Scalp Trading: The Complete Guide with Strategies and Practical Tips

What is Scalp Trading?

Scalp Trading, or simply Scalping, is a trading strategy that seeks to profit from small price fluctuations by executing multiple trades throughout the day. Unlike traditional day trading, scalpers hold positions for just a few seconds or minutes, accumulating gains through quick and frequent transactions.

Characteristics of Scalp Trading

• High frequency of trades: dozens or even hundreds of trades per day.

• Short term: trades last seconds or minutes.

• Low exposure to market risk: short positions avoid the impact of news or unexpected events.

• High focus on liquidity: scalpers prefer assets with high liquidity and low spread, such as mini futures contracts (index and dollar), blue-chip stocks, or cryptocurrencies with high volume.

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Main Strategies for Scalp Trading

1. Scalping with Tape Reading

Utilizes the analysis of the order book and the transaction history (Times & Trades) to identify large orders, aggressors, and imbalances in supply and demand.

Tip: Watch for institutional “players” entering with large orders; following these movements can indicate very short-term trends.

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2. Scalping with Technical Analysis

Based on chart patterns and very short-term indicators, such as:

• Moving averages of 9 and 21 periods

• Bollinger Bands (to detect overbought/oversold conditions)

• RSI (Relative Strength Index) adjusted for 2 or 5 periods

• Price Action (patterns like hammer, shooting star, etc.)

Example of a Simple Setup:

• Exponential moving average of 9 periods (EMA9)

• Buy when the price crosses the EMA9 from below to above, with volume confirmation.

• Short stop (2 or 3 ticks), quick target (1:1 or 2:1).

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3. Scalping with Microtrend Breakout Strategy

Involves identifying small congestion zones and trading the breakout of these areas with short stops and defined targets.