---
title: 'The Only Smart Money Concepts Tutorial You Need to See!'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=m1jRr_8Rxak'
video_id: 'm1jRr_8Rxak'
date: 2026-08-26
duration_sec: 942
channel: 'Smart Risk'
---

# The Only Smart Money Concepts Tutorial You Need to See!

> Source: [The Only Smart Money Concepts Tutorial You Need to See!](https://youtube.com/watch?v=m1jRr_8Rxak)

## Summary

This video presents a comprehensive framework for understanding and applying Smart Money Concepts (SMC) in trading. It breaks down the methodology into five sequential steps: analyzing market structure, marking fair value gaps, identifying liquidity, marking supply and demand zones, and executing trades by combining these elements. The tutorial includes real chart examples to demonstrate how to integrate these concepts for high-probability trades.

### Key Points

- **The Problem with Smart Money Concepts** [00:02] — Many traders use SMC but fail because they treat it as a collection of patterns rather than a way of reading the market. The key is understanding how concepts work together.
- **Step 1: Analyzing Market Structure** [01:14] — Identify market direction and trading range using 1-2-3 moves and breaks of structure. A break above previous high confirms bullish trend; a break below swing low confirms bearish.
- **Step 2: Marking Fair Value Gaps** [02:48] — Fair value gaps are three-candlestick formations indicating price imbalance. They act as magnets for price to return and fill, offering high-probability reversal zones.
- **Step 3: Identifying Liquidity** [05:15] — Liquidity levels are areas with high concentration of stop losses and pending orders. They attract price like magnets. Key types include swing highs/lows, equal highs/lows, turning points, and daily highs/lows.
- **Step 4: Marking Supply and Demand Zones** [09:38] — Supply and demand zones are areas where institutional volume caused sharp moves. Valid zones are identified by inefficiency (fair value gaps), break of structure, and pushed distance.
- **Step 5: Combining Concepts for Trade Execution** [11:42] — Real chart example on EUR/USD: define trading range, mark supply zone, wait for price to enter zone, then zoom into lower timeframe (15-min) for precise entry. Trail stop loss on breaks of structure to lock profits.

### Conclusion

Smart Money Concepts is not a set of isolated patterns but a cohesive framework for reading market behavior. By systematically combining market structure, fair value gaps, liquidity, and supply/demand, traders can identify high-probability setups and manage risk effectively.

