Advanced📖 26 min read🏷 Theory
IPDA & ALGORITHMIC THEORY
Understanding the Machine Behind the Market
Most traders treat the market like a chaotic battlefield. ICT's view is fundamentally different: the market is a programmatic delivery system. The Interbank Price Delivery Algorithm (IPDA) follows rules. It has patterns. It is predictable. Understanding this changes everything about how you read price.
The IPDA delivers price in programmatic, predictable ways — understanding its logic is the key to reading markets like an institution
// Lesson Content
The IPDA is ICT's framework for understanding how price is delivered in financial markets. ICT's thesis: major markets are not driven by random supply and demand, but by a programmatic algorithm operated by major banks and central banks.
THE CORE THESIS:
Major institutions coordinate through algorithms to deliver price to specific levels. These algorithms:
• Hunt liquidity pools to fill institutional orders
• Create FVGs as evidence of rapid order execution
• Deliver price in AMD patterns on every timeframe
• Reference specific lookback periods (20/40/60 days) for targets
• Operate during specific time windows (killzones)
WHY THIS MATTERS PRACTICALLY:
Whether or not you accept the theory — the OBSERVABLE BEHAVIOR is undeniable. Markets DO behave predictably during specific times. Price DOES consistently target old highs and lows. FVGs DO get filled with remarkable consistency. AMD patterns DO repeat.
ICT is not asking you to believe a theory. He's asking you to observe patterns in data. Backtest 100 liquidity sweeps on NAS100 and see the reversal rate. The data speaks.
📌 You don't need to believe every element of IPDA theory. Observe that markets behave in programmable, predictable ways. The patterns are real. The theory explains them.
// Test Your Understanding
// KNOWLEDGE CHECK
1. What does IPDA stand for?
2. What is the Consequent Encroachment (CE)?
3. When do New Week Opening Gaps form?
// What to study next
Continue your ICT journey