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Anyone else experiencing any issues with emails?

I just checked and all emails are sent properly. We had this issue in the past when gmail was delaying our emails. Then all of them came at once after few hours. Looks like it's happening again, my last email from SO was at 10:37 and I'm using gmail as well. So far reports are only from members who use gmail, so it must be the same issue. Meanwhile, I can recommend checking New content or All activity on the forum. it refreshes automatically.

The model portfolio was up 40.1% on total account for the month of April.

Like many other new members, I went through a frustrating time on Steady Options. I almost gave up on it very early on, but luckily, I hung around. Having been here a while now, I’ve seen other newbies come full of enthusiasm and leave full of disappointment, walking the same frustration-filled path that I left behind. I’ve examined my own journey, and can break it down into various stages. So, here they are. Other peoples’ journey may be very different, but I hope that my pathway may shed some light, or give some hope to others who find themselves shouting at the cat for no reason, like I once did. 1) Initial Enthusiasm I joined full of hope and excitement, lured by the mouth-watering annual returns, thinking “If I can make even half of those returns, then I’ll be a happy-chappy”. Motivation Level : 10/10 2) Frustration with Fills Okay, I’ve been a member for a few weeks, and have tried to enter a few trades, but each time, I cannot even get close to the official entry price. I give up on many trades and enter others at the wrong price, resulting in more losers than winners. Motivation Level : 7/10 3) Frustration turns to Fury (well almost) It’s now many trades later and the fills are not getting any easier. It’s getting annoying seeing others open trade after trade and close it two days later at a profit, whilst my GTC order to buy is sitting idle on some exchange gathering dust. I’m a mild-manner guy, who wishes no ill-will on anyone, and thought I didn’t have a dark side, but the ugly monster of jealousy is tapping me on the shoulder and saying “Damn, there’s another guy who’s just closed the GOOG calendar for 30% ….AND….he’s gone in and out twice already this cycle, whilst you can’t even get in once?”. I'm anything BUT a happy-chappy. Motivation Level : 3/10 4) “I’ve had enough” Months have rolled on, my SO portfolio is not showing any gains whilst the official portfolio is showing a healthy number. I don’t even bother trying to enter any SO trades now, and hardly logon to the forums. I’m bitter and just waiting for my membership to expire. Motivation Level : 1/10 5) The last Attempt Over a year has gone by, and the anger and frustration has turned to “Let me give this lousy service one last chance, before my membership expires”. I register with one of the two charting services (ChartAffair/VolatiltyHQ), and spend the whole weekend reading up on old trades, and asking myself “Why did Kim enter this calendar at this price? How does he know that it should be a 1-week or a 3-week calendar?” I look at the RV charts and start to see that the official trades are entered at very low RV’s and every time I over-pay, I’m reducing my chances of profitability. I’m seeing patterns in the calendar RV charts – a ramp up as we get to earnings, a zig-zag pattern that allows others (who I envied) to go in-and-out of trades multiple times. Same for the RV charts for straddles. I’m starting to see why Yowster thinks something is a good buy or not. My head is filled with little “ah-ha” moments and learnings, and the next few days I watch live prices and then I do the un-thinkable – I open my own calendar trade on PANW for 0.89. The very next day, Kim opens the same Put calendar for 1.05 – Bingo! I feel a sense of un-controllable excitement, not just cos I received validation that my trade was correct, but that I actually got a better price than the official. (https://steadyoptions.com/forums/forum/topic/4106-trades-panw-november-2017-calendar/?tab=comments#comment-87397) Motivation Level : 7/10 6) Creating my own Trades I spend Nov and Dec ’17 coming up with tons of my own trades – calendars and straddles. I'm not really too sure of what I'm doing, so some are winners and many are losers. I’ve started doing something else – I’m now keeping a proper journal. Every trade is logged together with the rationale behind it. If it goes wrong, I try to understand why. I’m trading full-time and this has become all-consuming, but I am enjoying it. My knowledge and skill level is rapidly increasing. For the first time, I make a profit for the month (12.9% for Nov ’17). I’m on a high. I still try to enter official trades, but don’t get upset if I miss many. I do this for a few months, averaging around 6% monthly profit overall. I also increase my portfolio size. Motivation Level : 8/10 7) Consistency at Last Two years later, and I have traded several earnings cycles, done literally hundreds of my own trades, and I rarely take the official SO trades. Fills are not a problem, as I’m normally in the trade already, and I’m also trading stocks which are not on the SO list. Profits are decent, but I get some big losses, and the occasional losing month. I don’t like those, so I ramp-up the commitment. I decide to REALLY focus on this from 01-Jan-20. And then a dark-cloud-with-a-silver-lining comes along – COVID lockdowns. They suit me just fine: 7-8 hours a day – just me, the PC screen, charts, Excel sheets, Word documents detailing my ups/downs, cups of Earl Grey tea…..trade after trade. Total immersion. I love it. The wife has become a trading-widow. The cat is happy to be around me, cos I am no longer shouting. My profits rise to new levels, the March crash comes and goes without a dent to the bottom line. As we head towards the end of the year, I can finally say to myself that I have matured into a proficient SO trader – my risk management has improved enormously, my position sizing is as it should be, and my ability to distinguish between good/not-so-good trades has improved. I still screw up, but I keep a list of the mistakes I’ve made each month, and it’s satisfying to watch that list become smaller as the months roll on. I have finally found consistency – I’ve made a profit every single month this year. And my SO portfolio is far more profitable than my other ones. But the learning never stops – every week I read some post on the forum and think “Oh, wow, I didn’t think of that.” I’m no longer a SO member for the trades, but for the ideas and the discussions on the forum. They are gold. And I’ve learnt skills that I’ve been lacking for a long time – patience (no more “FOMO”), discipline (sticking to the rules, no doubling-down etc), no emotional trading (no revenge trades, not getting upset when a trade loses etc) The next stages are to get to grips with different trade types, like ratios. Motivation Level : 10/10 I’ve written this not with the view of “Hey, look at me”, but in the spirit of “If a dunce like me can become a competent trader, then anyone can”. If you’re a frustrated newbie, then rest assured that many of us have been there, many others are still in that place, but with determination and dedication, it’s possible to come out of the pain barrier, and see the sunshine on the other side. Happy trading.

