Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies And How I've Used Them To Profit In Any Market Review

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(More customer reviews)I read this book and agree is it clear and concise - well written. Options are one of the more complex investment vehicles to understand. After signing up with my broker, ThinkOrSwim, and looking at all the features for options trading, and signing up for a trial of some of the option trade recommentations [...] and read some of the recommendations, I quickly realized how basic this book is. If you really get into options trading you will realize this book only scratches the surface of all the strategies out there.


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Learn options the easy way! After reading this book you will be able to read option quotes with ease, open an option enabled trading account, and perform the most successful option trading strategies.Options allow you to: 1. Get paid to buy your favorite stock.2. Purchase stocks for less than their current price.3. Buy insurance on stocks in your portfolio.4. Make money when stocks lose value.5. Make short-term trades with less money than buying the stock.The actual trade examples in this book will show you both the ups and downs of trading options as you learn the six most successful strategies.

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The Index Trading Course Workbook: Step-by-Step Exercises and Tests to Help You Master The Index Trading Course (Wiley Trading) Review

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(More customer reviews)This book has some great information on how to trade Indexes. It is broken out into sections, so if you are new to options it will walk you through the basics of what an option is and the different option strategies that are used for markets that are trending either up, down, or sideways (no movement). Unlike playing stock, If you are a savy options player you can make money no matter what the market does.
If you are a more advanced options trader you can skip past the basic chapters to read about the different indexes that are available to trade and how you can leverage indexes where the underlying is based on Gold, Treasury Bills or Foreign Markets.
This is one of the best Options Books I have ever purchased and if you are a serious options investor it is a must have for your library. I had to write the review becuase, if I kept this gem to myself it would do disservice to the Authors and I want to encourage them to release future editions of this book.

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An indispensable, hands-on companion to The Index Trading Course
In The Index Trading Course, financial experts George Fontanills and Tom Gentile provide an in-depth look at the tools and techniques used to trade in this profitable market.
Now, in The Index Trading Course Workbook, Fontanills and Gentile offer a wealth of practical exercises that will help further your understanding of index trading, as well as test and apply what you've learned before you take one step into the real markets-where time and money are luxuries you can't afford to lose. The media assignments found in each chapter are especially useful. They'll help you put the material you've read into action by prompting you to access some of the extensive media tools currently available to all traders-including financial papers, magazines, the Internet, and television.
This hands-on companion to The Index Trading Course also includes a complete answer key for every multiple-choice question and covers a wide range of issues related to this discipline such as:
Core stock market indexes along with the sector offerings from a variety of financial entities
Actively traded index products, including exchange traded funds (ETFs), index options, and ETF options
Options strategies used for different trends and volatility situations
Indicators and systems
Trade adjustments
The art of risk management

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The Options Strategist: How to Invest and Trade Equity-Related Options Review

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(More customer reviews)I've bought and sold many options using a variety of strategies. I enjoy reading as much as possible on options strategies because of the complexity of the subject. The author writes in a very clear logical sequence starting with Options 101 and then rapidly moves on to the more advanced strategies. He doesn't lose you in technical terms but keeps your interest as he walks through Options 401 (more advanced), and onto the more complex stuff. If you want to understand all of the "greek" options stuff, he explains it in an understandable format. Most options books I read get too generic and I lose interest but this book was different and I actually enjoyed it. I have 5 options books on my shelf right now and this one is the best of the group by far.

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Options DeMYSTiFieD, Second Edition Review

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(More customer reviews)"Options Demystified" is a worthy addition to McGraw-Hill's "Demystified" series, easily living up to its claim of being a self-teaching guide. Hundreds of books have been written on the subject of puts and calls, but this large-format paperback is by far the best I've come across for the aspiring option trader. It is comprehensive, well organized, generously illustrated and easy to understand. The book also includes many quizzes and a "final exam" to help the reader master the material.
The author, Thomas McCafferty, has been around commodities, stocks and options for many years and written numerous books on those subjects. This one not only lays out the basics of the options game, it also condenses much of the author's impressive horse-sense into a very readable and relatively short work (251 pages, plus an excellent index). "Options Demystified" should be on every trader's shelf. Even pros will find some pearls here, including a chapter on "trading philosophy" that's perfectly attuned to today's frothy markets. I recommend this book wholeheartedly to anyone looking for an options primer that is both comprehensive and easy to imbibe.


