How to Trade Options - The Basics
by: Daniel Webb
Many people would love to get involved with active investing and trading but there are some strategies that may be intimidating on the surface. Learning how to trade options can fall into this category. Options are not the most popular of trading methods so few people are involved with them. This means there will be little learning by way of osmosis. However, if you are motivated to take the steps to learn about options, you will discover the basics of this type of trading are not as complex as some assume. You can formulate a clear apprehension of the procedure of options trading just by studying a few fundamental elements of it.
One of the most fundamental definition about options is that it pertains to the skill to set aside the purchase or sale of a commodity or stock with a pre-arranged price. If you set a price for a stock at $20 per share and it goes up to $40, you basically are able to buy the stock at a 50% discount. To say this would be hugely profitable would be a tremendous understate. Believing such earnings are available, finding out how to trade options may prove to be an enormous scheme to take.
One of the finer components of trading options is that it can be employed with a small initial investment amount. For most people, money is not always available and if there is it is most likely very little to be used as investment in the market or other forms of trading such as Forex. Since options are not reliant upon huge outlays of money, they become more accessible to more people.
Naturally, before you can take part in options trading, you have to understand the procedure of how to trade options. While the idea is kind of easy to comprehend in a general thought, there are subtleties and complications to the procedure which entails you will have to invest the proper number of time into studying the finer points of it.
Some may wonder if the steps required for learning how to trade options is difficult. Although different people will each have distinct experiences in this view, there are a large number of systems in which one can learn the basics of options trading. This way, people of varying experience levels and backgrounds can find a way to achieve their goals.
Usual means in which people can study the fundamentals of how to trade options mean online courses on the subject, DVD or CD-Roms that talks about the subject, or even reading a top-rated book on the field. There is an assortment of superior sources in which to learn such material. Those concerned in acquiring skills with options trading are surely advocated to look into these references.
When you do learn how to trade options, you will discover a proverbial brave new world in terms of your financial future. Options can often create a pathway to amassing huge profits since options trading are known for their potential to deliver significant returns on an investment. That is why those searching for fresh ways of making their money work had better look into such options.
Visit my blog at http://www.savvyfinancialtraders.com for more advice and strategies regarding options trading and other forms of trading and investment strategies to suit your profile and be sure to grab some free stuff to help you along your endeavors.
Top Moving Average Secrets
One of the most popular technical analysis indicators is the simple moving average also known as SMA, if you learn how to use these correctly they can be a very useful tool to help you to make good trading decisions.
The 50 simple moving average, or 50 SMA, is simply the sum of the last 50 values for each period, divided by 50, this is a moving window, as time moves on so does the average. Notice that I used the term period because this indicator works on any time period in exactly the same way.
It can be used on monthly, weekly, daily, hourly, 30 minutes, 15 minute and on whatever time period you want to monitor and trade. Although the SMA is the most commonly used there is also the exponential moving average or EMA. This is a weighted version of the formula using the mathematical exponent function to give more weight to the more recent values, this has the effect of making it a much faster average that many traders like.
The reality is that it probably does not matter if you used the SMA or the EMA, what does matter however is that you use one or the other and then be very consistent with it. Do not switch between them, it is more important that you trust your chosen indicator then a slight difference in its value.
The simple moving average is primarily used to determine what the current trend of the stock is, depending on the value used it could be a short term, medium term or long term trend. An important point to note is that moving averages are most useful when the stock is trending, if the moving average is flat, i.e. horizontal on your chart it can become very choppy, this is a good time to stay out of the market.
The general rule is that if the current price is above the SMA the trend is up, if below the trend is down. This is very important to know because it forms the basics of trend trading and trading with the trend.
For the short term trend many traders like using a 5-8 SMA or EMA, here is a trading secret, never trade again the direction of the short term tend, this is really just common sense when you think about it.
Moving averages can often act as support or resistance, many traders use the 15, 21 or 30 SMA for this purpose.
There are a number of other very important moving averages that you need to know about, these are the 50, 100 and 200 SMA, and this mostly applies to the daily and weekly charts. A lot of big players in the markets, the mutual funds, investment banks etc use the 50 and 200 SMA as support and resistance, if they decide to buy or sell based on these you need to follow suite, the 100 to a lesser extent. These are very useful averages to watch if you trade EFT’s like an Oil ETF.
A useful tip is that when a stock breaks through one moving average it will often move all the way to the next, for example, if a stock breaks the 30 it may move to the 50 before finding some support or resistance.
