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The award for December 2020 goes to @zxcv64 mostly for his My Seven Stages of being an SO Member post, which became one of our most popular posts ever, and a must read for all new members. Thank you @zxcv64 for sharing your invaluable experience!

As I’ve done the past few years, I’ve broken down the Steady Options 2020 trade performance by trade type. Numbers were taken directly from the data in the Performance screen. Here’s are this year’s stats along with some comments from my perspective. Where applicable, I added totals from prior years for comparison... A note on prior year comparisons. 2020 was a year unlike any other in recent history so any comparison to other years will certainly have an apples vs oranges aspect to it – prior to 2020 we went through 8 years where the VIX barely got above 20, and when it did it only stayed there for a few days at most, this year we’ve had VIX above 20 for ~10 months straight with some historic highs as well. Pre-Earnings Calendars 33 Trades – 28 win, 5 loss (85% win) – Average Gain +21.97% 2019: 54 trades (65% win) – Average Gain +9.27% 2018: 40 trades (78% win) – Average Gain +9.61% 2017: 31 trades (84% win) – Average Gain +13.81% 2016: 44 trades (80% win) - Average Gain +15.07% 2015: 51 trades (80% win) – Average Gain +12.67% 2014: 48 trades (71% win) – Average Gain +13.80% 2013: 24 trades (88% win) – Average Gain +20.60% Comments: Lower number of trades this year, as high market volatility made finding good entry levels difficult (25 of 33 trades were made in the first 2 months of the year before Covid hit). The trades we did make had a very high win/loss percentage and the highest average gain we’ve had since we started using these trades. Contribution was very positive on overall portfolio performance. Straddles/Strangles (earnings and non-earnings) 118 Trades - 76 win, 42 loss (64% win) – Average Gain +2.80% Breaking down further by hedged and non-hedged: Hedged – 48 win, 24 loss (67% win), average gain +2.68% Non-Hedged – 28 win, 18 loss (61% win), average gain +2.99% 2019: 106 trades (68% win) – Average Gain +3.58% 2018: 72 trades (83% win) – Average Gain +5.40% 2017: 77 trades (79% win) – Average Gain +5.02% 2016: 18 trades (72% win) – Average Gain +5.19% 2015: 44 trades (68% win) – Average Gain +2.61% 2014: 74 trades (62% win) – Average Gain +2.54% 2013: 104 trades (57% win) – Average Gain +1.35% Comments: We did a lot of non-earnings hedged straddle (NEHS) trades this year during periods of elevated volatility, but to separate those will require a deeper dive into the data. So, for now, this data has all straddle trades grouped together, both earnings and non-earnings. It's safe to say that the NEHS trades had both bigger winners and bigger losers. Hedged straddle winning percentage was a tiny bit lower than prior years, but average gain per trade was down a bit more. Given the large volatility swings this year, I think we had some larger than normal losing trades when volatility dropped more than anticipated – part of trading in a year like this. Very low risk trades as it takes RV levels going much lower than prior cycles for these trades to be significant losers – although we did see a few of those this year. I am not surprised that the average gain for all straddles (hedged and non-hedged) is lower, as this is a result of short-term straddle trades held open for only a few days. The positive aspect of this is we were able to open more trades, so when you multiply the average gain x number of trades the positive contribution to the overall portfolio performance was good and in line with prior years. Index trades (TLT, EEM, SPY, UNG, USO, EEM) 19 Trades – 12 win, 7 loss (63% win) – Average Gain 9.54%. 2019: 20 trades (60% win) – Average Loss -7.71% 2018: 22 trades (86% win) – Average Gain +15.35% 2017: 9 Trades (89% win) – Average Gain +19.72% 2016: 27 Trades (67% win) – Average Gain +3.01% Comments: Longer duration trade with many big winners and big losers, many more big winners than big losers so average gain was very good. Reverse Iron Condor (RIC) trades 6 trades – 4 win, 2 loss (67% win) – Average Loss -5.17% 2019: 13 trades (62% win) – Average Loss -4.39% 2018: 7 trades (100% win) – Average Gain +30.96% Comments: One big loser offset the winners. Switched to NEHS setups instead of RIC trades, as downside risk is lower with NEHS setup. Ratio Trades 10 trades – 7 win, 3 loss (70% win) – Average Gain +2.50% 2019: 28 trades (64% win) – Average Gain +2.01% Comments: Trade count was lower, due to not finding good entry levels with elevated volatility for much of the year. We’d like to do more of these in 2021, especially for stocks who have stock rising tendencies into earnings. We’ve learned a lot about different hedging scenarios as we’ve done more of these trade. Other Trades 7 other trades than had an average loss of -8.46%. Nothing significant to note regarding them. Summary 2020 Steady Options model portfolio is likely to be around +120% for the year, so a very good return. Key to this was avoiding any big losing months, which was a significant accomplishment given the huge market swings this year. This year was one when our traditional bread & butter trades were not possible for a larger percentage of the year due to the very high market volatility. We adapted the best we could and avoided entering trades just for the sake of entering them. We had some bigger winners and bigger losers compared to prior years – but that is to be expected given the volatility. I hope 2021 returns to more normal market behavior where we can get back to our standard trades. I’d like to highlight and thank the SO community. We really have a bunch of very smart people who share their ideas and knowledge – this is what makes SO great. This year saw the development and enhancement of many different trade analysis tools put together by members and shared with the community. These things really do have a big impact on making trade analysis easier. Looking forward to a great, and hopefully more normal, 2021 2019 Year End Performance by Trade Type 2018 Year End Performance by trade type. 2017 Year End Performance by Trade Type 2016 Year End Performance by Trade Type 2015 Year End Performance by Trade Type

