[New Series] Zone Final Chapter Chapter 6: The "Masses" and the "Predators" of the Market — Who is Moving the Prices? ??
To you who, beyond the screen, are seriously facing the chart today as well, battling your own heart ☕️✨
In the previous 【Chapter 5】, we talked about the vivid back-and-forth between “a runaway train (huge orders)” on the exchange floor and the scalpers.
The market is by no means a cold, mechanical computer game; it is a real battleground of live humans, with genuine negotiations—has that sinking in gradually?
Now, in this 【Chapter 6】, we will take an even deeper cut into the identities of those who create the “order skew”—the “various market participants”—and uncover their true nature ✨
Why is it that the stocks that are touted as “sure to rise” on television news or on SNS crash dramatically the moment we buy?
This time, through a real incident that actually occurred at the Chicago exchange, we will reveal the cruel mechanism in the market of “predators (pros)” and “prey (the masses).”
It’s a slightly longer special edition, but this time too we will gently explain so you can read it smoothly on a smartphone. Please prepare a warm cup of tea and read while relaxing?

? The identities of the “three groups” participating in the market
In Chapter 6, Mark Douglas and Paul T. Woope classify the players participating in the market into three large groups.
To understand chart movements, first you need to know what their “purpose” is when they place orders.
1. Hedgers (commercials / real-demand participants)
Their purpose isn’t to profit,“to reduce business risk”.
Examples of participants:Large grain warehouses, farmers growing wheat and corn, homebuilders, oil companies, electric utilities, airlines, and the like.
Characteristics:Their order sizes are astronomical, and regardless of chart patterns, they place huge orders for their own reasons (inventory management, currency risk hedging, etc.). When these orders enter the market, they cause prices to move sharply in one direction.
2. Speculators (profit-seeking traders)
We individual traders are included here as well, but their nature varies greatly by size.
Examples of participants:Ordinary individual traders, scalpers on the floor, hedge fund managers, pension funds, investment banks, etc.
Characteristics:They aim to buy low and sell high (or sell high and buy back lower). Large funds understand that their huge orders can move market prices and act with that in mind.
3. The Crowd / Weak participants
This is the most tragic group.
Examples of participants:Ordinary investors influenced by TV or news, and by someone’s advice, they emotional-ly place orders out of greed or fear.
Characteristics:They don’t analyze themselves to seek an edge; they move under peer pressure of “because others are buying, I buy too.” As a result, they become “perfect liquidity (prey)” for the big pros.