A844534297
Put Options Used In The Collar Strategy Can Protect Your Stocks
Hoping and praying that the stocks that you just bought will go up is not the best strategy to use, however it is the one very often used by the average Joe stock trader who is using simple trading indicators. The only salvation they have is that in bull markets most stocks will go up.
Statistics show that in a bull market about 75% of the stocks will follow the general trend and go up, and in a bear market 75% will also go down. Trading with the trend is the best way to trade as 8 out of 12 stocks will follow the trend and give you the best chance of making gains on your stock purchases.
But what if you own some nice stocks and don’t want to sell when the market is clearly going down, or about to go down?. There are a few tactics that you can consider, both of which involve the use of options, CALL options and PUT options. There is the widely known strategy called Covered Calls, and the much lesser known one called the Married Put.
If you are going to trade options it is important that before you start trading you get the best option trading education that you can. You should also practice stock trading until you are comfortable with the process. This is a very important point that must be taken seriously, if you don’t understand the terminology and theory then you should not be trading options. If the terms Put option, Call option, Married Put and Covered Call are new to you then don’t trade until you have studied sufficiently.
Selling call options against your stock in 100 share increments is the basis of the covered call strategy and it can provide about a 2-7% buffer against the loss in stock price. However a bigger drop in the stock price will not be compensated for using the covered call strategy, in general.
Stocks in a bear market, and even in a bull market, can drop quickly on news or earnings releases, as much as 15 to 45% within a month. Using covered calls to protect your stocks will only provide limited protection of less than 7% at best and so will not save you if the stock takes a 40% tumble.
The better solution to providing down-side stock protection is the option strategy called the Married Put. As the name suggests the PUT that you buy is used to provide protection when the stock goes down because Put options will increase in value when the stock decreases in value. The term married is used because the option that is selected has to be a good fit with the stock, in other words a good match, if the strategy is to work.
The selection of the best Put option is not straight forward and involves several criteria which are listed below:
1. The strike price of the option
2. The current share price
3. Choice of options, in or out-of-the-money
4. Put expiration time
Even though the married Put protection only has a short life span if offers much more protection than the covered call. It can provide as much as 95% loss recovery in the event of a significant drop in the stock price.
The downside of the good protection is that you have buy the Put which is a debit whereas the covered call is a credit. But there are ways of off-setting this expense and there is much more to this strategy when executed correctly. The Married Put can be made to pay for itself and used to generate very good gains if the market, or stock to be specific, moves a lot.
The general idea of the Collar Trade is to combine the covered call and married Put strategy into one, this is what is called the Collar Trade. In effect you put a collar around the stock, you sell a call and buy a PUT. If you do this correctly most of the cost of the Put can be offset by the credit from the covered call so you can protect your valuable stock at almost no cost. Yes this is a great strategy which the general public is unfortunately ignorant of, and most brokers don’t understand.
The strategy that I have outlined above is unknown to the average stock market trader but is one of the best trading systems you could have.
A675438906
Understanding the Advantages and Disadvantages of Options for an Effective Option Trading Strategies
by: Daniel Webb
This article looks at the potential advantages and disadvantages of using options. Understanding these are crucial for investors and present a factor to investors in formulating their option trading strategies.
What are the Advantages?
Options contracts present a lot of potential advantages to holders and writers:
Advantages for holders
Security
Call options give those investors wishing to protect their existing positions a way to ensure that their underlying assets (e.g. stock) can be put up for sale at a definite price within a specified time frame.
What’s more, put options potentially offer investors a way of considering at the same time as concurrently preventing their losses: in terms of say an option to purchase stock, the holder’s maximum potential loss would be the cost of the option (which would be realized in the case that he/she does not use the option); by contrast, were the investor to invest directly in the same stock, his/her probable loss would be the whole price of the stock (e.g. if the stock became worthless).
In addition, as options impose a fixed obligation on writers independent of market changes, it also create the potential for those correctly positioned to generate profits even when the market is falling.
Power
Moreover, as put options holders, investors can most likely acquire “more bang for their money” (i.e. higher returns on their investments (ROI)) by managing further equity with their funds than would be the case if they were to acquire the important essential assets outright.
Benefits for writers
Options also offer some potential advantages to writers. For instance, in a “covered call” (i.e. where the option writer is the owner of the property that is the subject of the option), the options premium with regards to that property can stand for an added source of income for the writer (without the writer having to dispose of that property) if the option expires before being executed
General advantages
Also, the present market bid all investors, whether they hope to be holders or writers, with a broad collection of option contract models of varying complexity.