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In good times and bad, you need to know your OPTIONS
Market volatility is at a record high, which has investors running scared. You don't have to be one of them.Whether your goal is to protect your money in a downturn or profit handsomely from an upturn, trading options is theanswer.
Options DeMYSTiFieD reveals why today's smartestinvestors rely on the versatility of the optionsmarketplace--and how you can, too! With its quick, snappy explanations and easy-to-understand examples, it provides the knowledge you need to start trading options like a pro in no time. Chapterending quizzes and a final exam round out Options DeMYSTiFieD into a comprehensive self-teaching guide that allows you to learn at your own pace.
This fast and easy guide has everything you need to:
Protect your investments from market downturns--even those in your IRA or 401(k)
Increase income from stocks you already own
Multiply the leverage you have in the market to max out your profits
Manage the risk of investing without decreasing profit potential
Engage in more complex trading, such as covered calls, spreads, straddles, and hedges

Simple enough for a beginner but challenging enough for an advanced trader, Options DeMYSTiFieD haswhat you need to build a solid foundation in options trading.

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Exotic Options Trading (The Wiley Finance Series) Review

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(More customer reviews)This book is an excellent resource and expose of most exotic options traded around the globe. It cuts to the really essential parts of the options quickly. No in-depth math analysis. De Weert lists the essential formulas and payoff functions in a readable and understandable format. He also gives some practical hints and explains some pitfalls one should be aware of. Both traders and quants will find this an excellent reference.

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Written by an experienced trader and consultant, Frans de Weert's Exotic Options Trading offers a risk-focused approach to the pricing of exotic options. By giving readers the necessary tools to understand exotic options, this book serves as a manual to equip the reader with the skills to price and risk manage the most common and the most complex exotic options.

De Weert begins by explaining the risks associated with trading an exotic option before dissecting these risks through a detailed analysis of the actual economics and Greeks rather than solely stating the mathematical formulae. The book limits the use of mathematics to explain exotic options from an economic and risk perspective by means of real life examples leading to a practical interpretation of the mathematical pricing formulae.

The book covers conventional options, digital options, barrier options, cliquets, quanto options, outperformance options and variance swaps, and explains difficult concepts in simple terms, with a practical approach that gives the reader a full understanding of every aspect of each exotic option. The book also discusses structured notes with exotic options embedded in them, such as reverse convertibles, callable and puttable reverse convertibles and autocallables and shows the rationale behind these structures and their associated risks.

For each exotic option, the author makes clear why there is an investor demand; explains where the risks lie and how this affects the actual pricing; shows how best to hedge any vega or gamma exposure embedded in the exotic option and discusses the skew exposure.

By explaining the practical implications for every exotic option and how it affects the price, in addition to the necessary mathematical derivations and tools for pricing exotic options, Exotic Options Trading removes the mystique surrounding exotic options in order to give the reader a full understanding of every aspect of each exotic option, creating a useable tool for dealing with exotic options in practice.
"Although exotic options are not a new subject in finance, the coverage traditionally afforded by many texts is either too high level or overly mathematical. De Weert's exceptional text fills this gap superbly. It is a rigorous treatment of a number of exotic structures and includes numerous examples to clearly illustrate the principles. What makes this book unique is that it manages to strike a fantastic balance between the theory and actual trading practice. Although it may be something of an overused phrase to describe this book as compulsory reading, I can assure any reader they will not be disappointed."
—Neil Schofield, Training Consultant and author of Commodity Derivatives: Markets and Applications

"Exotic Options Trading does an excellent job in providing a succinct and exhaustive overview of exotic options. The real edge of this book is that it explains exotic options from a risk and economical perspective and provides a clear link to the actual profit and pricing formulae. In short, a must read for anyone who wants to get deep insights into exotic options and start trading them profitably."
—Arturo Bignardi

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The Mathematics of Options Trading Review

