Posts Tagged ‘How To Trade Options’

Stock Option Trading – Fundamental Flaw in Fundamental Analysis and Stock Picking

Clinging on to Fundamental Analysis and stock picking software, only keeps you stuck in trading equities. Trading this way, compounds concentration risk in one asset class and fails to adequately diversify risks across Equities, Bonds, Currencies and Commodities.  There’s much more to stock option trading, than stock itself.I cite Benjamin F. King’s study, quoted repeatedly [...]

Stock Option Trading – Paradox – More Trades on Dull Days and Normal Days than Big Days

Contrast these 2 days.  29 Sep, 2008: Dow down -7.50%, Nasdaq down -10.06% and S&P 500 down -9.63%.  Versus 13 Nov, 2008: Dow up +6.25%, Nasdaq up +6.11% and S&P 500 up +6.47%.  Many retail option traders would have rushed to get their spreads filled on such big days, either to get short or long.  [...]

Binary Options Trading – Turn Tiny Trades into Big Profits

The amazing new field of binary options trading is helping small capital investors turn a couple of tiny little $200 trades into $300/day trading profits.  The risks are high, but new strategies are evolving daily to mitigate some of those risks.
Binary options trading is an exciting emerging field in the world of investing. As [...]

Online Options Trading – Portfolio Measures and Trade Performance Metrics

The Reward of Profit and the Risk of Losses for retail option trading needs to be managed at 2 related levels of performance: Portfolio and Trade Specific.At the Portfolio level for online options trading, there are 3 types of Targets that must be set, even before you trade.Maximum Return Target: complete achievement of the “ideal” [...]

Options Trading Strategies – Book Review – Sheldon Natenberg, Option Volatility and Pricing

As with most books on the topic of how to trade options, the amount of material to get through can be daunting. For example, with Sheldon Natenberg’s Option Volatility & Pricing, it is about 418 pages to digest.  There are adequate reader reviews on Amazon and Google Book Search, to help you decide if you [...]

Options Trading Strategies – Wrong Use of Historical Volatility and Implied Volatility Crossovers

Not all volatilities are constructed equal.  It is critical to differentiate between Historical Volatility and Implied Volatility, so retail traders learn how to trade options focused on what is material to theoretically price option spreads forward.Historical Volatility (HV) measures past price movements of the underlying asset recording the asset’s actual or realized volatility.  The more [...]

Options Trading Strategies – Treat Implied Volatility of Calls Separate From the IV of Puts

The Implied Volatility (IV) of Calls needs separate treatment from the IV of Puts. Also, for specific options trading strategies treat the IV of both Puts and Calls as a combined bundle.Each option at each strike implies its own individual percentage value of the underlying product’s future volatility. This makes it unique from any other [...]

Options Trading Strategies – Book Review – Guy Cohen, The Bible of Options Strategies

Most trading literature on option strategies tend to lean towards mathematical formulas to define the construction of a spread.  Guy Cohen has chosen to use pictorial logic, even with the Greeks unique to a particular strategy, to piece together the legs of a spread with diagrams.Diagrams that connect with each other are a much more [...]