Member of the month award for April goes to @Vkleniko for his continuous contribution of trading ideas and analysis.

This chart has nothing to do with options. It measures the signal. It is histogram of the measurement error, when comparing the forecast with what really happened during the last 20 years. As you can see the forecast is pretty accurate. There are many ways to play this signal. Using options stacks additional edge.

One of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite movies.

We will not be affecting the largest market in the world (Treasury), I assure you. Petrodollar system is a very convincing reason.

Yes, here is one done by a member: At the end, here are the results, backtests of the strategy over the last 20 years : Mean RMSE = 3.36%.

The RV chart used the ATM stradfle each day, whose strike may change from day to day. It’s a measure of how well the IV rise is counteracting negative theta. This is useful for determine downside risk if the stock price doesn’t move. However, the return matrix follows the straddle opened on a given T-x day so it does account for the stock price movement.

I think the first question to ask when considering a subscription service is: do they actually trade? If they do, do they track their live trades? Do they publish their track record? If yes, is it honest and transparent? If they don't trade, how do you even know that the methods they teach are profitable? As Tom Nunamaker mentioned, it's like learning to be a surgeon from someone who hasn't operated in 12 years.. (now it would be 20 years). I think the fact that they now charge monthly subscription instead of one time fee doesn't change all previous comments. The essence is the same.

