Trading Blog

The “common knowledge” about uncovered calls is that they are always high-risk. Conservative traders should avoid them. But is this always true? Risk by  most definitions is associated with specific strategies. So covered calls are low-risk and uncovered calls are high-risk. But this assumption is not always a fair one.

Perhaps the toughest part of trading options is figuring out what to do. For this we have advisors, seminars, newsletters and more. Yet, one tool that all investors need, but few utilize adequately, is data. This concept is parroted across the industry, but how does the average investor move from the desire to utilize data to the actual practice?

Many that sell equity market put options focus on the S&P 500 (SPX, XSP, SPY). Some will add small caps by selling puts on the Russell 2000 (RUT, IWM). An investor could also make their put selling strategy globally diversified by adding MSCI EAFE (EFA) and Emerging Markets (EEM).

The “random walk hypothesis” (RWH) is one idea about how stock prices behave – but only one of many. It is a theory promoted in academia and believed in my many, but not so much by traders involved with handling real money. Theories aside, is the market truly random?

I’ve now been trading options for over a decade and been associated with Steady Options for seven years – hard to believe.  Over that period, I’ve learned quite a bit about option trading; how to improve, what not to do, and generally how the option markets work. I’m still learning.

No one likes losing money, and no one likes hearing "excuses". However, in an effort to be fully transparent, solicit feedback, and to improve our own performance, we're writing this article to do a further breakdown of the losses which our model portfolio incurred in January 2019. 

Options traders constantly seek the elusive reliable reversal signal. A few unusual but strong reversals are worth looking for, and their patterns reveal likely exceptional timing for opening or closing option trades. One example of this exceptionally strong signal is the island cluster (or, island reversal).

There currently are over sixty million Americans that are active 401(k) participants, and well over 500,000 total active 401(k) plans offered by employers in the United States.  Despite these high numbers, usages could be higher, as the US Census Bureau estimates that only 41% of all employees with access to a 401(k) plan utilize it, with even less funding it fully.

I am on the hunt for a short volatility position for three main reasons. First, the market’s wild swings have, for the time being at least, diminished. Second, option activity has dried up as my options barometer continues to be stuck in the 4 – 6 range as traders are not making big bets in either direction.

For many US investors, the "base case" for equity investing is US large cap stocks, most commonly benchmarked as the S&P 500. You could absolutely do far worse than owning these 500 great US companies, and the weight of the evidence suggests that most actively managed mutual funds that benchmark themselves against the S&P 500 index have in fact done worse.

The use of moving average (MA) for predicting future price behavior must be undertaken cautiously. MA is a lagging indicator, so the question must be: Can a lagging indicator provide guidance for the future? Yes. The use of two MA lines and how they interact is a reliable form of reversal indicator.

Our members know that pre earnings straddles and calendars have been our bread and butter strategies in the recent years. We enter those trades when the prices are cheap compared to previous cycles. However, in the last few months of 2018, Implied Volatility exploded, making most of those trades too expensive.