@Kim, it's a pleasure - in fact, an honour - to be part of this community. Not only am I thankful to you, Yowster, and the dozens of others here, but my accountant is also loving you guys from a distance as he prepares my year-end figures. The forum has become a compulsory daily read for me - a teenager probably checks their Facebook feed as soon as they wake up in the morning and reach for the smartphone, I click the 'View New Content' button on here. I get a greater buzz. Just minutes ago, I see that Yowster has come up with another variant of an earnings trade (on INTC) - how does one put a value of ideas like that? Wow.... Thanks to everyone here for helping to create a great forum, and looking forward to more trades, more ideas, more profits in 2021 and beyond.

Thank you @Yowster Great analysis as usual. And now we have a full bear market in our track record, and we proved once again that "making money in any market" is not just a mantra, but a reality for us. 9 straight years of outsized gains, with very few drawdowns. I'm not sure there is another service that can show results that come even close. Please remember that 2020 was a very unusual year. With volatility declining pretty constantly since April but still pretty high, it was a tough environment for our strategies. Hopefully the markets will return to more normal environment in 2021. I would like to take this opportunity and thank everyone for your support, and wish you and your families Happy and HEALTHY 2021!

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.

Thanks, @CJ912. I wasn't aware of the "Orders" module. I could swear it's something new, but I'll have to go back and see (for my own edification) when it was introduced. That module allows all the things I originally said were not possible.

Hmm. I'm using the Beta, too (v2.0.63), but I'm not sure how to do that. I'll PM you to figure it out, then summarize it here.

@rasar I can both update the price and cancel from ONE, but I have to add that I use the beta version

ONE is simply uses an API-based gateway into Tradier's back-end order flow. It passes a modeled order into Tradier as a one-way transaction. It doesn't provide for any further order monitoring, or manipulation such as tweaking the price, changing the order or even canceling it. That must still be done through TradeHawk, or through Tradier's web-based "Dash" portal. Any such changes in the order must then be done manually to the transaction in ONE. (see correction below) In other words, ONE is only a TENTH in this case.😁

Thanks that would be cool once this covid madness abates a little I shall gladly take you up on that.

@TrustyJules I use tradier with One. Trading can be done directly through One (I'm not sure if this is already in the production version but the public beta has had it for the last two versions). Unfortunately One has no mobile solution. I used to have a horrendous commute, during which I often wanted to trade and therefore I initially used Tradehawk. Their mobile version was littered with issues on Android though. Since I foresee quite a bit of travel in the future and I'm still looking for a solution as well. Perhaps a remote connection with something like teamviewer and a tablet could work. Btw, since we don't seem to live too far apart, you are more than welcome to come over and see how One works with Tradier if you want to.