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Options.,... Argh... no more!!
- Thread starter Jdesey
- Start date
Of late, where I cut my losses faster, I am at 55% winners so, how the hell do the options sellers get that 80% win rate?
Easy, you sell far OTM. Mathematically, it's far harder to make money buying options vs selling assuming that the market is efficient. Why? Because if I buy at ATM call and I'm right, I still need the stock to go above the strike at least far enough to offset the premium paid. Right now, I can sell a put on SPY expiring end of the week and it can still drop about 1.5% by the end of the week and I can still make money. Long options, you have to get the direction right or volatility has to increase. The shorter the time frame, the sooner you must be right to make money. That said, since before the pandemic, I have moved away from selling mostly naked calls and puts and gone more towards ratios and butterflies.
Easy, you sell far OTM. Mathematically, it's far harder to make money buying options vs selling assuming that the market is efficient. Why? Because if I buy at ATM call and I'm right, I still need the stock to go above the strike at least far enough to offset the premium paid. Right now, I can sell a put on SPY expiring end of the week and it can still drop about 1.5% by the end of the week and I can still make money. Long options, you have to get the direction right or volatility has to increase. The shorter the time frame, the sooner you must be right to make money. That said, since before the pandemic, I have moved away from selling mostly naked calls and puts and gone more towards ratios and butterflies.
you cant be right with options if you aren't right on the volatility.
For me, it's difficult enough to maintain desired exposure at all times trading stocks and futures.
It's a lot more difficult with options, being non-linear and multivariant. Maintaining desired exposures require continuous monitoring and trading, often introducing other strikes / dates into the portfolio in order to hedge efficiently, leading to higher commission and losses to spread. Portfolio will become messy and complicated, all of these for very little or no extra value.
I told myself all the time to keep things simple and avoid options, but every now and then I still cannot resist...
You made it more complicated that is all. I just buy calls and puts and trade directionally. When you add multiple legs, it complicates that trade without making that trade more profitable.
if you're trading options as a leveraged play on spot, you deserve your losses - these are not lotto tickets. its even worse when you don't have any directional model and are just trading on whims and astrology. sorry not sorry
Trade directionally with the trend. Make sure your trade is aligned with the major trend. Buy deep in the money options with a lot of time. Ride the trend as long as it is intact. Rinse and repeat. You will have winners and losers, cut the losses and keep it small. Profits will take care of themselves.
Easy, you sell far OTM. Mathematically, it's far harder to make money buying options vs selling assuming that the market is efficient. Why? Because if I buy at ATM call and I'm right, I still need the stock to go above the strike at least far enough to offset the premium paid. Right now, I can sell a put on SPY expiring end of the week and it can still drop about 1.5% by the end of the week and I can still make money. Long options, you have to get the direction right or volatility has to increase. The shorter the time frame, the sooner you must be right to make money. That said, since before the pandemic, I have moved away from selling mostly naked calls and puts and gone more towards ratios and butterflies.
I do not buy ATM options, I buy deep ITM call and put options and buy 3 months or more out. Make sure the trade is aligned with the major trend of that stock. Sit on it as long as the trend is intact. Percentage wise, I have the edge over the seller. Once, the trade moves in my favor, the options seller is piling on losses for the small amount of premium he collected. Then, I collect when the trend ends or my stop loss is hit. I will ride that trend as long as it is strong and going my way.
My reaction anytime someone says they are giving options a go:...
I traded index options pretty intensely for a trading firm for years before ever having bought or traded a share of stock. But once I was on my own and traded stocks for the first time, I never looked back and haven't traded a single option contract since. Great experience but I think I still have option ptsd from it all and have no interest in diving in again.
I traded index options pretty intensely for a trading firm for years before ever having bought or traded a share of stock. But once I was on my own and traded stocks for the first time, I never looked back and haven't traded a single option contract since. Great experience but I think I still have option ptsd from it all and have no interest in diving in again.
To each his own. Do what works for you. Lots of ways to makes monies in the Stockmarket.
you cant be right with options if you aren't right on the volatility.
If you can hold until expiration, you don't care about the premium increase due to volatility unless you're running with low margin.
I do not buy ATM options, I buy deep ITM call and put options and buy 3 months or more out. Make sure the trade is aligned with the major trend of that stock. Sit on it as long as the trend is intact. Percentage wise, I have the edge over the seller. Once, the trade moves in my favor, the options seller is piling on losses for the small amount of premium he collected. Then, I collect when the trend ends or my stop loss is hit. I will ride that trend as long as it is strong and going my way.
That can work, but you're basically trading pure delta. The premium on a deep ITM option will be very low and you might as well just trade the underlying directly. Only point of using options in that case is to reduce your margin / leverage. Being long a deep ITM call is synthetically equivalent to long stock + buying deep OTM put. So then it just comes down to how well you can pick direction.