The ICT method, explained simply

Classical technical analysis teaches patterns: triangles, head and shoulders, channels. The problem is not that they are wrong, it is that they describe the past without explaining why price moves. You end up with a catalogue of shapes and no logic for deciding which one wins when two contradict each other.

ICT concepts start from the other end: the market needs counterparties to fill size. Where stops pile up, there is liquidity, and price has a mechanical reason to go and take it. That read gives you a causal explanation — not a shape guess — and above all a clear invalidation criterion.

In practice it changes how you prepare a session: instead of hunting for a pattern on a chart, you identify where the stops sit, which zone price left behind, and what scenario invalidates your idea. Three questions, one answer per chart.

Reading market structure properly — spotting swing points, recognising a valid break — takes a few weeks of daily practice. That is not the hard part. Most people get there faster than they expect.

What takes time is execution: waiting for your setup without forcing it, holding a stop, accepting five losses in a row without doubling size. Count on several months before that is stable, and that is normal. Nobody shortcuts this stage, and be wary of anyone promising otherwise.

That is exactly why the method leans so hard on the trade journal. You do not improve by looking at more charts, you improve by re-reading your own decisions and spotting the pattern that keeps repeating in your mistakes.

Yes, with one condition: the market has to be liquid enough. The concepts rest on institutional order behaviour, so they apply to indices, major forex pairs, futures and large caps. On an illiquid micro-cap or an obscure altcoin the logic holds far less well — there is simply no participant large enough to leave the traces you are trying to read.

Timeframe, on the other hand, is your call. The same principles read on the 1-minute and on the daily. A scalper will work the London and New York killzones; a swing trader will set bias on the daily and execute on H1. The structure does not change, only the scale does.

So the real constraint is not the market, it is your schedule. If you work full time, pick a timeframe that fits your availability rather than trying to scalp between two meetings. That is the first thing we frame together.