r/fundedoptions

More time on charts feels productive. Like research. Like discipline.

But after a point, it’s just boredom in the name of analysis. Your brain stares long enough and suddenly every candle starts looking like a setup.

Look at this trade history.

Nine trades. Switching between puts and calls on the same ticker, same expiry, same morning. Puts, calls, calls, puts, calls again.

That's not a strategy. That's a brain that stayed on the screen too long and started seeing setups that weren't there.

The dangerous part is none of the losses look terrible by themselves: -$29, -$16, -$23.

It doesn't feel like blowing up. It feels like "almost got it." That's what makes it dangerous. Death by a hundred small bad trades nobody warns you about.

The loop is simple:

Long session → more trades → more forced entries → more losses → stay longer to make it back → more trades.

Doesn't end with a better win rate. Ends with a blown account and a journal full of trades you knew were wrong while clicking buy anyway.

What changed for me

Shorter sessions. Hard stop on number of trades. If the first two don't work, laptop closes.

Less screen time forced better filters. Can't afford bad trades if you're only there for 90 minutes.

In an options funded account, avoiding one bad forced trade can matter more than catching one extra setup.

Funny how that works, but how many trades are you averaging per session?

Vanquish is celebrating 4th of July with a flat 50% off across all the plans for both basic and advance options accounts.

If you have been on the sidelines to try Vanquish or have questions before getting started, do not hesitate to join the free Vanquish Discord community.

Most traders look at price. Where did it go, how fast, what candle pattern formed. But price alone doesn't tell you why it stopped where it stopped.

Volume profile helps with that.

It's just showing you where actual trading happened. Not when. Where. That shift in thinking changes a lot, especially if you’re trading SPY 0DTE inside an eval account where one bad entry can mess with your drawdown buffer.

What the chart is actually telling you

Look at this. VAH at 739.00, VAL around 738.50. That's your value area where the bulk of volume got transacted. Price inside that range isn't doing anything interesting. Market accepted those prices.

That 7.29K bar around 738.70 is the real thing to notice. That's a HVN. Enormous amount of contracts traded right there. Price doesn't just cut through that level cleanly. It gets absorbed, slows down, sometimes just dies. Not because of some indicator signal. Because there's real supply and demand sitting there from actual transactions.

Then there are the gaps. Tiny bars, near zero volume. Those levels have no history. There’s less prior participation there. Price tends to move through those fast because there's nothing to stop it.

Why it actually matters

You can have a perfect looking SPY 0DTE and still lose because you walked straight into a HVN 40 cents above your entry. The trade wasn't always wrong, sometimes it can be location.

For a funded options eval, that matters even more. You don’t just need direction. You need clean location, because chop near heavy volume can burn entries, stops, and drawdown.

Volume profile just tells you where the traffic is before you drive into it. That's it. Not magic, just context that price charts alone don't give you.

Anyone else layering Volume Profile for SPY/options evals, or is this mostly a futures tool in your workflow?

This is a common question we see on Reddit. Join our discord and check the 'payout-feed' channel for the answer.

Short week. High impact data. One less trading day. 

The real Qs for me this week is not just “where does SPY go?” but also, “how do i trade SPY 0DTE during NFP week without letting one macro candle mess up a funded options eval?”

Here’s how I’m approaching it:

Key levels on SPY right now

SPY sitting around $728-731. Resistance at $736 is the level to watch multiple rejections there already. 52 week range is $610 low to $760 high. We're in the middle of that range right now, not at extremes.

Simple framework for this week:

• Above $736 with volume = bullish continuation, calls on breakout
• Below $728 and failing = more downside, puts on bounce rejection
• Choppy between $728-736 = dead zone, no trade

What's on the calendar this week

Monday had no major schedules. Cleanest session of the week from a news-risk standpoint.

Multiple factors for Wednesday: 

ADP employment report drops alongside ISM Manufacturing PMI. Two red folder events same day. Size down around those releases or sit out entirely. ADP especially moves markets fast. 

Also Fed Chair Warsh speaking at 9:30am EST. Fed speaker at market open is dangerous for 0DTE. One sentence can move SPY 1% instantly. Be very careful around that time.

Thursday NFP drops a day early due to Independence Day holiday. Consensus is around 172,000 new jobs. This is the biggest event of the week. NFP morning is volatile, unpredictable, and brutal for 0DTE premium. Either sit out or wait for the dust to settle before entering anything.

