Risk First, Trade Second: Simon Mach on The Gambling Files Podcast

Why does Simon Mach call himself a crypto father?

Bruford opened with a test: is Simon a crypto bro? The label, Simon says, belongs to accounts predicting the next thousand percent memecoin pump.

“So I would actually put myself as a crypto father.”

The joke carries the mission. He introduced MyCryptoParadise as a crypto trading signals and market analysis firm operating since 2016. The mission is pulling crypto away from emotional trading and toward process. The accounts Bruford was picturing? That’s usually the people that are running these kind of pump and dump groups which we are actually since 2016 fighting aggressively against.

What goes into a crypto trading signal before the trade?

Bruford admitted he had no idea what a trading signal is. Simon’s definition does not start with a prediction. It starts with the loss.

“How I understand the crypto trading signal from the beginning is always focus on the risk first.”

Before the ParadiseTeam shares a setup, the questions are already answered. How much is this trade allowed to lose? What position size and leverage does that permit? Where is the idea invalidated, and where does profit get taken?

“So for me, crypto trading signal is made out of clear entry zone, stop loss aka the invalidation area and exit targets. Because if you don’t have a plan before entering this crypto trading signal, then your plan is to fail.”

The contrast is the trader who enters convinced the trade can only win. The first move against the position then arrives with no plan, and every decision after that is emotional.

What do slot machines and crypto charts have in common?

The Gambling Files runs a spinoff show about addiction, so Bruford brought research linking crypto trading and gambling psychology. Simon went further and explained the mechanism from the inside.

“Addiction is very interesting because every time you have uncertain outcome where sometimes you can win money, sometimes you can lose money, it’s very exciting.”

The anticipation of an unknown outcome is the hook itself, the thing that makes you keep pressing the button. That’s how slot machines work, right? The same chemistry sits in front of every chart, which is why a professional needs rules that hold when excitement spikes.

His dividing line is blunt. Anyone who wants the thrill should not be trading at all. Treat trading as gambling and then it’s much better to keep your money in a bank account and lose it on inflation. Treated as a business, with defined risk and sizing, he argues it is worth doing. The thrill is not the product. The process is.

Where does crypto’s value actually come from?

This is where Bruford pushed hardest. Fiat currencies, the government-issued money in your bank account, move on trade flows, oil shocks and the economy underneath them. What is underneath a coin? Simon’s answer is that both systems ultimately run on belief.

“So if nobody would actually believe in the value of the digits in your bank account or in that paper, right? It would be just a piece of paper. It would have no value at all.”

Crypto simply carries a larger share of its value in that belief layer, so the price moves when the story moves. Bruford compared the space to the dot com years and to multi-level marketing waves, and Simon agreed more than he argued. Bitcoin tops, he said, work the same way. A market with no new buyers needs to go down because there is not enough people to keep on pushing the price further up.

What makes crypto move so much more than fiat money?

Belief is half of the answer. The other half is mechanical, and most newcomers never see it.

“The volatility is mostly because of lack of liquidity in crypto, right? So there are some coins that have overall market volume of I don’t know $1 million. So even one small market buy can actually move it couple of percentages, right?”

A market buy takes whatever price is on offer right now. Thin order books therefore mean small money moves prices in ways no major fiat pair would tolerate. Put shifting belief on top of shallow liquidity and the swings follow.

“So it’s liquidity and belief in my opinion. This kind of combination then creates this volatility.”

What does FOMO do to a trader?

FOMO came up through the same gambling psychology research. Simon’s point is that it is not a crypto invention.

“And FOMO is not just in crypto, it’s everywhere in life, right? So, when you are not invited to a party, you have FOMO.”

Emotion drives action, and a market that never closes supplies the emotion on demand. He described anxiety as overthinking about future and depression as overthinking about past. Professional trading is only possible from the present, following a process rather than living in the outcome.

“Either you have too much on or too little on. When the trade goes in your direction you have too little on. When it goes against you, you have too much on.”

The escape is judging yourself on whether you followed the rules, and letting the result be what it is.

If the method works, why give the analysis away?

It is the question every skeptic asks a signals firm: if the method works, why share it at all? Simon’s honest starting point is his own first stake: he began trading underage, with about twenty dollars from his father, and lost it. Then he reached for a surgeon’s scalpel.

“The same tool is not going to do the same things in like two different hands, right?”

A scalpel does not make anyone a surgeon. Analysis, indicators and setups are tools. The hard part is executing them with discipline, patience and consistency: that’s where the mastery happens and that actually starts here in your mindset.

So the knowledge is free on purpose: we are actually doing the knowledge for free. I’m recording three times a week on YouTube, Bitcoin analysis every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, alongside free Telegram channels and free technical analysis education. Private memberships exist for people who lack the time to build their own process and want the team’s own trade setups instead.

“We are making them think more about protecting capital than trying to double triple their capital overnight.”

What should traders watch for around market manipulation?

One of the sharpest stretches of the episode covers how coordinated pumps actually work. The blockchain is public, which means accumulation is visible to anyone monitoring wallet flows before the crowd arrives.

“We can actually see the movements of the wallets, what they are doing, before some of the pump and dumps happens.”

The pattern he described is simple. A large account quietly builds a position, then says something loud in public. A market buy into thin liquidity makes the move look instant. Followers pile in over the next minutes, and that late buying becomes the exit liquidity the early position sells into. Bruford’s response was that on the stock market this behaviour would get someone arrested.

Why does Simon welcome crypto regulation?

For a founder in an industry famous for hating oversight, Simon’s closing position was unambiguous. Regulation is how the cowboy era ends.

“As the time goes, I do believe it’s going to be more regulated. People will be watching like what’s going on behind the scenes more. It will be more protected.”

Protection changes behaviour. People participate in markets they trust, and for a lot of retail traders it will be positive.

Watch the full conversation

The full hour also covers fiat currencies, the dot com years, belief as a human need, and where crypto stands with mainstream acceptance.

About Simon Mach

Simon Mach founded MyCryptoParadise in 2016. It began as a group of friends posting their trades in a free Telegram channel. It grew into an analysis and education company built around risk and process, not price predictions.

He started young. His father gave him about twenty dollars to trade with while he was still underage, and he lost it. He calls that lost twenty dollars his early tuition. It is also why he argues so hard against the memecoin casino that greets most newcomers to crypto.

Simon writes and speaks about trading psychology, risk management and disciplined execution. You can follow him on LinkedIn and on X. He also argued that trading psychology decides more than strategy on the Market Mamas podcast. He spoke about hearing the signal over the noise on the Crypto Hipster podcast, which we covered when MyCryptoParadise released its Professional Trader album. And he explained how the company was built to survive every market cycle on the 21st Century Entrepreneurship podcast. The psychology side of the work continues at our sister project MyTradingCoach.

Crypto trading involves substantial risk and can result in the loss of your capital. Comparing trading with gambling psychology does not change market risk. Nothing in this article is financial advice, and past performance does not guarantee future results.