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Wow, a competitive marketplace. The way it should be.

I jokingly say this, but, it still happens. If everything is on autoquote, it doesn't get stale. At least on the CBOE, where you can't eat on the floor, if your eating a ham sandwhich, you aren't trading. If the market is busy, you won't leave the floor. If there are 20 people in the crowd...

You could look for trades when the MMs are at lunch. Hehehe. Middle of the day is always lazy time, so, markets don't get updated very quickly. I would regularly sit in my office and call in orders that would never be filled because the markets weren't up to date. There would be some real...

"IV plays on calendars work well if you enter the spread with a big IV skew. If the IV collapses the front month price drops far more than the back month." These are fairly common with IV up across the board. It is also the way you play an earnings release without exposing yourself to large...

My impression was that your question was very broad. It would have been better to ask, "what are some effective delta neutral strategies." You still would have gotten back that delta neutral is a loaded term. A stock could move 20% and your deltas could go positve to neutral to negative back...

This is just a guess, but, I think you are looking for a magic bullet. It doesn't exist. Your question has been answered many times. The reason people say to go read Natenberg and Cottle is that they don't want to write a book on this website to explain every single dynamic of these...

In a zero sum world, I have no doubt that is true. However, derivatives aren't as zero sum as people would suggest. Very good traders make trades which, superficially, don't look good. After all, where would Timberhill be?

"I was being facecious and silly." Aren't there stages in which a person passes through when they receive bad news?

"I took the liberty of graphing out your ideas... Buy Signal?" You're dillusonial. You still graphed it!!! When you you say, wait a second, nothing then maybe just maybe!!!!

I have been wrong with my deltas, really really f$@%ing wrong, and not lost a dime. On the other hand, I have been right with my deltas, totally leaning the right way, and lost money. It is the position that you carry in relation to a multi-dimensional environment which determines whether or...

Maybe a few of the option exchanges go bust. Maybe the VIX will go to ten because nobody gives a shit and volumes have dried up. People hate the market, which means they still have an opinion. When they no lomger have an opinion, then, is the time to get long.

I totally agree. The zero debit spread is an extreme case. A .50 debit with a possibility of earning 4.50 is a hell of a risk reward ratio. If you could trade stock or options around it, ooohhhhhh, as close to free money as you could get! A lot of things are possible in today's era of $1...

Yes. The markets line up so that buying on the bid and selling on the offer would allow you to purchase a fly for a net credit or zero. Doing so is obviuosly free money. Theoretically, you should never be able to do so. However, due to the spread in the bid and ask and market volatility, it...

Excellent idea. If the options are liquid, you could leg at decent prices. When IV shoots up, MMs are sometimes able to enter into flys at no cost. It is also a trick to see where options are under or overvalued with just looking at the screen.

That is hilarious. Traders throw the stuff on the floor although usually torn up. Besides, you print up so much of the shit you have no idea where it all goes. I have found sheets for even the most dilligent and secretive goups with the most to lose if people knew their positions.

One thing you should be careful of is entering the spread at a good price. IBM spread markets should be fairly tight, probably .20, even if the market in the individual options are 20 or 30 cents wide. If you don't, a couple point move in the underlying will turn into a small profit at...

When I was a MM, I used to tell people that I was a shoe salesman. When I couldn't go any further without cracking up, I would tell them my actual job. They were clueless even after an explanation. Fed up, I would say ,"Have tou ever scene Trading Places? That's what I do." It was much...

IB has a flat rate per contract. It does not matter if it is two orders.

They discuss this in threads like this: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=5992

What was the net credit or debit?