## Transcript

popular trading approaches. But why do so many traders who use it still profitable? What separates the traders who use smart money concepts successfully from the ones who keep failing?
The real difference is understanding how these concepts work together and where the market. Because smart money concepts isn't a collection of patterns, it's a way of reading the market.
puzzle. That's why in this video, we're going to provide a comprehensive framework that brings all of these concepts together process. By the end of this video, you'll not
only understand what each concept means, but more importantly, you'll understand when to use it, how it connects to the other concepts, and how to turn all of framework. Now, if that's something you're
make sure to hit the like button to support our work, and subscribe if support our work, and subscribe if you're new.
five simple steps. So, let's start with the first one. Analyzing the market structure. In this general analysis, we apply the market structure concepts of smart money trading to the chart to find the market
direction and define the trading range. When the market forms a 1-2-3 move and breaks above the previous high, we have a trend. again, that confirms a trend continuation.
formation shows that the bulls are in control, and price is more likely to As long as the price stays above the swing low, we remain bullish on this So, the trading range we're looking at starts from this high to this low.
If the price pulls back deep enough for traders to enter long positions, it will likely rise again and form another impulsive bullish move. Now, this was just a simple demonstration of how to apply market
structure concepts. However, the problem is that the market rarely looks this clean. Most of the time, it looks more like But don't get confused. Let's apply the same market structure concept.
Here is the latest break of market structure. So, we'll mark the swing high, swing low, and define the trading range. Every formation inside this range is considered internal structure, and the
overall direction is bullish. This was the first step. Analyzing the market structure to find the direction and trading range. Now, let's move on to the next step, which is marking fair value gaps.
What are fair value gaps? A fair value gap is a price gap caused by a sudden imbalance between the strength of buyers and sellers. It's defined by a three-candlestick formation, where we have a gap between
like this. Now, what does the fair value gap even mean in terms of price action? As the name suggests, it simply means that there is a gap in the fair value of the price.
The massive buying pressure has caused this aggressive movement, likely due to institutional activity, and now the price is inefficient. As a smart money trader, marking fair value gaps is the first thing we do when
we open the chart. But why mark fair value gaps on a chart? Fair value gaps are empty spaces on the chart, where the price moved very quickly without much trading in between. The market often comes back to these
gaps to fill them, as the price looks for balance. Traders watch these gaps closely because the price may react when it returns to them. Additionally, a demand or supply zone
that created a fair value gap is usually stronger than a zone without an imbalance. If the price returns to such a zone, there is a higher chance it will act as a strong reversal point.
Now, back to the previous chart. Let's mark the fair value gaps. price. But what do they mean? And what is the point of identifying them on the chart? The bullish fair value gap shows that
this move had strong bullish momentum. The demand zone that created this gap provides a high probability trading opportunity to go long because the gap indicates that buyers were aggressive in this area.
When price returns, those buyers may defend their positions, pushing the market back up, and giving us a favorable entry with lower risk. shows the opposite.
It signals that this small internal move has strong bearish momentum, which could push the price below the demand level and trigger a reversal. However, if the retracement ends and the price reverses back up to the point that
created this gap, it is a strong indication that the price may push higher. Now, let's move on to the next concept, identifying liquidity. Liquidity levels are areas on the chart where a high concentration of orders,
such as stop losses or pending trades, are likely to exist. These levels act like magnets for price, often pulling it toward them before a major move occurs. Imagine this as our recent price action.
the demand area, many price action traders will go long and place their stop loss orders just below it, hoping to benefit from a If the price then continues to rise and
traders may mark it as their target, take profits, or even open short positions at the resistance area. This means there is liquidity both below swing lows and above swing highs, which we refer to as sell-side liquidity and
buy-side liquidity, respectively. Now, let's talk about the key liquidity types you should mark on the chart. But, before we continue, if you're looking for a trusted prop firm with fast and reliable payouts, then you need to check
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account reward, available only through our link in the description. The first type is swing highs and swing lows. We've mentioned these terms many times, but what do they actually mean?
Swings are price turning points where three candles form a specific pattern. A swing high occurs when the middle candle makes a higher high than the candles on A swing low occurs when the middle candle makes a lower low than the
candles on both sides. The pattern is only confirmed once the third candle closes. In this example, these are our In this example, these are our identifiable swing highs and swing lows.
Keep in mind that you can also use a five-candle swing pattern, which can make swings more reliable and give stronger signals. Now, let's move on to the second type of liquidity, equal highs and lows.
As the name suggests, the price forms equal lows where the low points are around the same level. Similarly, the price forms equal highs same level. So, what does this signify in terms of
price action? Double or triple bottoms created on the chart are great places to look for trading opportunities. Many retail traders expect a rejection to the upside once the price taps into
this area again. So, they enter long positions at these levels, placing their positions at these levels, placing their stop losses somewhere below. However, as we mentioned earlier, smart money aims to trigger these stop losses. Therefore,
