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I often send Warren Buffett my list of hot stock tips that I did my own research on. He wrote me back with a secret tip that he really liked KO and AXP--I'm sure he let me in on his secret because I sent him some really hot tips! He wouldn't tell me how many shares, but it didn't matter to me! I...

As I tried to tell you, it's the contract, not the broker that dictates whether the option is American or not, and how long the expiration is. You can get an option with any expiration and any terms you want, but it's OTC, and it's not up to the broker to "let you trade" them that way, its...

There's no such thing as the "American Way". Options are either American or European based upon the contract definition. You'll need to find which contracts you'd like to trade and then lookup whether they're American or European. For example, OEX is American style S&P 100, XEO is European...

This implies trading information is normally distributed. I'd argue it's more leptokurtic (much like our friend, the stock market)--a few fat tails on the edges, but the vast majority is MUCH more worthless than you'd expect. I swear there are automated programs which generate financial...

And the dozens of articles posted on ET about AMEX's questionable business practices didn't disuade you entirely? :-)

Yes, generally so. Look at the Dec '07 vs Dec '06 corn contract. People believe ethanol is going to really take off next year and make corn very expensive. The premium for the far contract goes way beyond simple cost-of-carry. If Ethanol doesn't look like it will explode next year, or it becomes...

You can find everythiing you're looking for on the CBOT web site. Here's the wheat contract info page: http://www.cbot.com/cbot/pub/cont_detail/0,3206,1322+14398,00.html Here's the ag margin page: http://www.cbot.com/cbot/pub/page/0,3181,2142,00.html#1a

Not at all. Spreads of corn versus soybeans, for example, are quite common. Even intermonth spreads are common. (For example, Corn Dec '06 against Corn Dec '07).

You should read up on futures contracts a bit. If you bought 100 wheat contracts, a single tick move would be $1250. A 1 cent price change in wheat would be $5000 in profit or loss. A typical day in wheat will see a 5-10 cent change. In wheat, a single contract is 5,000 bushels, and the price...

Wheat generally has lower exchange fees and therefore lower commissions by a dollar or so. That $7 is each way, so buy is $7, sell is another $7. If you're just interested in CBOT grains, Interactive Brokers has $3.05 each way commissions on the electronic contracts (and $4.00 for pit traded).

A lot depends on your volume and whether you're trading pit-only or not. Lind-Waldock was $7 for NYBOT. I got a bit better from Man through Vtrader Group. Of course, IB now offers electronic everything at CBOT (wheat, corn, oils, etc) and they're pretty hard to beat.

No matter what, you'll never make more than the premium. Keep in mind that you've dramatically simplified options by considering only the "at expiration" case. If you sell a 220 call for a $1, 221 is your break even point *at expiration*. If the underlying heads to 221 tomorrow, you will...

Beware OEX, there are all sorts of issues with being assigned early that have nothing to do with the list you mentioned. As an addendum to that warning, beware cash-settled instruments. An early exercise leaves you with a more risky position than you'd expect. On non-cash settled instruments...

Yes! Like any business, why give away money you don't have to? Would you invest in a company that paid 5x what they could have for goods and services? Why not pay $5/gallon for gas?

You think? This actually is a super trade in the event of terrorist attacks. The open after 9/11, oil dropped 10%, the dollar dropped .8% This spread would probably work great.

You're talking about strangles. But your assertion certainly isn't true for the S&P, Nasdaq, Russell 2000, bonds, oil, euros, sugar, lumber, or practically any other market I follow. There were plenty of ways to get killed. When ES dropped from 1330 to 1220 in a month, not only did it move...

I can't even parse what you're talking about, much less be able to name a trade for you. Are you looking for contracts which have deep liquidity AND they tend not to move?

This still doesn't make sense. If you sell a 219 call and it rallies to 220 tomorrow, you will be at a substantial loss, not break even. If the market goes down below 219 *by expiration* you'll get to keep 100 pips of premium. You don't make any money from market movement. If the market...

The problem is the barriers to entry are pretty low. Brokers offering $200 FX accounts or $500 daytrading margins are bound to attract everyone with a few bucks to their name who are SURE they're going to be millionaires in a week.

I'm sorry zoo, but I can only infer that you are a kid who has never even remotely been involved in business. You can flip "broker" for "customer" in your rant without any conflict at all. A broker chooses his customer. How do you think one broker charges $80 in commissions round trip and...