The vast majority of volume (probably 90%+) on all the markets is institutions. Private retail traders like us are a tiny percentage of the market. Therefore almost every time you take a trade there is an institution taking the other side of that trade!
The institutions employ super smart, highly educated people and state of the art computer systems programmed by the smartest most highly paid quants (computer programmers with huge brains and maths/physics degrees) in the world to trade for them.
So how come every trade isn’t a loser then?
Well firstly remember there are people all over the world trading every different time frame and every different chart type (tick, volume, line, etc). Some aren’t even looking at charts and are trading solely based on fundamentals. So what looks like a perfect trade to you on your chart could look completely different to the person (again likely working for an institution) taking the other side of the trade.
Another possibility is the institution who is (probably) taking the other side of your long position could be going short on a much higher time frame and be willing to hold through an early pullback (allowing you a quick profit).
Also they might just have a huge order to fill, and be willing to buy more and more long positions throughout the day despite the market being in a bear trend, again allowing you to get in and out of a short position and make money.
Also the High Frequency Trading algorithms, which are huge players these days, will scalp for only one pip all the way down a trend, even though the very last trade will be a loser, allowing you to get long at the very bottom of a move. Why do they do this? Well their systems obviously show this to be profitable otherwise they wouldn’t! Yeah they are taking a losing trade at the very bottom of this move, but every other trade on the way down was a winner, so overall they made a profit.
Important to remember that no matter how sure you are of a setup, there is always someone somewhere who believes the exact opposite, otherwise you wouldn’t get filled! Also as most of the volume is institutions, you’re taking on the big players every time you trade!