This article will shows how this works, and how IV can affect your decision on what type of trade to open. Directional Spreads Let’s start with the simplest of options spreads, the put or call vertical spread which is often used as to place a trade for a stock to move in a certain direction. Here’s a slightly OTM (Out of The Money) call vertical debit spread on AAPL about a month away from expiration (a popular spread to play for stock price to rise). The stock price is $182 and the call vertical is long the 185 call and short the 190 call. Note the highlighted Vega section that will illustrate some important points regarding IV: When the spread strikes are OTM (stock price is below both long and short call strikes) the trade is vega positive. This means while the spread remains OTM, increasing IV will help it retain more of its value. As the stock price rises toward the spread strikes the degree of vega positive becomes less. It eventually becomes vega neutral at roughly the break-even point for the spread at expiration. As the stock price rises even farther, approaching the higher short strike and beyond, the trade will become vega negative. This means when the spread is ITM (In The Money), decreasing IV will help the value get closer to the spread width (the max gain). How can this factor into a trade opening decision? When opening a bullish call vertical spread when IV is elevated it may help to enter near the vega neutral position with the long strike ITM and short strike OTM. This will be likely be a setup where the max gain is equivalent to the max loss. If the stock price rises then you’ll hit the point where the spread becomes vega negative sooner, so any drop in IV won’t hurt. Conversely, if opening when IV is lower you can start out with both legs of the call vertical being OTM. This will give you a setup where the max gain is higher than the max loss, but you know that any further IV decline is less likely and therefore the downside risk due to dropping IV is not as high so it can be ok even though it will take more of a stock price rise to get to the point where the trade turns vega neutral and then vega negative. Spreads for Minimal Stock Price Movement I’m now going to focus on common spreads to play for minimal stock price movement. The Iron Condor (IC) is one such spread and shown in the following chart, it consists of both an OTM put credit spread and an OTM call credit spread. When the stock price is in the winning position between the wings it is vega negative meaning an IV drop will accelerate profit growth above the level that just time decay would generate. Conversely, an IV rise will decelerate profit growth. Also note that when the stock price gets to the losing zones within and beyond the wings, the IC becomes vega positive meaning an IV rise would help keep the losses smaller. How can this impact a trade opening decision? Opening an IC when IV is low means that you’ll have to use closer to ATM strikes to get the same opening credit compared to times when IV is higher when you can get the same credit with farther OTM strikes. Also, when opening with low IV a further IV decline is less likely, so you won’t get the accelerated profit growth when IV drops. Opening an IC when IV is somewhat elevated means to can go farther out with strikes (so a bigger stock price move is required to get to the losing zones) and any IV decline can accelerate profit growth provided the stock price doesn’t make a significant move. Many people don’t like Iron Condors due to their risk vs reward where the max loss is higher than the max gain. Let’s look at two other common spreads to play for minimal stock price movement that have more equal risk vs reward and how IV can factor into which one to use. The first is the calendar spread, which commonly uses the ATM strike when playing for minimal stock price movement. The primary gain catalyst is theta decay (and minimal stock price movement) but IV can also factor in. As shown on the chart below, its vega positive everywhere meaning that rising IV will always help the trade. Rising IV will both increase the gain potential and widen the profit tent. Declining IV will lower the gain potential and tighten the profit tent. The other common spread to play for minimal stock price movement is the butterfly spread. Its PnL chart looks very similar to that of the calendar with a balanced risk vs reward and similar break-even points. The primary gain catalyst is the same as the calendar, theta decay and minimal stock price movement. But there is one important difference, the butterfly is vega negative when in the winning zone meaning that declining IV will allow gains to grow at a quicker rate. How can this impact a trade opening decision. When IV is lower, further IV decline is less likely so using a calendar is a good choice as any rise in IV can help the trade. However, when IV is elevated and IV decline is more likely then a butterfly can be a good choice as any decline in IV can help the trade. Spreads for Stock Price Movement in any direction I’m now going to focus on common spreads to play for significant stock price movement, either up or down. A long straddle or long strangle consists of only long legs, so they are always vega positive. Rising IV will lessen the impact of negative theta, falling IV will add more price decrease to that of negative theta alone. This is why straddles and strangles are typically used in the timeframe before earnings where you have the virtually guaranteed IV increase to counteract some of the negative theta. A reverse iron condor (RIC) is the inverse of the iron condor. It consists of and OTM call debit vertical spread and an OTM put debit vertical. How far away from ATM you go impacts the risk vs reward setup. Note that the RIC is vega positive when in the losing zone between the put and call wings, so any IV decline will accelerate losses. The trade becomes vega negative when the stock price moves into a winning zone, so if you get the stock price to move then you are guaranteed to have a winning trade regardless of what happens with IV. There are certainly more complex trade setups to use in any of these scenarios, but I’ve covered some of the most popular trades and you can see how current IV can impact your decision to use one trade setup instead of another.

