What was your first optionality trade?
- Thread starter .sigma
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Apple at about $7. I think it was maybe 2008-9. Their computers had market share and that new phone looks pretty cool. I wasn't sure if they could keep it up...So I bought the stock and did a covered call on it. Over the years I've bought and done 4 covered calls on Apple. Made money each time...But if I I would have just...
you mean split adjusted 7 dollars.
Oh damn, I will never forget this one:
I just finished Charles Cottles "The Hidden Reality", thought I understood everything and got cocky. I've traded futures and spreads until then and had a little experience with derivatives math.
In the beginning of SEP 2009 I loaded the boat with call front spreads on GLD when it traded around 98$. Skew was insane and I sold 4 120$ NOV calls for every NOV 100$ call I bought. I think the position was even in premium. I was betting on a GLD breakout above 100$ and didn't want to lose in case I was wrong...lol.
Breakout really happened and I was immediately down more than I anticipated. On top of that I promised my girl to go on a 4 week vacation with her starting last week of OCT. Theta did it's magic and kept the position alive, but GLD was closing in on the short strikes.
My P/L wasn't doing anything but gamma got bigger and bigger. I ended up sitting in front of my laptop in the hotel room sick to my stomach and constantly fighting with my woman.
Mid NOV I closed the position for a small loss because I just could not take it anymore. The remaining two weeks of vacation were a disaster...it rained the entire time and we were stuck in the hotel.
Back home I realized that GLD topped out at 120$ and I would have made a healthy chunk of dosh if I just kept the position...on top of that I got dumped by my girl 2 weeks later.
Good times
I just finished Charles Cottles "The Hidden Reality", thought I understood everything and got cocky. I've traded futures and spreads until then and had a little experience with derivatives math.
In the beginning of SEP 2009 I loaded the boat with call front spreads on GLD when it traded around 98$. Skew was insane and I sold 4 120$ NOV calls for every NOV 100$ call I bought. I think the position was even in premium. I was betting on a GLD breakout above 100$ and didn't want to lose in case I was wrong...lol.
Breakout really happened and I was immediately down more than I anticipated. On top of that I promised my girl to go on a 4 week vacation with her starting last week of OCT. Theta did it's magic and kept the position alive, but GLD was closing in on the short strikes.
My P/L wasn't doing anything but gamma got bigger and bigger. I ended up sitting in front of my laptop in the hotel room sick to my stomach and constantly fighting with my woman.
Mid NOV I closed the position for a small loss because I just could not take it anymore. The remaining two weeks of vacation were a disaster...it rained the entire time and we were stuck in the hotel.
Back home I realized that GLD topped out at 120$ and I would have made a healthy chunk of dosh if I just kept the position...on top of that I got dumped by my girl 2 weeks later.
Good times
Good lesson in position sizingOh damn, I will never forget this one:
I just finished Charles Cottles "The Hidden Reality", thought I understood everything and got cocky. I've traded futures and spreads until then and had a little experience with derivatives math.
In the beginning of SEP 2009 I loaded the boat with call front spreads on GLD when it traded around 98$. Skew was insane and I sold 4 120$ NOV calls for every NOV 100$ call I bought. I think the position was even in premium. I was betting on a GLD breakout above 100$ and didn't want to lose in case I was wrong...lol.
Breakout really happened and I was immediately down more than I anticipated. On top of that I promised my girl to go on a 4 week vacation with her starting last week of OCT. Theta did it's magic and kept the position alive, but GLD was closing in on the short strikes.
My P/L wasn't doing anything but gamma got bigger and bigger. I ended up sitting in front of my laptop in the hotel room sick to my stomach and constantly fighting with my woman.
Mid NOV I closed the position for a small loss because I just could not take it anymore. The remaining two weeks of vacation were a disaster...it rained the entire time and we were stuck in the hotel.
Back home I realized that GLD topped out at 120$ and I would have made a healthy chunk of dosh if I just kept the position...on top of that I got dumped by my girl 2 weeks later.
Good times
I evolved from buy-and-hold mutual funds at Raymond James to swing-trading ETFs at T.D. Ameritrade. It wasn't working out well. I heard Kurt Frankenberg of RadioActive Trading say in a video "Don't time your trade: trade your time." So I figured options was the way to go. But T.D. Ameritrade wouldn't let me buy options. So I switched to tastyworks. My first options trade was a covered call on the ETF MJ while I was still at T.D. Ameritrade. Then I went through a lot of trial and error with options strategies before settling on The Wheel, which I could have done at T.D. Ameritrade.