What are the Cons?
There are several potential disadvantages which investors should bear in mind while designing their option trading strategies.
For example, unused options are worthless once they have expired. Hence, if it has not been exercised prior to its expiration date, the holder will have effectively wasted the premium.
Furthermore, as noted above, options can be extremely complex and can require a good deal of market observation in order to be used effectively.
Advise for new investors
Novice investors thinking of becoming holders should first consider their own risk profiles: they should decide whether they wish to use options to leverage their existing capital, or to protect them against unwanted near-term market fluctuations (as above).
Investors should also factor in brokerage fees when considering the cost of options contracts. Undeniably, the cost may be higher on a percentage basis than the cost of trading in the essential stock.
In addition there are a lot of approaches accessible to investors, some are more risky than others. The neophyte investor would be best off staying away from the high risk end of the spectrum (e.g. becoming a writer on an uncovered call, i.e. where the writer grants an option over property that he or she does not own - there is no theoretical limit on the losses that the writer may incur under such an arrangement).
All investors should understand the potential for options contracts to generate losses (e.g. where the amount of the premium cancels out the income based on the possession or disposal of the underlying asset.
Finally, it is much sensible for newbies who are looking to make money through stock options trading to primarily go into options contracts as holders, rather than writers (due to the larger possible risks facing writers).
The information offered in this article is absolutely not complete. Of course, there are many more factors one needs to consider in formulating effective option trading strategies before diving into this potentially lucrative venture and certainly, one would be well advised to fully understand the pitfalls beforehand.
Visit my blog on more information about how you can make money trading options and grab some free ebooks and e-courses along the way: http://www.savvyfinancialtraders.com
Technical Analysis Secrets For Stock Traders
Technical analysis of the stock market, or any other market such as Forex, futures, is how most traders and investors make their trading decisions. This is as opposed to fundamental analysis which most people more agree is pretty much done as a way of making trading decisions, unless of course you are Warren Buffet!.
You only have to think back to recent stock market scams like Enron to know that it is almost impossible for the average, and even very sophisticated fund manager or hedge fund trader to really know what the real financial state of a company is.
Just by reading the balance sheet and other quaterly reports they release gives you a very poor insight into the real health of the company. Whereas the technical analysis charts of the company tend to give the real picture of what the market thinks of the value of the company. In the case of Enron even simple technical analysis told you to SELL when the stock was in the $80-90 range, this is why technical analysis of stocks is so popular.
So what is the secret to technical analysis?, I’m about to tell you, here are my golden rules:
* Only use 3-5 simple technical analysis indicators
* Make sure that you understand how the indicators that you have selected work, what the parameter settings are and in what market conditions they are effective
* After selecting your indicators and parameter settings don’t mess with them.
The real secret to technical analysis is to become VERY familiar with your choosen indicators, and really this can only be done by watching and studying the market, so that you get to the point that you TRUST them.
The fact is that in any market, for each bar, there are only 5 pieces of information, the open, close, high, low and volume, yet there are now hundreds of indicators. Most of these indicators are displaying the same information and so are redundant.
For the record my set of indicators are:
* 4 Simple Moving Averages
* Bollinger Bands
* MACD
* Stochastics
But the way I use them is quite special, to learn more about how to become an expert at technical analysis visit:
A907156389
Trader Types?: Scapler, Day Trader, Swing or Position
Did you know that there are 4 mains types of trader and depending on what sort you are will determine many parts of your trading strategy and trading plan. The 4 types are: scalping, day trading, swing trading and position trading. When you determine the type of trader that you are it will also determine the best time frame in which you will be making your trade. This will be a very important decision that you need to make when deciding how you want to learn to day trade.
1. Scalping Trader, if you scalp the market this means that you are only looking for a few ticks profit per trade and you may only be in the trade for a few seconds or a minute at most. trading. Some people will also call this day trading but it’s really micro day trading, buying the bid and selling the offer, it’s high speed trading and you might end up doing 15-50 trades a day. This is a very stressful way of trading for many people.
2. Day Trader, the true day trader opens and closes their trade within the same trading session, usually this mean the same day, but unlike a scalper the trade may be held for a few minutes up to several hours. Usually day traders make about 2-5 trades a day and most of them will be in the 5-30 minutes range. This is a less stressful way of trading than scalping but it still requires a lot of attention and quick decision making.