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(More customer reviews)This book fails on so many fronts that space simply wont allow to cover everything. First off, the author commits the crime of not knowing his audience. He assumes that you know nothing about options and very little about math. He then proceeds to bore you in early chapters with math that isn't even required later on. What's the point!? Its not until you get half way through the book that you finally get into the real meat. By then, he's makes a huge leap from reviewing how you add 1 + 1 to suddenly assuming that you know 1st year college calculus all in the matter of 1 chapter. In short, he tries to appeal to all, but misses the mark. I am an engineer, I know math, thats why picked up this book!!
Technically, I have many issues. First off, he more or less states that when selling naked puts you shouldn't worry about a move greater than 4 standard deviations because they never happen. Well my friend, although moves such as these do not occur frequently, they do occur often enough that I'd be concerned about using such a stratedgy. I have real life data from the past year to back up my claims. All the author has is theory. Go ask anyone holding a naked put in a pharmacutical company that just got shot down by the FDA what they think of a 4 SD move. They happen.
The author then states throughout the book that these are his claims for how the methods that he presents should work, but he then goes on to say that they should be tested before committing any real money. What the heck!? Why publish a book only to say that you should do your own research to prove his methods!?
I've been waiting for such a book for years! All the other options books out there miss the point of expected value. This book shines on that front. What's the point of winning 90% of your trades if you're a loser at the end of the day. That's the power of expected value. For years I've thought that if I could only come up with a way to accurately calculate expected values on options, then I could turn wall street into my own little casino and retire early! Well, its not that easy!
I've been doing my own research for the past year on all the formulas presented in this book. I've analyzed 1,000's of positions every month on spread sheets with easily downloadable data. Word of warning, dont bet your house on the expected values holding up. Distributions of returns vary from month to month and they also vary depending on the length of time involved. These distribution profiles vary enough to screw up expected values. Distribution profiles also vary greatly depending if you're looking at a large cap or micro cap stock. Do your own research as the author warns and you'll see for yourself. Its been a very frustrating process because in theory the math should work and I should be rich by now, but in practice it doesn't work so well. It just speaks volumes to how difficult it is to make money long term trading options.
I haven't given up the chase yet as I am continuing on with my research, testing and tweaking. This book should be credited for pushing me in the right direction, but its disappointing that the book falls short on its own real world exhaustive research.


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Advanced Option Pricing Models Review

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(More customer reviews)Katz's book on Advanced Options Pricing offers traders additional insight into limitations and errors found in traditional pricing models. For those of us that write mechanical options trading systems, particularly combination models, Jeff's book is a must read. If you are an options price researcher looking for in depth advanced pricingmodel discovery, analysis and mathematics, this book is probably not for you. However, if you are looking at ways to improve your existing models thus converging the error between empirically derived options system equity curves and those equity curves derived from options models, you should read this book. As most traders know, efficient entry and exit points in the market often occur during periods when pricing models break down, so the more you can learn about options behavior during this transient period, the better your overall trading system will be.

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Options for the Stock Investor: How to Use Options to Enhance and Protect Returns Review

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(More customer reviews)I recently added "Options for the Stock Investor" to my financial trading and investment library, hoping it would keep its promise describing it as logically written in a systematic and straightforward manner. I'm pleased to say it HASN'T DISAPPOINTED.
Unfortunately, this book hasn't received the attention it deserves among the many books devoted primarily to intermediate options traders/investors. I've always felt that options were explained in a much too "matter of fact" manner, where the most practical information is inadvertently ignored, obscured or non-existent.
Anyone trying to learn stock options is arguably bombarded by fearful information and disorganized, incomplete explanations. This short but concentrated book cuts through the many counterintuitive aspects and implicit contradictions involving stock options.
Beginners need only go to the Investopedia and similar sites on the internet to reinforce the Introduction and supplement their exposure to the language of options.
I've seen some of the worst. This book ranks highly among the best.

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McGraw-Hill's classic options bestseller, Options for theStock Investor, has been updated to reflect changes in theoptions market. This extensively revised second edition featuresall-new material describing electronic trading, decimalization,and single stock futures, along with increasinglypopular vehicles such as stock indexes, LEAPs, and exchangetradedfunds. The CD-ROM contains all-new OP-EVAL IIsoftware, which eliminates guesswork while providing handsoninformation on spreads, position Greeks, and "what-if"forecasting and graphing features.

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Financial Derivatives, 3rd Edition Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a quick and easy guide to understanding derivatives. Excellent as a brief reference quide. Would recommend to professionals working with these products.

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Understand derivatives in a nonmathematical wayFinancial Derivatives, Third Edition gives readers a broad working knowledge of derivatives. For individuals who want to understand derivatives without getting bogged down in the mathematics surrounding their pricing and valuation Financial Derivatives, Third Edition is the perfect read. This comprehensive resource provides a thorough introduction to financial derivatives and their importance to risk management in a corporate setting.

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Options Trading 101: From Theory to Application Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a quick review of the excellent stock options trading book written by Bill Johnson called Options Trading 101.-johnI had a chance to buy Bills book when I met him in person at an options trading seminar before the book was launched publically.
Bill is one of the traders for a company called Options University which teaches stock options trading. Bill's book hit number one on Amazon just after it launched, so a lot of other people must have thought it looked pretty good too.
I guess the simplest thing I can say about Bill's book is that there is a fully in-depth options trading education within the 449 pages of the book, and if you have the discipline to go through the book slowly, taking notes, you can get an education that others have paid hundreds or maybe even thousands of dollars to recieve.
One of my favorite parts of Bill's book are the chapter review quizzes that he gives at the end of each chapter. Like any good teacher who teaches you something and then reviews with you to make sure you got it, Bill does just that with his end of chapter quizzes.
Bill goes from very beginner to rather advanced between the pages of this book and he does it in a pretty simply and easy to understand way, drawing a lot of connections to other real life matters to make understanding the more technical parts of trading a lot easier.
For a $20 book on options trading success, Bill's book is a no-brainer.

