You hear the callout. You click submit. You get filled — three, five, eight points worse than the called entry. Then the trade pulls back and you're sitting in the red while others are at breakeven. The trade eventually stops out. Your loss is double what it should have been.
This is what chasing looks like, and it's silently destroying your trading account. The fix is embarrassingly simple — but it requires patience you haven't been practicing.
The Math of Chasing
Let's break down exactly why chasing is a lose-lose proposition. Michael explains:
"If you're not looking to get an entry below that reference price, and you're waiting for me to say that I am in — that then becomes your reason to click submit. The odds of you getting a fill at the same price as me are extremely low."
What actually happens: "Maybe it's at 146. Maybe it's at 151. Maybe it's at 141. But you're then chasing that move, and you're no longer taking the same trade as me."
The consequence: "When you win, you're gonna win a lot less. And when you lose, you're going to lose a lot more. Which is ultimately a lose-lose situation."
The Dollar Impact
"Let's say you get an entry that's three points worse than me and an exit that's three points worse, on three trades. Six times six times six equals a $360 difference — assuming we're trading with one contract."
With two or three contracts? "That difference very quickly becomes thousands of dollars. And what is ultimately a really minor difference in your execution."
The 30-to-90-Second Rule
Here's the insight that changes everything: "For 99% of my trades, they won't just go 20 points and never look back. Price action is going to retest my entry price or even below my entry price within the first 30 to 90 seconds of my entry."
Read that again. On 99% of trades, the market comes back to your entry level within 90 seconds. You don't need to chase. You just need to wait.
The Fix: Wait for the Pullback
"When you hear me say it, instead of then clicking submit and chasing, you slow down, you buy yourself an extra moment, and you wait for that pullback into 138."
The process:
- Hear the callout — "In at 138, one contract, stop loss 123"
- Set up your order window with the called price
- Watch for the pullback into that price level
- Click submit the second you see it hit
"You dedicate all your focus to that. All you're doing is watching for price to pull back into that area."
Level Two: Beat the Called Price
Once you've mastered waiting for the retest, push further: "If I got in at 138 and you get in at 134, all of a sudden you're increasing your margin for error. You're going to make more money than me when we win. And you're going to lose less money than me when we lose."
That's a win-win situation — the complete opposite of chasing. "You get to start to juice the odds in your favor."
Why Chasing Feels Good (But Isn't)
"Chasing feels really fun. It is the easier thing to do because it allows us to shut off our brains and effectively hope that we're going to make money."
But with the DTR focus on position sizing and risk management, "those dramatic differences in executions can lead to the difference of hundreds of dollars per trade."
Make It Binary
"Your objective is to make that order entry logic binary. Either it pulls under my called-out entry price, or it doesn't. And if it does, you should get it. If it doesn't, you need to avoid it and wait until it does."
No gray area. No "close enough." No "it's only a couple points." Either you're at or below the reference price, or you're not in the trade.
The Clones vs. Cousins Problem
Michael puts it bluntly: "If your objective is to copy DTR, you are not copying our trades if you are taking trades with a worse entry price and with an outsized risk profile. That is fundamentally the opposite of what we're trying to do."
"It's similar to the strategy. But it's like cousins instead of being clones. We want to make sure that we are cloning and not settling for a compromise."
The Compound Effect of Precision
"Once you can start to slow down your entry execution process, be a little bit more deliberate with your technique — then you will very quickly start to make more money, compound your gains, and potentially even outperform my performance."
That's the payoff. Better entries don't just save you from bigger losses — they create the possibility of outperforming the very person you're following. All from waiting an extra 30 to 90 seconds.
Key Takeaways
- Chasing is a lose-lose — you win less on winners and lose more on losers
- 99% of trades retest the entry within 30-90 seconds — the pullback is coming
- Wait for the retest, then click submit — simple process, massive impact
- Level up by beating the called price — turn lose-lose into win-win
- Make it binary — at or below the reference price, or no trade
- 3 points of slippage across 3 trades = $360+ per contract — it adds up fast
- Precision creates the possibility of outperformance — not just matching, but beating
- Be deliberate, not reactive — 30 seconds of patience saves thousands over time
Trade With Precision, Not Panic
At DayTrader Funding, we fund traders who execute with discipline. Stop chasing, start waiting for your price, and watch your consistency transform. Get funded today.