Search results

Thanks Percy, 0.50 cents decay sounds better than 0.005. But I still think its too much for an OTM option. 0.50 x 10days = $5 Current option price ~ $3.20 :confused: I would understand better if theta is currently around 0.20 and increasing as we get nearer to expiration.

Hi all, Im trying to understand the greek numbers that Im seeing in the options analytics page in IB. eg SPX at 1275 and im looking at AUG 1240 PUT Mid price $3.45 Theta is -0.5232 Does that mean the option will lose $0.5232 (52cents) with each passing day or it will loose...

Thanks for your response Mark. Didn't realise market makers can lose money. Just thought they make the sell at the ASK and buy at the BID in offsetting/pairing amounts and laughed all the way to the bank :D eg. every 1300SEP Call you sold, you will buy back the same instrument and take the...

I agree Coach, mixing it is the way to go.. Tried to buy a 1222AUG/1200SEP diagonal yesterday at mid of 2.25 debit but did not get filled. Serves me right for being a tight arse as I didnt add a dime or two to the mid. I think the mid today is arond 2.65 when i looked an hour ago...

Mark, lets say you started with no position and the market was up and your first position was a call credit spread or diagonal spread opened for a credit. And lets assume the market did not move down after that and continued slowly moving up for the next two months. Does that mean you will...

What..no free lunch ? :eek: :p Always good to hear your thoughtful dissections of a strategy. I too was actually thinking about these wider diagonals to pay less of a debit and was wondering what the catch was. I like Murray's strikes of 20 or 25 points apart because the delta of the...

Point taken, thanks :)

Good point Coach, Have to make sure that its done waay below my margin available levels. Even with SPX i do not use my full margin available. Well not yet anyway :)

Just a follow up Margin requirements for naked ES options. ES Sep futures ~ 1268 Sell 1 1265 AUG PUT FOP Initial margin = 4681.87 Maintenance margin = 4345.50 So if i sold 10 contracts i would need around $46818 Premium ~ 15 Sell 10 SPX 1260/1250, margin is $10,000 Premium ~...

Murray, I was just thinking the same. I was looking at Big Charts Vix below and noticed that between Feb and May there wasn't much vol spikes to place these back month puts or even help with the diagonals positions. You mentioned writing the naked back month DEC 1175 PUT as an example. Can...

No worries Coach, advise well heeded. Im very risk averse :) Only using around 20% of available margin.

Hi Murray, Love this VEGA play or Christmas tree as Mav calls it ! Superb :D Can't wait for vol spikes now:p you'll need to sell BACK month options. Im assuming you mean like selling your naked back month Dec 1175 PUT on the vol spike? You sure can with IB's ES futures options :)...

I think he meant AUG 1230 being the back month and the weekly AUG expiring this week being the front month. More opportunity to trade or more trading turnover i suppose.

Hi Baderl and welcome, Not sure about TOS, but at IB i get charged only 75 cents per contract if my trades are routed through SMART. That's pretty good by my books. If its not through SMART, then the comission is 1.65 per contract. But they have canx fees which i think TOS don't have, so I...

Thanks Murray, Think I'll do the same with the SPX spreads by choosing strikes like 1225,1200 etc. Yet to do one yet and just want to make sure I do it right for my first diagonal. I think getting a bad fill when opening a diagonal could ruin the strategy somewhat. At least your method of...

Murray, Do you leg into your diagonals or do you enter them as a spread order? If you're entering them as spread order, do you have as hard a time getting filled as dagnyt? It seems diagonal orders are harder to fill around the midpoint than credit spreads. And which broker do you use...

Andy, I find I do get filled between 0.05 to .20 cent off mid on my SPX credit spreads. However i find that if I get filled 0.10 cents off mid, it may not really be that. Cause when i do get filled, it may be because the market has moved in the market maker's favour. ie the bid ask has...

I could be wrong but I think Murray said the position were placed around 1265ish. Its stated at the top of his post.:) Wow that makes the 1250/1230 diagonal pretty daring :eek: Yes thank you Murray, a great post indeed!Much appreciated.

Got it, thanks again Edit: Forgot to say that the ES trades was only in the PAPER TRADING account. Just have to get used to working TWS IB and the bid ask before jumping in. So maybe my experience in getting filled in the paper account is not indicative of the real TWS account. I definitely...

The option im trying to bu is SEP1340 1.75 BID (mine after shaving) and 1.90 ask. So what is one tick ? 0.10 or 0.05 Or does one tick off the ask mean buying at 1.89 or 1.80? Sorry dumb qs...i know