Me: If the chart’s messing with your head, read this once.
You: “So how do I trade dYdX on Phemex without blowing up?”
Me: Use 4h to enter, confirm with liquidation clusters.
You: “Stops?”
Me: hard stop-loss where your idea is invalid, not where it feels safe. honestly.
| Thing | What to do |
|---|---|
| Choppy market | Lower leverage, fewer trades, wait for clean levels. |
| Trending market | Let winners run, trail stop, don’t over-take-profit. |
| High funding | Reduce hold time or wait for better entry. |
One-sentence rule
If structure is unclear, I do nothing. If it’s clear, I risk small and follow the plan.
Tip: Common mistake: ignoring fees/funding because it ‘seems small’. Fix it by slowing down and sizing smaller.
Funding, fees, and slippage can flip a “good” idea fast. Leverage is risky—use money you can afford to lose.
Wrap: Missed trades are cheaper than liquidation.
Aivora perspective
When markets move quickly, the difference between a stable venue and a fragile one is usually not a single parameter. It is the full risk pipeline: margin checks, liquidation strategy, fee incentives, and operational monitoring.
If you trade perps
Track funding and realized volatility together. Funding tends to amplify crowded positioning.
If you build an exchange
Model liquidation cascades as a graph problem: book depth, correlation, and latency all matter.
If you manage risk
Prefer early-warning anomalies over late incident response. Drift is a signal, not noise.
Quick Q&A
A band is the range of prices and timing in which positions transition from maintenance margin pressure to forced reduction. Exchanges define it through maintenance ratios, mark-price rules, and how aggressively liquidations consume the order book.
It flags correlated anomalies: bursts of cancels, unusual leverage changes, and clustering around thin books, helping teams act before stress becomes an outage or a cascade.
No. This site is educational and system-focused. You are responsible for decisions and risk management.