🌄 The Opening Bell Trap 🔕

Good morning, traders…

The opening bell rings. Volume explodes. Your charts light up with seemingly perfect breakouts.

You see an irresistible opportunity.

I see a trap.

After 22 years of watching the market’s daily drama unfold, I’ve learned that the first 30 minutes of trading are pure theater. Lots of sound and fury, but rarely signifying the direction the market actually wants to go.

False breakouts occur more frequently between 9:30 and 10:00 AM than any other time during the trading day. Support levels that look rock-solid at 9:35 AM crumble by 9:50 AM. Momentum that appears unstoppable at the open fades into sideways chop by lunch.

Yet traders keep making the same mistake. They see early morning volatility as a trading window instead of recognizing it for what it actually is…

Smart Money repositioning, overnight emotion, and gap-driven chaos that has little to do with the day’s eventual trendline.

I’ve developed a completely different approach. While everyone else is scrambling to catch the opening moves, I’m focused on one thing: managing what I already own, not chasing what I don’t have.

If you follow my trade alerts, you’ve probably noticed this pattern. I’m usually taking profits during the first 30 minutes, not opening new positions.

This isn’t an accident or a coincidence … it’s a strategy built on decades of watching early-morning “opportunities” turn into afternoon regrets.

Let Me Show You Why The Opening Bell Is Best Used For Exits, Not Entries…

The Management Hour

From 9:30 to 10:00 AM, my focus is entirely on managing existing positions.

This is when I scale out of winners from the previous day (or week).

On Monday morning, I took:

My first scale on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (NYSE: TSM) October 3 $260 Calls.

My second scale on UnitedHealth Group Incorporated (NYSE: UNH) September 19 $320 Calls.

Both were open positions from the prior week, ready for profit-taking during the first 30 minutes on Monday.

The same volatility that makes the first 30 minutes dangerous for new entries makes it ideal for profit-taking.

High volume means better fills. Emotional buying or selling means I can often get more attractive prices for my contracts.

The False Signal Factory

The first 30 minutes are a false signal factory.

Overnight news, morning gaps, and pre-market positioning can create artificial price action.

Stocks gap up on earnings beats, only to fade by 10 AM. Others gap down on negative headlines, then reverse higher once actual trading begins.

I’ve watched countless “breakouts” at 9:35 AM turn into “fakeouts” by 9:50 AM. The volume spike that looked like institutional buying was actually just retail FOMO.

The support level that seemed rock-solid crumbled once the true daily trend had formed.

The intraday trend doesn’t establish itself until 10:00 to 10:30 AM. Before that, you’re trading noise, not signal.

The Patience Payoff

By 10:00 to 10:30 AM, the early-morning craziness subsides.

The emotional trades are done. The overnight gaps have been digested. The institutional repositioning is complete. What remains is actual price discovery based on supply and demand.

This is when reliable trends establish themselves. Support and resistance levels start to matter again. Chart patterns begin to follow their historical probabilities.

When I enter positions after 10 AM, I’m trading with the intraday trend, not against it. The success rate on these trades is dramatically higher than anything I attempted during the opening frenzy.

What To Do During The First 30 Minutes Of Trading

For the next two weeks, try this experiment:

Track every setup you identify in the first 30 minutes. Note the entry price, the reasoning, and what the position would have done by 11 AM.

Compare those results to setups you identify after 10:30 AM using the same criteria.

I bet you’ll notice a dramatic difference.

The opening bell creates the illusion of opportunity, but the best setups come from waiting for a clearly-defined intraday trend … and trading that.

Happy trading,
Ben Sturgill

P.S. President Trump is preparing to announce his boldest economic plan yet … a move to fast-track an unprecedented $9 trillion initiative…

But before it has a chance to become “law of the land…”

On Wednesday, September 10th at 8 p.m. EST, Tim Sykes is going live with $20 million trader Jack Kellogg…

Since Trump’s return to the White House, Jack’s banked a ridiculous $5.4 million in trading profits.*