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Well, if you're considering selling an 45/47.5 call vertical with the stock at 47.30 then you might as well consider buying a 45/47.5 put vertical. It is exactly the same position, with the benefit of no early assignment risk.

Any stock/index can be a good credit spread candidate. The key is to pick the right strategy at the right time. What kind of credit spreads are you talking about - ITM, ATM, OTM, long term, short term,....?

Hi Jet, If you can't decide which one to go with then just try them both out. You can open a cash account at OX, there's no minimum deposit and no inactivity fee, so you get access to all the features for free. TOS has a demo, which you can use for some time. Give them both a go and see which...

Long NEM, closed for a 3.9% gain the next day. Coincidentally, that was my first trade ever - beginner's luck.:D

Yeah, but you don't need historical option prices to calculate historical volatility, you only need the index prices.

Options on Q's are like equity options, i.e. American-style, last trading day is the third Friday, and physical settlement. NDX and MNX options are index options, i.e. European-style, last trading day is Thursday, and cash-settled. Q's options are very liquid, not to say that NDX/MNX...

Just a note, QQQ=QQQQ (it's just a new symbol). So are you asking about options on the respective underlyings?

Historical volatility can be calculated from historical prices, it is nothing more than a standard deviation of the returns. Can't help you with IV data, though.

Same goes for calls.

Just to get the time line right, the "record date" is NOT 1 day before the ex-dividend date, it is 2 days AFTER it. The dividend is always paid to the holder of record on a set day, that's why it is called the "record date" (aka "Holder of Record Date"). Since stocks settle on T+3 basis, the...

You can estimate it by hand (i.e. with a calculator). Just divide volatility by the square root of time, that will give you 1 standard deviation for the required period, then just multiply by 2 to get 2 standard deviations.

That's a good point Rearden. Loufah, Why don't you just plug in the values into a pricing model and see how much you lost to IV, time decay and so on.

Jay, I'm not sure if you actually mean the date the dividend is announced/declared or the ex-dividend date, since you keep using the terms "dividend-declaring stocks" and "upon dividend declaration", but the stock price is affected on the ex-dividend date. The announcement date has absolutely...

Yes, essentially that is the case. The stock price doesn't drop on the announcement day though, but on ex-dividend date and the latest you have to buy the stock to receive the dividend is the day before the ex-dividend. Now, since the stock price is affected by many different factors the...

Yes it can be. IV jump is one reason. Also the underlying can move in your favor, thus making an OTM option profitable, even though it may still remain OTM. It doesn't matter if you buy(sell) an OTM, ATM or ITM option, as long as you can sell(buy) it for more(less) than you bought(sold) it...

You mean stock going ex-dividend, not declaring a dividend!? Nothing will stop you, but what is the point?

There's nothing special about that, that's standard for everyone.

The key word in that sentence is "theoretically". If we held all other things constant then the stock would open lower by the amount of the dividend. However, there are many dynamic factors that affect the stock price, so just because the stock went ex-dividend does not automatically mean that...

It seems that there's an obvious solution to your problem - open an account with OptionsXpress.

On Monday.