Friday markets closed for Fourth of July. Four trading days only this week.

Geopolitical risk still in play

U.S.-Iran situation hasn't gone away. Both sides traded fire near the Strait of Hormuz last week but peace talks remain on track according to U.S. officials. Any escalation over the weekend or during the week can gap SPY hard. Check the news before opening every single day this week.

How I'm trading this week

Monday is the most normal day of the week, no major events. Best opportunity for clean ORB setups. Full focus.

Tuesday light data,Job openings, relatively safe. Normal approach.

Wednesday reduced size around ADP and Fed speakers. Probably sitting out the first 30 minutes minimum.

Thursday NFP day. Either no trade or very small size after the initial move settles. Not a day to be aggressive.

Friday closed. Rest.

Overall bias

Last week PCE came in hot and rate hike odds moved higher. That's not bullish for equities. But Iran peace talk hopes are providing some support to sentiment this morning. Mixed signals which means I'm not coming in with a strong directional bias. Let the ORB tell me what side to be on each day

No predictions. Just levels and rules.

What levels are you watching this week? And are you trading around NFP Thursday or sitting it out?

After blowing up two accounts selling naked puts, I pretty much gave up trying to maximize premium and settled into put credit spreads on SPX. Been running it for 5 months now, sitting at ~76% win rate. Still not perfect, but it's the most consistent I've been.

My current setup:

- Expiration: 7-18 DTE (I like 10-14 days best)

- Short leg: 10-16 delta

- Width: 5-10 points, depending on the credit

- Minimum credit: $1.00–$2.00 (at least 1:3 risk/reward)

- Position size: 1-2% of account risk per trade

Process: I check IV rank first. Under 30 and I'm mostly sitting out.

When a setup looks right, I enter one or two positions and wait. Then take 50% profit as soon as it hits (often within 2-5 days). Cut at 2x the credit received, if it goes against. Hard rule.

Learned this the hard way back in month 3. I had four contracts of a 12 DTE spread on, and the market sold off hard into the close. Was down around $680, and instead of closing it I rolled down looking for a bounce. Ended up a $2,100 loser by expiry. I’m mostly running this on SPX and SPY in small sizes. I also skip Fed days, CPI, and any big macro event I haven't planned for before open. One thing I still haven't worked out is what to do during extended low IV periods. Technically sitting out is right but doing nothing is mentally tougher:) Still working on that discipline.

Why it works better for me in a funded options account.

For me, SPX put credit spreads make more sense than naked premium selling because the risk is defined before I enter. In a funded options eval, that matters more than squeezing out extra credit.

My goal is to survive enough trades for the edge to play out rather than the biggest premium. That’s why I keep the spread width small, risk only 1-2% per trade, take profit around 50%, and cut when the loss reaches 2x the credit received. It keeps one bad SPX move from turning into an account ending mistake. Anyone else running SPX credit spreads or theta gang setups?

What’s your current setup?

Most people open the charts at 9:30 and wonder why they're already confused. The trade starts before the market opens. This matters even more in a funded options account, because one oversized 0DTE trade can put you near your drawdown line before the day even gets going.

Here's exactly what I do in the 30 minutes before open.

Step 1: Mark the key levels on SPY

First thing. No news, no Twitter, no distractions. Just the chart.

I mark PDH and PDL previous day high and low. These are the levels price almost always respects or reacts to. If SPY is pushing into PDH at open, I'm not blindly buying. If it's sitting right at PDL, I want to see if it holds or breaks.

After that I look at higher timeframe liquidity on the 1 hour chart. Where are the obvious areas price might get drawn to? Where has price stalled before? Those zones matter more than anything an indicator tells you.

Levels take maybe 10 minutes. Nothing fancy. Just knowing where the important areas are before price starts moving.

Step 2: Check Forex Factory for news

Once levels are marked I check Forex Factory for any high impact news events scheduled for the day. Red folder events especially.

If something big is dropping right at open or within the first hour I'm either sizing down or sitting out that specific window. News can invalidate a clean setup instantly. Better to know before than find out mid-trade.

This takes 5 minutes max.

Step 3: Write down my account risk line

Before I even think about entry, I check the account side of the trade. Max loss for the day. Position size. Where my drawdown line is. And whether a full size trade even makes sense for the day.