3. Swing Traders, swing trading usually means that a position is held for between 1 to 5-10 days, although some swing traders may hold a trade on for longer most are within this time period. For many this is the idea way to trade because it allows you to review your trade overnight, at the very least you have many hours to make your trading decisions.
4. Position Traders, this just means that you are going to hold onto your trade for longer than 5-10 days, maybe even as long as a few months.
If you are still working out how to day trade then it may be better to go with the longer time frames as it gives you more time to think.
A1528561
The Secret To Technical Analysis
Technical analysis of the stock market, or any other market such as Forex, Bonds, Futures, is how most traders and investors make their trading decisions. This is as opposed to fundamental analysis which most people more agree is pretty much done as a way of making trading decisions, unless of course you are Warren Buffet!.
You only have to think back to major stock market scams like Enron to know that it is almost impossible for the average, and even very sophisticated fund manager or hedge fund trader to really know what the real financial state of a company is.
Just by reading the balance sheet and other quarterly reports they release gives you a very limited insight into the real health of the company. Whereas the technical charts of the company tend to give the real picture of what the market thinks of the value of the company. In the case of Enron even simple technical analysis told you to SELL when the stock was in the $80-90 range, this is why technical analysis of stocks is so popular.
So what is the secret to technical analysis?, I’m about to tell you, here are my golden rules:
* Only use 3-5 simple technical analysis indicators
* Make sure that you understand how the indicators that you have selected work, what the parameter settings are and in what market conditions they are effective
* After selecting your indicators and parameter settings don’t mess with them.
The real secret to technical analysis is to become VERY familiar with your choosen indicators, and really this can only be done by watching and studying the market, so that you get to the point that you TRUST them.
The fact is that in any market, for each bar period, there are only 5 pieces of information, the open, close, high, low and volume, yet there are now hundreds of indicators. Most of these indicators are displaying the same information and so are redundant.
For the record my set of indicators are:
* 4 Simple Moving Averages
* Bollinger Bands
* MACD
* Stochastics
But the way I use them is quite special, to learn more about how to become an expert at technical analysis visit:
A875645387
Protect Your Stocks Using Put Options
Hoping and praying that the stocks that you just bought will go up is not the best strategy to use, however it is the one very often used by the average Joe stock trader who is learning how to trade. The only good point they have is that in bull markets most stocks will go up.
Statistics show that in a bull market approx 75% of the stocks will follow the general trend and go up, and in a bear market 75% will also go down. Trading with the trend is the best way to trade as 8 out of 12 stocks will follow the trend and give you the best chance of making gains on your stock purchases.
The most important thing that you can do is learn to trade from a good trading mentor, and also learn about other startegies such as swing trading.
But what if you own some good stocks and don’t want to sell when the market is clearly going down, or about to go down?. There are a couple of tactics that you can consider, both of which involve the use of options, CALL options and PUT options. There is the well known strategy called Covered Calls, and the much lesser known one called the Married Put.
If you are going to trade options it is essential that before you start trading you get the best option trading education that you can. You should also practise until you are comfortable with the process. This is a very important point that must be taken seriously, if you don’t understand the terminology and the theory then you should not be trading options. If the terms Put option, Call option, Married Put and Covered Call are new to you then don’t trade until you have studied sufficiently.
Selling calls against your stock in 100 share increments is the basis of the covered call strategy and it can provide about a 2-7% buffer against the loss in stock price. However a bigger drop in stock price will not be compensated for using the covered call strategy, in general.
Stocks in a bear market, and even in a bull market, can drop quickly on news or earnings releases, as much as 15 to 40% within a month. Using covered calls to protect your stocks will only provide limited protection of less than 7% at best and so will not save your account if the stock takes a 40% tumble.
The better solution to providing downside stock protection is the option strategy called the Married Put. As the name suggests the PUT that you buy is used to provide protection when the stock goes down because Put options will increase in value when the stock decreases in value. The term married is used because the option that is selected has to be a good fit with the stock, in other words a good match, if the strategy is to work.
The selection of the best Put option is not straight forward and involves several criteria which are listed below:
1. The strike price of the option
2. The current stock price
3. Choice of options, in or out of the money
4. Put expiration time
Even though the married Put protection only has a limited life span if offers much more protection than the covered call. It can provide as much as 95% loss recovery in the event of a significant drop in the stock price.
The downside of the good protection is that you have buy the Put which is a debit whereas the covered call is a credit. But there are ways of offsetting this expense and there is much more to this strategy when executed correctly. The Married Put can be made to pay for itself and used to generate very good gains if the market, or stock to be specific, moves a lot.
