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SteadyOptions 2016 - Year In Review


2016 marks our firth year as a public service. We had a good year overall. We closed 127 trades in 2016. The model portfolio produced 40.1% compounded gain on the whole account based on 10% allocation. The winning ratio was pretty consistent around 66%. We had three losing months in 2016.

Performance Dissected

 

It is important to mention that those numbers are pre-commissions, so your actual results will be lower. As with every trading system which uses multi leg trades, commissions will have a significant impact on performance, so it is very important to use a cheap broker. We have extensive discussions about brokers and commissions on the Forum (like this one) and help members to select the best broker. Commissions reduce the monthly returns by approximately 2-3% per month, depending on the broker. Please refer to Performance Dissected topic for more details. 

 

We had few rough months in 2016. The main reason is that we started implementing a new strategy that holds trades through earnings. This is a high probability high risk strategy that had very good historical results and probability, but did not work well in 2016. You can read more details here, including the lessons we learned. This strategy was responsible for majority of the losses in Feb-Apr. 2016. Once we realized that the strategy doesn't work well and is higher risk than most members would like, we abandoned it and went back to our time proven strategies. It took us just 5 months to recover, and our model portfolio doubled since April lows. Members who had the discipline and patience to stay the course have been greatly rewarded.
 
To put things in perspective, it was our worst drawdown in 5 years. Despite our best efforts, drawdowns happen in trading, it's part of the game. Despite this drawdown, we still delivered 5 years CAGR of 82.5% (including commissions), while investing only 50-60% of our capital on average. It is important to understand that Drawdowns Are Part Of The Game. All big winners including AAPL, AMZN, GOOG and MSFT had few drawdowns ranging from 65% to 92%. If you sold them, you would not enjoy the gains that followed. 

 

Our strategies

 

SteadyOptions uses a mix of non-directional strategies: earnings plays, Iron Condors, Calendar spreads etc. We constantly adding new strategies to our arsenal, based on different market conditions.

 

SO model portfolio is not designed for speculative trades although we might do some in the speculative forum. SO is not a get-rich-quick-without-efforts kind of newsletter. I'm a big fan of the "slow and steady" approach. I aim for many singles instead of few homeruns. My first goal is capital preservation instead of doubling your account. Think about the risk first. If you take care of the risk, the profits will come.

 

We continue expanding the scope of our trades beyond the earnings trades, Iron Condors and calendars. We are trading SPY, TLT, VIX and other ETFs to diversify the portfolio. We will continue refining those strategies to get even better results. This gives members a lot of choice and flexibility.

 

Looking at specific strategies, pre-earnings calendars were our best performing strategy, producing 18.2% average return with over 80% winning ratio. We will continue trading what works the best and adapt to the market conditions.

 

What makes SO different?

 

First, we use a total portfolio approach for performance reporting. This approach reflects the growth of the entire account, not just what was at risk. We balance the portfolio in terms of options Greeks. SteadyOptions provides a complete portfolio solution. We trade a variety of non-directional strategies balancing each other. You can allocate 60-70% of your options account to our strategies and still sleep well at night.

 

Second, our performance is based on real fills. Each trade alert comes with screenshot of my broker fills. Many services base their performance on the "maximum profit potential" which is very misleading. Nobody can sell at the top and do it consistently. We put our money where our mouth is.

 

Our performance reporting is completely transparent. All trades are listed on the performance page, with the exact entry/exit dates and P/L percentage.

 

It is not a coincidence that SteadyOptions is ranked #1 out of 704 Newsletters on Investimonials, a financial product review site. Read all our reviews here. The reviewers especially mention our honesty and transparency.

 

We place a lot of emphasis on options education. There is a dedicated forum where every trade is discussed before the trade is placed. We discuss different strategies and potential trades. Unlike most other services that just send the trade alerts, our members understand the rationale behind the trades and not just blindly follow the alerts. SO actually helps members to become better traders.

 

Other services

 

In addition to SteadyOptions, we offer the following services:


The LCD is our most diversified and scalable portfolio, I highly recommend that members check it out. It is offered as an added bonus of all subscription plans. We also offer Managed Accounts for Anchor Trades and LCD.

 

Let me finish with my favorite quote from Michael Covel:

 

"Profits come in bunches. The trick when going sideways between home runs is not to lose too much in between."

 

Subscription is now open to new members for a limited time. If you are not a member and interested to join, you can click here to join our winning team. When you join SteadyOptions, we will share with you all we know about options. We will never try to sell you any additional "proprietary systems", training, webinars etc. All our "secrets" are included in your monthly fee.

 

Happy Trading from SO team!

 

Edited by Kim

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