I feel this part is important in a funded options account because the setup can be clean and still be a bad trade if the size puts the account rules at risk.

For SPY 0DTE, I’d rather miss a trade than take one that leaves no room to manage.

Step 4: Wait for My Setup

That's it. I don't pre-plan trades. I don't decide "I'm buying today" or "looks bearish, going short." Everything after this is just waiting for the 15 minute ORB to form at open and seeing what the market actually wants to do.

EMA confluence, clean break, volume confirmation that's when I act. Not before.

Why this works

The routine isn't complicated because it doesn't need to be. Most of trading is just knowing where the important levels are and not being surprised when price reaches them. 30 minutes of prep means you're not making decisions reactively when the market opens you already know what you're looking for.

No routine = sitting there at 9:30 trying to figure out what to do while price is already moving. That's how you get bad entries.

What does your pre-market routine look like? Anything you check that I'm missing?

Monday, SPY was moving strong from the open. Volume was actually there, not the fake open volume that disappears in 3 minutes. I waited about 10 minutes just to confirm it wasn't noise.

It wasn't.

What I was looking at all three EMAs were bullish. 9 above the 21, 21 above the 50, all sloping up clean. That alignment doesn't happen every day. When it does, you don't overthink it, you just wait for the price to pull back into the zone and give you an entry.

That's exactly what happened. SPY pulled back, held above the EMAs, and didn't break structure. Entered there.

Then started adding slowly as it confirmed. Not because I was greedy because each add had a reason. Price held, EMAs stayed stacked, volume backed it up. Position built itself almost.

Booked it when it felt right. No specific target, just read the move and got out. Good thing too because SPY dumped hard right after. If I held 15 more minutes and that $2.4k trade becomes a "why didn't I just take the money" story.

I’m doing this inside a Vanquish's funded options eval, where the rules include a 5% drawdown limit and a 30% consistency rule. One greedy hold and that selloff doesn't just kill the trade it kills the account. So yeah, glad I got out when I did.

The EMA confluence is something I keep coming back to. People overcomplicate entries. When all three are aligned and price gives you a clean pullback that's the whole setup. That's it. Everything else is just noise you're adding because sitting on your hands feels uncomfortable.

What actually helps is not going full size on the first entry. I start with half, see if the trade confirms price holds, EMAs stay stacked, no weird wicks then add the rest. Keep the risk down on the initial entry and if it doesn't confirm you're not fully committed to a bad trade.

Same logic with exits. I don't wait for one perfect moment to close everything. Book part of it when it's up decent, let the rest ride. Worst case the trade reverses and you are still locked in something. Best case the runner keeps going and you didn't leave empty handed trying to time the top perfectly

Still working on making this consistent. But Monday felt like proof the setup actually works when you let it.

Seen this debated a lot. Most answers are either "never trade news, too risky" or "news = volatility = opportunity." Both are kind of right and both miss the point a little.

Here's my honest take after trading SPY 0DTE through a few news days this month, especially inside a funded options account where drawdown and consistency rules actually matter.

I trade them, but smaller. Because sitting out entirely felt like I was just guessing which days matter and which don't. Some news days move hard and clean. Some are just noise. You don't always know which one it is until it's already happening.

So I stopped trying to predict it and just adjusted my size instead. Same setup rules - 15 min opening range breakout, EMA confluence, clean break, and actual follow through.

Everything still has to check out. I just reduce position size instead of treating news volatility like a normal session.

If it works, I make less than a normal day. Fine. If it doesn't, I lose less than a normal day. Also fine.

In a funded options account or options eval account, that matters even more because one oversized news candle can hit your drawdown or consistency rules before you even get a chance to “manage” the trade.

What changed my mind

Had a Monday this month where news hit mid session, and I wasn't expecting it. Setup was already there ORB had formed clean, EMAs were stacked. The news just added fuel. Ended up being my best day of the month.

If I'd sat out because "news day" I would've missed it entirely.

But here's the thing

I'm not saying trade every CPI, every FOMC, every random Fed speaker. High impact scheduled news especially before ORB forms. I'm either waiting or staying out completely. That's a different beast. Price action before a scheduled event is just noise, not a setup.

The distinction I try to make: is the news hitting an already clean setup, or am I entering because news is making things look exciting. First one is fine. Second one is how you blow up a good week.

What do you do on SPY/0DTE news days in a funded account - full sit out, reduced size, or you just trade normally and manage it?