The basic idea of the Collar Trade is to combine the covered call and married Put strategy into one, this is what is called the Collar Trade. In effect you put a collar around the stock, sell a call and buy a PUT. If you do this correctly most of the cost of the Put can be offset by the credit from the covered call so you can protect your stock at almost no cost. Yes this is a great strategy which the general public is unfortunately very ignorant of, and most brokers don’t understand.
The strategy that I have outlined above is unknown to the average stock market trader but is one of the best trading systems you could have, along with momentum trading.
A675438906
Are You A Short, Medium Or Long Term Investor?
Did you know that there are 4 mains types of trader and depending on what type you are will determine many parts of your trading strategy and trading plan. The 4 types are: scalping, day trading, swing trading and position trading. When you determine the type of trader that you are it will also determine the time period in which you will be making your trade. This will be a very important decision that you need to make when deciding how you want to learn to day trade, maybe using a stock picking tool like stock assault software
1. Scalping Trader, if you scalp the markets this means that you are only looking for a few ticks profit per trade and you may only be in the trade for a few seconds or a minute at most. trading. Some people will also call this day trading but it’s really micro day trading, buying the bid and selling the offer, it’s fast trading and you might end up doing 10-50 trades a day. This is a very stressful way of trading for many people.
2. Day Trader, the true day trader opens and closes their trade within the same trading session, usually this mean the same day, but unlike a scalper the trade may be held for a few minutes up to several hours. Usually day traders make about 2-6 trades a day and most of them will be in the 5-30 minutes range. This is a less stressful way of trading than scalping but it still requires a lot of attention and quick decision making.
3. Swing Traders, swing trading usually means that a position is held for between 1 to 5-10 days, although some swing traders may keep a trade on for longer most are within this time period. For many this is the idea way to trade because it allows you to review your trade overnight, at the very least you have several hours to make your trading decisions.
4. Position Traders, this just means that you are going to hold onto your trade for longer than a few days, maybe even as long as 1 to 2 months.
If you are still working out how to day trade then it may be better to go with the longer time frames as it gives you more time to think, of course you should also take the best technical analysis course you can find.
A1528561
Traders Moving Average Secrets
One of the most popular technical analysis indicators is the simple moving average also known as SMA, if you learn how to use these correctly they can be a very useful tool to help you to make good trading decisions.
The 50 simple moving average, or 50 SMA, is simply the sum of the last 50 readings for each period, divided by 50, this is a moving window, as time moves on so does the average. Notice that I used the term period because this indicator works on any time period in exactly the same way.
It can be used on monthly, weekly, daily, hourly, 30 minutes, 15 minute and on whatever time period you want to monitor and trade. Although the SMA is the most commonly used there is also the exponential moving average or EMA. This is a weighted version of the formula using the mathematical exponent function to give more weight to the more recent values, this has the effect of making it a slightly faster average that many traders prefer.
The truth is that it probably does not matter if you used the SMA or the EMA, what does matter however is that you use one or the other and then be very consistent with it. Do not switch between them, it is more important that you learn to trust your chosen indicator then a slight difference in its value.
The SMA is oftern used to determine what the trend of the stock is, depending on the value used it could be a short term, medium term or long term trend. An important point to note is that moving averages are most useful when the stock is trending, if the moving average is flat, i.e. horizontal on your chart it can become very choppy, this is a good time to stay out of the market.
The general rule is that if the current price is above the SMA the trend is up, if below the trend is down. This is very important to understand because it forms the basics of trend trading and trading with the trend.
For the short term trend many traders like using a 5-8 SMA or EMA, here is a trading secret, never trade again the direction of the short term tend, actually this is really just common sense when you think about it.
Moving averages can often act as support or resistance, many traders use the 15, 21 or 30 SMA for this purpose.
There are a number of other very important moving averages that you need to know about, these are the 50, 100 and 200 SMA, and this mainly applies to the daily and weekly charts. A lot of big players in the markets, the mutual funds, investment banks etc use the 50 and 200 SMA as support and resistance, if they decide to buy or sell based on these you need to follow suite, the 100 to a lesser extent. These are very useful averages to watch if you trade EFT’s like an Oil ETF.
A useful tip is that when a stock breaks through one moving average it will often move all the way to the next, for example, if a stock breaks the 30 it may move to the 50 before finding some support or resistance.
A844534297