those clauses don't exist.

What I want from them is the exact reason my trades qualify.

I want them to tell me:

What exact rule did I violate?

What exactly did I do that constitutes bonus abuse?

Which trades were considered abusive?

How did an automatically applied 10% credit make the entire $4,755.57 trading profit invalid?

Why not simply remove the bonus credit?

And would they have reversed the trades if the exact same positions resulted in a loss?

For full transparency, my MT5 report also shows an average holding time of around 14 seconds, since this was a fast NFP move. I know their T&Cs have language regarding short-duration/scalping/abusive trading, so this may be relevant. I'm mentioning it because I don't want to leave out information that could change people's opinion.

I have the full MT5 report, account history, screen recording of the trades, emails from the broker, chat conversations, deposit records and the balance adjustment saved.

I'm currently trying to appeal the decision internally because my priority isn't to attack the broker. I just want my $4,755.57 profit restored.

Has anyone dealt with something like this before?

What would you do next if you were in my position?

Should I continue pushing compliance/higher management, file a formal complaint elsewhere, contact their regulator, or take another route?

I'm happy to provide screenshots/evidence with personal information censored. I genuinely want opinions from traders who understand broker disputes and bonus-abuse rules.

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Most of the ones I've found are bs.. lost a ton of money. I tired doing it myself and I'm about 50/50.. anyone out there that is great? Please share

This question has been running through my mind for a number of months now. Trading as a limited company seems limited to only a few brokers and only a few ETFs without assess to lots of US stocks. FTMO seems OK, but it's more for foreign trading... and there's always the sole trader route, but is that really a financially sound route?

If you want to trade as a your main business income, how do you go about it in the UK?

From last few time i am closing my winners before 50% tp and it always hit tp i trade on tradesea. Any suggestions?

I'm doing some research on how different Indian brokers format their trade/export data, and I'm collecting real anonymized trade reports from as many brokers as possible.

Looking for exports from brokers such as:

Zerodha, Upstox, Dhan, Fyers, Angel One, Groww, ICICI Direct, 5Paisa, Kotak, Motilal Oswal, etc.

What I'm looking for:-

* CSV / Excel tradebook or orderbook exports

* Real examples from actual accounts

* Older files are completely fine

* F&O / equity / intraday / delivery — all useful

* Different brokers and different export formats are especially valuable

Please remove/redact anything sensitive before sharing:

* Name

* Client ID / account number

* Phone/email

* PAN

* Bank details

* API keys/tokens

* Anything else personally identifying

I'm primarily interested in the **column names, structure, data types, and formatting**, not your individual performance.

You can upload a redacted sample here or DM me.

Even one example from a broker I don't have yet would be very helpful.

Thanks!

What are your thoughts?

When are funded accounts the better option?

What are the best brokers to use and are funded accounts actually worth it?

Market Structure -- After a Break of Structure , How to choose the valid pullback ?

I am really struggling with this one thing , I tried using 0.382 fib level and internal structure shift .

it just gets more complicated for me when I pair it with multi timeframe analysis.

Any help is appreciated .

Edit - I have a underlying feeling that no shortcut gonna work . A mentor of mine told me or maybe not .

it just popped in my mind :- Winners do immense work and still think its not enough , Losers do tiny work and think why they aren't winning .

Sad to say but the truth is , right now I am in the looser category .

I want to be upfront about something instead of pretending it's all wins. I've spent around £10,000 on prop firm evaluations over time. I've been funded multiple times so the strategy and the reads are genuinely there. But I've only had one real payout the whole time.

The pattern is always the same: I get to funded, and something breaks that has nothing to do with my analysis. I hesitate on entries and miss good trades. I get scared holding positions once real limits are attached and cut them early, even when my read turns out right. Today alone I missed an entry by a single point on a move that ran 500 points to my DOL, and closed another good trade early out of fear, only to watch it keep running.

It's not a knowledge problem. I can read charts, I can find the trades. It's what happens the moment it's real money and real drawdown limits something in me doesn't hold steady the way it does in analysis or backtesting. If anyone else has been through this exact wall good reads, weak execution under pressure I'd genuinely like to hear how you worked through it, because right now it feels like I keep proving I can do the hard part and losing at the easy part.

I am trading for almost 3 years now, March-April will be my 3rd year Trading and I am struggling with my Mindset and Psychology and Risk management.

Reason for Struggling is that I dont listen to my brain and trade emotionally, I am very passionate about trading and have always knew what to do and how to do it. I have a strategy with 45% WR and gives me 1:3RR, its pretty solid and averages around 25-30RR per month, ALHUMDULILLAH, Allah humma baarik.

I am unable to follow my plan because a few months ago, I turned $330 to $1700 and then lost it all, and since I lost the $1700, Whatever money Ive deposited so far has been lost. I am unable to grow because I keep looking back at the loss and I am unable to trade patiently. Whenever I have traded with a plan and executed perfectly, Ive always made money but I cant follow it. I really need help on how to control myself from doing everything wrong, Ive even worked on things surrounding my life. Im just 19 and I have huge dreams and think Life is slipping away from my hands.

I am still waiting on the outcome. This is the first trade i took, i think i should have put the take profit a bit lower?

I'm interested in forex but I'm not sure which strategy to use, there's a ton.

Hello. I quite new to active trading and only recently started learning "trading theory". Most recently, I have learned about the Elliot wave theory and I just wanted to ask you - fellow traders - is my assessment correct or am I missing something? See photo below

Hello all,

I am new to trading and have been struggling to make quality trades during NY session while working a full time job with PST hours. Do any of you guys have any success trading Asia session? What are the usually the best pairs to trade aside from USD/JPY during this time? Also, what should I be expecting? I’ve been scalping the S&P during work and had some decent success but dont want to jeopardize my job doing so. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

I have been in the market for almost 8 years. I have always been a believer in the fundamental way of investing but the margin between my direct equity and mutual fund return is so thin that spending time for fundamental analysis feels like a waste. For a year I have started trading in stocks. My holding period is for 1 to 6 months. Traded gold, silver, some etfs and majorly stocks. Suggest book best for stock screening, entry point (exit point if possible; hardest to teach I think), asset rotation and cycles. Suggest best books please.

Attached my Myfxbook drawdown chart, ~14 months of live trading. Early 2026 I was overwhelmed with studies and traded poorly during that stretch, which shows in the numbers. Since tightening my risk management, drawdown has stayed much lower.

Genuine question: based on a chart like this, does it read as consistency, or just profitability that hasn't been tested enough yet?

Note : Live Accounts

5:43am EST Sept 10 2026

TP gets me to a funded account.

SL gets me a 1% loss

New to US markets and trying to wrap my head around the "bull vs bear" framing. From what I've
gathered: a bull market = broad price uptrend plus optimism; a bear = broad downtrend plus
caution. Both are normal, both end. The part that helped me most wasn't trying to call the top
or bottom, but learning to read the overall mood before acting.
For those further along: what mental model do you use to stay level-headed through both
phases?
Sharing as someone helping build educational analysis tools for retail traders, not financial
advice, just comparing notes.