Why Your Timing Sucks (And It's Not Your Fault)

You know how you beat yourself up when your entries are garbage? When you buy the high, sell the low, and feel like you couldn't time a traffic light correctly?

I figured out the real problem.

Your timing doesn't suck because you're bad at trading. Your timing sucks because you're trying to trade in volatility.

I'm not talking about regular market chop. I'm talking about those days when everything goes sideways - war breaks out, Fed speaks, earnings miss big. The days when you think, "This is my chance to make real money."

Those are exactly the days you should sit on your hands.

When the cash market opens during chaos, you get what I call "order flow imbalances." Apple traded maybe a million shares pre-market. Bell rings, suddenly 2 million shares for sale hit the pipes. Might not have buyers. Or vice versa.

That pop you're seeing in the first few minutes? Not a rally. That's just massive order flow flooding the marketplace, creating imbalances that look like directional moves but aren't.

I watched it happen the other day. S&Ps down 115 handles, everything looking like hell. First minute of trade, you see this pop and think "rally!"

Nope. Just order flow piling in. Huge imbalances. Then it reverses. Then it pops again.

The algorithms love this because they can process it instantly. You? You're trying to read through something that's literally indistinguishable from noise. It's like trying to have a conversation during a rock concert.

The professionals know this. When volatility spikes, they step back. When the VIX hits extreme levels, they wait. When order flow gets crazy, they let it sort itself out.

But retail traders see big moves and think "opportunity." They jump in during the exact moments when reading the market is impossible.

You're not a bad trader. You're trying to trade during the only times when being a good trader doesn't matter.

I've been doing this for decades, and on those volatility explosion days, I still can't get a feel for what pricing looks like. Bid-offer spreads go wild. Nothing makes sense for the first hour sometimes.

Don't try to get better timing. Learn to recognize when timing becomes irrelevant.

Next time volatility explodes and everything's moving fast, remember this: you're not missing out by waiting. You're avoiding the meat grinder that kills most retail accounts.

Let the dust settle. Let the order imbalances work through. Let the professionals finish their dance.

Your timing doesn't suck. You're just trying to time the untimeable.

Wait for the moments when skill matters again.

To your success,

Don Kaufman