About
I trade breakouts. I write down what actually happens.
The Trader Sid is a swing trading education project built around one specific approach to the Indian cash market, documented in public, mistakes included.
My approach
Triangles first, then a few specific setups beyond that
I primarily trade the Nifty 200 universe, on weekly charts. The setup I trade most is a triangle, symmetrical or ascending trendlines converging on a stock, and I trade the breakout out of that structure. The high tight flag is one specific way a triangle forms, when a sharp pole is followed by a pullback that itself draws out a triangle before the second breakout. A breakout that pulls back before continuing is also part of this same triangle family, not a separate category.
One more setup rounds out what I actually look for: a gap up, where a stock gaps hard on real volume and the decision is how and when to get involved in the continuation. This one is genuinely different from the trendline-based setups, and I treat it with its own logic rather than forcing it into the triangle framework.
I also look beyond the Nifty 200 into mid and small caps when a stock outside that universe is showing the same kind of explosive setup. The framework doesn't change based on index membership. And while the weekly chart is where I find most setups, the daily timeframe isn't just there for entry timing, I trade off it directly and significantly, not only as a secondary confirmation step underneath the weekly read.
The other setup
Gap ups
A gap up is the setup furthest from the trendline based approach. A stock gaps hard on real volume, and the actual decision is how and when to get involved in the continuation, rather than waiting for a trendline structure that a gap like this usually doesn't give you time to draw. It gets its own read, since forcing it into a trendline framework it doesn't actually fit would just be a worse version of a setup that has its own logic.
Triangle, HTF, and gap up are the three setups I actually trade. The first two share a common trendline foundation, the third has its own logic entirely, and together they cover what I'm willing to put risk behind.
How it actually plays out
The read, step by step
Step one
Find the converging trendlines
A symmetrical or ascending triangle forming on the weekly chart, two trendlines actually converging, not just a loose, wide range.
Step two
Check whether it's an HTF variant
If a sharp pole led into the triangle, I'm looking at a high tight flag specifically, pole, pullback, then the second breakout above the pullback high.
Step three
Allow for a pullback after the first breakout
A breakout that pulls back before continuing is still part of this same triangle family. I don't treat the pullback as a failed trade on its own.
Step four
Trade the confirmed breakout
Entry on a real break of the triangle, stop and position size calculated before I click buy, never after.
Why this exists
What I'm not building
Most trading content in India falls into one of two buckets: tip channels selling calls with no explanation, or textbook courses that never show a real trade. I wanted to build something that actually sits outside both.
Not this
This instead
“I'd rather show you the trade that went wrong than pretend it didn't happen. That's the only version of this worth building.”
— The Trader Sid
What I actually trade
Cash market only, no shortcuts
Everything here is Indian cash market equities, primarily the Nifty 200 universe with mid and small caps in view when the setup justifies it. No options, no futures, no intraday scalping. Weekly charts for finding most setups, daily charts as a significant trading timeframe in their own right, not just a confirmation step. I risk 1% of my total trading capital on any single trade, not 1% of the position itself — the stop distance decides how many shares that works out to, and no position is allowed to exceed 20% of total capital regardless.
I won't pretend cash market is where I started. I traded futures and options early on, the way most people do when they first get into markets, because that's where the attention and the noise is. It took losing real money to learn something about myself rather than about the market: that kind of leverage and speed didn't suit my temperament or how I actually think through a trade. Cash market, with time to actually plan an entry and sit with a decision, fit who I am as a trader far better. Everything on this site comes from that version of trading, not the one I started with.
This site exists to document that process in full, the wins, the losses, and everything in between, so that anyone following along is learning from what actually happened rather than a curated highlight reel.
See the approach in action
Real trades, entry to exit, wins and losses both.