{"id":23171,"date":"2025-02-12T07:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-02-12T12:30:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2025-02-18T03:12:52","modified_gmt":"2025-02-18T08:12:52","slug":"how-to-trade-choppy-markets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/how-to-trade-choppy-markets\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Trade Choppy Markets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Choppy markets can be brutal for traders.<\/p>\n

One day stocks are up, the next day they’re down.<\/p>\n

It feels like there’s a lot of action… But really, there isn’t much of anything happening.<\/p>\n

The S&P 500 has been locked in a super-tight trading range for the past month. The index has waffled between 6000 and 6100 – frustrating bearish and bullish traders alike.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, this consolidating action serves to build energy to fuel the next trending move. But, it’s tough to sit through the action (or lack of action).<\/p>\n

Most folks tend to over-trade in this environment – trying to scalp every move between support and resistance. That activity rarely pays off. Instead, traders chew up their accounts as they force trades that aren’t quite ready to go.<\/p>\n

We get frustrated as small gains turn into small losses. So, we take the hit and move on to a different trade which looks even better. And, we end up getting chopped around in that trade while the previous position rebounds and would have been profitable.<\/p>\n

Trading Around the Core<\/h2>\n

It is often helpful in this situation to look out 60-90 days and trade the setups that might play out in that timeframe, ignoring the day-to-day fluctuations of a choppy market.<\/p>\n

Or… have a core position on a stock – which you plan to hold for 60-90 days – and add a short-term position for scalping smaller, faster moves.<\/p>\n

This “trading around the core” allows a trader to maintain a position in anticipation of a large, breakout move. At the same time, we satisfy our craving for activity and avoid the frustration of watching small gains fade and turn to losses.<\/p>\n

When the market starts trending again, we have our core position to take advantage of that move. And, while the market is chopping inside a tight trading range, we have a smaller short-term position for scalping those choppy moves.<\/p>\n

\n

Free Trading Resources<\/strong><\/p>\n

Have you checked out Jeff’s free trading resources on his website? It contains a selection of special reports, training videos, and a full trading glossary to help kickstart your trading career \u2013 at zero cost to you. Just click here<\/a> to check it out.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

My main point here is that in a choppy, back-and-forth environment, it is sometimes useful to divide a position into “big picture” and “little picture” subsets.<\/p>\n

Best regards and good trading,<\/p>\n

\"Signature\"<\/p>\n

Jeff Clark
\nEditor, Market Minute<\/em><\/p>\n

P.S.<\/strong> This type of volatility is exactly what I was expecting during the first 100 days of President Trump’s second term. And for savvy, smart traders – this could be the most profitable 100 days of your life.<\/p>\n

Check out more of my strategy right here<\/a> for getting at least one chance to double your money each week for the next three months as President Trump deploys his agenda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Choppy markets can be brutal for traders. That’s why we “trade around the core.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"0","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"service":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"publication":[10],"person":[7],"newsletter-type":[],"ticker":[],"class_list":["post-23171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-market-minute","publication-market-minute","person-jeff-clark"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23171"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23171\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23276,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23171\/revisions\/23276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23171"},{"taxonomy":"publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/publication?post=23171"},{"taxonomy":"person","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/person?post=23171"},{"taxonomy":"newsletter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newsletter-type?post=23171"},{"taxonomy":"ticker","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeffclarktrader.com\/market-minute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ticker?post=23171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}