Retail just set a record. That worries me.

$7 billion a day into options, and most of it is walking into a buzzsaw.

Last month, retail traders put more money into options than at any point in history.

Citadel handles the bulk of America's retail order flow, and their numbers just came in. June: about $7 billion a day in options premium. May was a record too. June 12th was the single biggest day of retail buying they've ever logged.

Now, most people read that and think the little guy is finally winning.

I read it differently.

When everyone stampedes into the same trade at the same time, in the fastest, most unforgiving instruments on the board, the crowd is usually not the one walking away with the money. 

I spent two decades watching order flow from the inside, first as the 13th employee at thinkorswim, then running trading education at TD Ameritrade. 

A surge like this doesn't tell me retail is about to get rich. It tells me a lot of people are about to fund somebody else's year.

The 0DTE game isn't rigged. But it punishes the unprepared fast, and right now the unprepared are pouring in by the billion.

That's exactly why I built DON-DTE. Three mornings a week, live at the open, I walk the same-day setups in the biggest stocks in the market and show you which windows are real and which ones to leave alone.

Don't be the flow. Be the one reading it.

To your success,

Don Kaufman