I’m sitting here this morning in the offices of SMB capital in downtown Manhattan, making some notes in anticipation of a blitz I”ll be doing this week, recording the majority of the videotapes that will form the core of our options training program. It brought me back to my first days as an options trader and the intense excitement … Read More
SMB Options Trade of the Week – Heart Friendly Butterfly
Seth Freudberg discusses a “Heart Friendly Butterfly Trade” designed to minimize the effect of market price movements on the the PNL of an options income trade. The option is on the SPX.
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One of the most popular income options strategy is known as the high probability iron condor, which consists of a call side credit spread and a put side credit spread “facing each other” very far out of the money. For example, on January 19, 2011, at about 10:30 in the morning, the RUT Index was trading at 798. An options trader … Read More
What do all successful traders have in common?
In the summer of 2010, I traveled to Manhattan from my home in Philadelphia to meet with Roy Davis of SMB Capital for the purpose of checking out SMB’s intraday equities training program. While I am an income options spread trader myself, my premise was that intraday equities trading and options income trading were not at all mutually exclusive … Read More
Sometimes Nothing’s A Real Cool Hand
For those of you who are movie buffs like me, you’ll know that one of the truly greatest films of all time is Cool Hand Luke, the titlecharacter having been played by Paul Newman in one of his finest roles. If you haven’t seen it, see it. What a great flick. The Paul Newman character is a prisoner on a … Read More
The Right Way to Adopt a New Options Strategy for Your Playbook
In our last blog post we discussed the reasons that options traders should take it slowly when adopting a new income strategy. Here are some simple steps you can take to assure that your adoption of a new options strategy is sound: Communicate with the developer of the strategy and see if he or she is still actively trading the … Read More
Beware of the Fad: Five Reasons to Take it Easy with a New Options Strategy
In the options universe, there are plenty of traders who are happy to share a new strategy that has either worked well for them in the recent past, or has backtested splendidly over an extended period of time. Regardless of whether these strategies have been developed by competent veteran traders or newer traders who have not experienced every type of … Read More
Options Trade Initiation: Why Patience Pays Off
When developing traders enter into income options strategies, there is a tendency to become impatient when executing the opening trade. The trader will typically put an order in at or around the mid-price but often finds that the market is not biting on that price immediately. This can create anxiety and a feeling of impatience in the trader, arising from the belief that, since almost … Read More