Three Derivatives Charts Helped Me Dodged Bullets
If you’re trading perps and only watching technical analysis and price candles, you’re trading blind.
Mr.Coffee4 min read·Just now--
You’ve seen this before.
Price is below a key MA, and you know if you enter the trade at this level is catching knife, so you’re waiting for the confirmation signal.
Then a strong bullish candle comes in. Looks like a reclaim.
You enter a 10x long.
An hour later, you’re up 15%. Feels easy.
A few hours later, you check again.
Liquidated.
No warning. No time to react.
Just gone.
And you look back at the chart, it’s a fake breakout and rejected, but you didn’t notice at all.
Suddenly you feel defeated and you told yourself, this is the last time.
But the same story keeps on repeat again and again.
This kept happening to me until I changed one thing.
I just checked 3 MORE charts before I enter ANY trade, I didn’t enter the wrong timing and saved lot of money.
Liquidation Heatmap
This shows where leveraged positions will get wiped.
Brighter zones mean more money ready to get liquidated.
Why it matters?
Liquidations create momentum.
Longs get wiped → price drops → more longs get wiped → cascade.
What looks like support can disappear in seconds.
I’ve stepped into “strong support” before, only to get nuked because hundreds of millions in long liquidations were sitting just below.
Now I check first.
How I use it:
- If there’s a big long liquidation cluster below price, I don’t rush longs. I size down or wait.
- If there’s heavy short liquidation above, I watch for a squeeze.
- In ranges, it shows where nothing will happen vs where things can explode.
Don’t use it for exact levels. It shifts fast.
Funding Rate Heatmap
This shows who’s paying who.
If funding is positive, longs are paying shorts. That usually means the market is leaning long.
Most people ignore this. That’s a mistake.
When funding stays high for a while, it tells you one thing. The trade is crowded.
Crowded trades don’t end well.
I’ve held positions where price went nowhere, but funding slowly drained my PnL.
Now I check it before I decide to hold anything.
How I use it:
- If funding is high and I’m long, I get cautious. The trade is crowded.
- If price goes up but funding drops, conviction is fading. I start thinking about exit.
- Sometimes I lean into the carry if the setup is clean.
Also watch for caps. If funding is maxed, everyone is on one side.
Bubble Chart
This gives a full view of the derivatives market.
Size shows interest. Position shows momentum or volatility.
When you’re tracking many pairs, this saves time.
You don’t need to scan everything. Just find what stands out.
Why it works:
- You spot rotation early. New money always shows up somewhere first.
- You avoid crowded trades. Big clusters usually mean late entries.
- You see your risk. If all your positions sit in the same zone, you’re exposed.
I use this at the start of every session.
Pick a few names, then go deeper.
How I Use Them Together
This is my workflow.
- Start with the Bubble Chart → find what’s moving
- Check Funding → see if the crowd is leaning too hard
- Check Liquidations → see if I’m about to get trapped
That’s it.
No overthinking.
I’m not trying to call tops or bottoms.
I’m stacking odds.
These are not indicators
They don’t sit on your chart and they don’t look pretty.
This is raw derivatives data.
This is where traders get trapped.
They won’t make you right every time.
But they will keep you out of the obvious traps.
In this game, avoiding bad trades matters more than finding perfect ones.
Data sources: All Derivatives Charts from CoinAnk
Disclaimer: This is how I trade and manage risk. Use it as a framework, not a signal. Your execution is still your responsibility.