it's important to wait for the liquidity to be collected before entering the If a demand area exists below the equal lows, there's a high chance the price will break below, sweep the liquidity, and then push higher.
This is one of the key trading patterns in smart money concepts, waiting for the price to collect retail traders' stop losses, and then entering the market at the demand area. Next, let's talk about another key
Turning points. Turning points are areas on the chart a long-term trend. These levels are often seen by the market as overbought or oversold, which increases the likelihood of a reaction
when the price revisits them. They hold significant liquidity because they attract attention from both retail and institutional traders. Daily highs and levels. The daily high is the highest price
reached during the trading day, while the daily low is the lowest. These levels often draw a lot of trader activity, with many placing their stop loss orders or pending orders around them, making them rich in liquidity.
liquidity zones that need to be marked on the chart, let's move on to the next concept, marking supply and demand Supply and demand zones are areas on the chart where traders have entered the
market with enough volume to cause the price to move sharply away from that Normally, we mark the beginning of this sharp move as the supply or demand area and expect the price to reject this zone when it revisits it due to the behavior
of market participants. However, there are several key factors to consider when identifying valid supply and demand zones for trading. Inefficiency, break of structure, and pushed distance.
clue in confirming the strength and reliability of the zone. Inefficiency occurs when price leaves an area quickly, creating an imbalance between buying and selling orders. This imbalance is often visible as a
fair value gap between consecutive candles. These gaps indicate a lack of supply or demand at that level, making it a potential turning point. A break of structure happens when the
price moves past a key support or resistance level, signaling a shift in market sentiment and confirming the potential strength of the supply or demand zone. Each time price breaks a structure
level, it increases the likelihood of trend continuation. The pushed distance refers to how far the price travels away from the zone before returning. A larger pushed distance often signals a
more significant rejection, making the zone stronger. together, you can more effectively identify high probability supply and demand zones for your trades. For example, if we draw zigzag lines on
the Euro-Dollar 1-hour chart, we can clearly see the highs and lows marked. The latest impulsive movement meets all the criteria for a high-quality demand zone. It has created a fair value gap, broken
and pushed the price higher by a significant distance compared to earlier Once the price retraces back to this zone, there is a higher probability that it will reject the area and continue moving upward. Now, in this part of the
video, let's see a couple of real chart examples to show you how to put all these smart money concepts together like pieces of a puzzle to enter a high-quality trade. Here on the Euro-Dollar 1-hour chart, we
have a bearish market structure formation. So, we are only interested in selling opportunities. The first step is to define the trading This is the latest breakout, so we mark the trading range from the swing low to
the swing high. This means we anticipate the correction to happen inside this range and the next impulse to follow downward. If the price breaks above this protected high, the entire bearish outlook
changes. Now, where could our supply zone be for placing short entries? To answer this, let's first mark the imbalance and liquidity. There is no noticeable structure to mark
as a liquidity level, but here we have a fair value gap area. Basically, the candle that created this gap can be considered a supply zone to look for selling opportunities. We can also mark the last bullish
momentum candle before the bearish impulsive move as another potential It doesn't make much difference which one we choose because later we will zoom into the lower time frame to refine our entry.
Now, let's play the price forward to see what happens. Here, the price has created equal highs, which we will mark as a key liquidity area because these highs may attract stop-loss orders from sellers and buy
stops from breakout traders. If the price breaks above these equal highs and then pulls back deeply into our trading zone, it could provide us with a great trading opportunity. We plan to wait for the price to enter
our trading zone, then zoom into lower time frames to find an entry. Here, the price has retraced all the way up to our trading zone. But, there is another important price action formation. This bullish movement
has created a bullish fair value gap, which indicates strong buying momentum. This momentum might have enough power to push the price above the supply zone. So, we now have a fight between supply and demand.
If the demand is strong enough to break above the high, we are no longer bearish on this pair. If the supply is strong enough to break gap, it will provide a great opportunity to
go short. Now, let's see what happens. Supply has overcome demand and is now in control. To execute the trade, let's zoom into the 15-minute chart for more detail.
On the 15-minute chart, all we need to do is identify a supply zone to go The candle that created the fair value gap will make a great supply area for entering a short trade. Now, let's play the price forward.
trade. But, let's continue to place more trades. Once again, we have a fair value gap area, so we will mark the supply zone and place a sell limit.
For this setup, we are going to trail our profits, meaning that every time price creates a break to the downside, we will move our stop loss to the protected high. This way, even if the price reverses, we
trade run. Here, we have our first breakout, so let's move the stop loss to this protected high. Once more, we have another breakout, so we move the stop loss again.
This process continues until the price reverses and hits our stop. For this particular trade, we were able to catch almost a 1:4 risk-to-reward ratio. This is a quick example of how combining
multiple smart money concepts can help us achieve great trades. So, that's it for this video. I hope it was valuable for you. and don't forget to share your thoughts
in the comments. See you in the next episode.