We are pleased to expand our services offerings with a new strategy called SteadyYields. We target April 1st as a starting date, and will offer 2 months of free access to all current paying members. On June 1st it will become a paid service for everyone. If you are a current member of any of our services, do NOT sign up before June 1st, as you have free access util then. Here are the service parameters: Tailored for short term traders Minimum portfolio size - $10,000 Underlying -TLT, TMF Average holding period - 2-3 weeks Number of trades per month - 3-4 Profit target - 200%+ annually The impact of commissions is minimal (unlike VIX), but we still recommend trading with low or no commission broker (like Tradier or FirstTrade). TMF & TLT are extremely liquid, scaling up will not be a problem. SteadyYields is a trading strategy that takes advantage of the correlation between long dated Treasury Bonds and Crude Oil. The correlation has treasury yields trailing the price of crude oil by about three weeks +/-. Here is some good research on this phenomenon: https://seekingalpha.com/article/3271415-is-crude-oil-correlated-to-the-10-year-u-s-treasury-note https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S030142072100502X https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isv9WUzVeHA The strategy uses credit and debit spreads about 30-45 days from expiration. The spreads are designed to take advantage of the direction oil has provided, whether that be long, short or neutral. Please see this thread for an example of a live trade: https://steadyoptions.com/forums/forum/topic/9468-crude-oil30-year-treasury-yield-correlation/ Here is an excerpt from the thread: There is a definitive correlation between Crude Oil prices and the 10 year Treasury yield, led slightly by crude. That's the edge. The option trades around this are endless. It makes sense, higher crude price, higher inflation, higher yields. However, in my opinion it is mainly driven by the petrodollar system. 1 year chart 10 Year Treasury Bond: 1 Year chart Crude Oil: Sure looks like the 10 year yield is about to move higher very soon. And there's the bounce: As can be seen above, the direction of crude about 3-4 weeks out is used to determine the direction of near term Treasury yields. Treasury yields and bond prices move inversely, so yields and crude move inversely to the price of TLT/TMF. The $10,000 model portfolio will hold 50% in the strategy spreads and 50% in hedges and neutral positions. As always, we will report returns on the whole account. I estimate the max drawdown to be about 20% in a massive Black Swan event, where the strategy spreads were 100% bearish on treasuries. However, the target for each trade is about 40% and I expect to average closing two trades per month. The trades were up about 70% on risk for the SO March portfolio. The strategy does not require PM (Portfolio Margin). How do we report performance? The monthly returns are calculated as the sum of all trades closed for the month. The P/L is always calculated on the entire account. For example, the April credit spread required $5,020 capital and was closed for $2,360 gain or 47.0% on $5,020 capital. This was reported as 23.6% gain on the entire account. A total of 3 trades (credit spreads or iron condors) have been closed in April, for a total return of $4,010 or 40.1% gain on $10k account.

I have not received an email notification of any kind since this morning at 10:37 AM. Is it me or did something change / Thanks

I use credit spreads unless I am anticipating a very sharp elongated move. I want to be Theta positive while I wait for the move to play out, and rolling allows to also capitalize on Delta. For example, the model portfolio is up about 50% MTD using only credit spreads.

There is a definitive correlation between crude oil prices and the 10 year Treasury yield, led slightly by crude. That's the edge. The option trades around this are endless. It makes sense, higher crude price, higher inflation, higher yields. 1 year chart: Sure looks like the 10 year yield is about to move higher very soon. 5 year chart: Absolutely remarkable. Directional trades can be huge winners here. Crude leads the 10 year yield (therefore their prices are inversely correlated).

Got some answers from Tradier team (they are not allowed to post directly here): Q. How much are exchange and regulatory fees per contract ? 10/15 cents ? A. There are exchange fees that are passed along when you purchase or sell an option contract. The primary fee that is charged on each option transaction is the ORF or Options Regulatory Fee. This fee does fluctuate over time, but the ORF fee currently stands at about $0.05/contract. When selling options contracts, a TAF fee also applies. This fee also fluctuates over time, but currently stands at about $0.01/contract sold. Index Option fees currently range from $0.18/contract - $0.60/contract but only apply on these symbols: DXL, EPX, HGX, MNX, MVR, OEX, OSX, RUT, SOX, SPX, SVO, UTY, VIX, XAU, XEO and XDE. Q. Also, what are the margin requirements and margin interest? Do they allow VIX/SPX calendars (without exorbitant margin requirements). Also, how is their reputation on execution quality A. Margin requirement are consistent with the brokerage industry for the various types of option strategies. Unfortunately, Tradier Brokerage does not allow calendar spreads on index options. Expiration dates have to be the same. Tradier Brokerage is held to the same Best Execution standards within the securities industry. Q. With Tradiers offer this would be 480USD + exchange and regulatory fees. Is this right ? A. That is correct. Q. Hi Kim, looks great, but what about futures and options to futures (CME)? They allow that? A. Current, Tradier Brokerage does not offer futures and options on futures.

Hi Kim, looks great, but what about futures and options to futures (CME)? They allow that?