I almost made a mistake this week. I almost shorted the XRP pump right into the $1.30s. With Bitcoin ripping like Marcus Cole has been mapping out, everything is getting dragged up with it. But my gut screamed 'trap'. Instead of shorting, I flipped my bias and started hunting for a long entry. But not here. Not yet.

The chart looks beautiful on the surface. We finally broke and held above that nasty resistance block at $1.35 that's been capping us for weeks. The 4-hour chart is printing higher highs and higher lows. Textbook stuff. But when I pull up the volume profile, it's just... weak. This isn't the kind of explosive volume you want to see confirming a major breakout. Proper volume analysis trading keeps you out of these potential fakeouts.

This is where patience pays. Chasing this green candle at $1.41 is a low-probability play. The R/R is garbage. The high-probability trade, one of the best day trading setups out there, is the breakout retest.

I'm not interested in the fundamentals or the latest lawsuit rumor. Unlike Alex Volkov, who's probably got the macro view dialed in, I just trade the levels on my screen. Price is all that matters. And the price is telling me to wait for a dip.

• Entry Zone: I'm looking for a pullback to the old resistance, now new support. My bids are layered from $1.36 down to $1.34.
• Stop Loss: A hard stop at $1.285. If we lose the $1.30 psychological level, this play is dead.
• First Target: I'll be taking half my position off at $1.55, just below the prior swing high.

This setup gives me a clean risk/reward of over 3:1. That's a trade I'm willing to take every single time. Chasing the pump up here? That’s just gambling.

What kills this thesis? Simple. If XRP slices back below $1.34 and closes a 4-hour candle there, this whole move was a liquidity grab. The weak volume already has me on alert for this exact scenario. It would be a classic fakeout designed to trap breakout traders before nuking the price back into the range. Don't be that trader.

My plan is set, and I'll follow it mechanically. Getting chopped up in moves like this is what leads to my biggest weakness—revenge trading. Sticking to the plan is the only cure. So, is this XRP move just riding Bitcoin's coattails, or is there real, underlying demand building for a run to $2.00?