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Option Spread Trading: A Comprehensive Guide to Strategies and Tactics (Wiley Trading) Review

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(More customer reviews)The author definitely knows what he is writing about but I have strong doubts about his ability to write a readable and error-free book. Throughout reading it, I had a strong impression that I was the first person on the planet who read it, and this includes the author himself and editors and proofreaders if there were any. (It is incomprehensible to me how such a reputable publishing house as Wiley could give it a green light.) But it is not only English, which sometimes gives you a real headache. It is also factual errors. For example, there is reference to Figure 4.4 but it is not there. There is also no Figure 4.3 but luckily, there is no reference to it, either. The author writes "straddle" where it should be "strangle" and "iron condor" where it should be "iron butterfly." Figure 5.17 has Long Straddle with wrong numbers, and this is a Figure comparing the Long Straddle with the Reverse Iron Butterfly. There are more errors, misreferences, and clumsy sentences violating the rules of English grammar. The author also has a very strange tendency to explain relatively simple concepts in the most convoluted manner and constantly repeat himself.
The aforementioned Figure 5.17 was a last straw that broke my patience and rushed me to write this review. I am almost sure that I will see more surprises in the rest of the book, and I intend to read it to the end because of the autor's competence in the subject (that's why 2 stars rather than 1). So if you are eager to test your patience and to see how quickly you'll get really annoyed with this book, buy this book with confidence.

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McMillan on Options, Second Edition (Wiley Trading) Review

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(More customer reviews)As a ROP (registered Options principal) I feel I am uniquely qualified to review this book. First, understand that Larry McMillan is considered by many to be the best options mind on Wall Street (sorry Bernie Schaeffer). His knowledge of this less-than-logical derivative investment is the equivalent of Alan Greenspan's knowledge of the economy.
My assessment: this is a good book. McMillan covers virtually every aspect of options trading: history, terms, strategies, volatility, theoretical approaches, etc. I am particularly impressed by Larry's use of historical examples to bring complicated strategies down to basic levels.
This is not to say this is an easy read. An easy investment read is Peter Lynch's "One Up on Wall Street". McMillan on Options is more like a doctor's guide to brain surgery: the pictures are cool but the content can be complicated. Topics covered include spreads (verts, calendar, diagonal), straddles, combos, the greeks (delta, rho, theta, vega and gamma) and strategies that employ these. If volatility is your life, and you hold a hefty position in Rolaids futures, then this book is for you. I have not read a more comprehensive, useable options book. I believe all options traders and speculators should own McMillan on Options.

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Legendary trader Larry McMillan does it-again-offering his personal options strategies for consistently enhancing trading profits
Larry McMillan's name is virtually synonymous with options. This "Trader's Hall of Fame" recipient first shared his personal options strategies and techniques in the original McMillan on Options. Now, in a revised and Second Edition, this indispensable guide to the world of options addresses a myriad of new techniques and methods needed for profiting consistently in today's fast-paced investment arena. This thoroughly new Second Edition features updates in almost every chapter as well as enhanced coverage of many new and increasingly popular products. It also offers McMillan's personal philosophy on options, and reveals many of his previously unpublished personal insights. Readers will soon discover why Yale Hirsch of the Stock Trader's Almanac says, "McMillan is an options guru par excellence."

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Fundamentals of Options Market Review

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(More customer reviews)I have been trading stocks and options for 3 years and found the volatility, strategy and synthetics section excellent. I have had a hard time understanding synthetics and the idea of creating other positions and understanding the risk and rewards was very useful. I already knew all the strategies but the book went into explaining how to trade them and hedge them. The contract vs. delta neutral was very informative and practical. The simple use of calculating volatility down to the day was very useful and helps me determine option's premiums against fair value. I like the workbook feel instead of textbook feel.
Pros - Simple explanation of volatility, intro to synthetics, strategy section with how to trade the positions, great basic strategy formula section, interesting market making section, seemed more like a workbook, and a the quiz at the end of each section.
Cons - More on Synthetics, some sections a little complicated for the beginner (This book is more intermediate then basic). Would like more on pricing formulas. The position trading section needs more examples instead of just one.
Final thoughts: ... it was worth it, not too complicated, and information that you can use. At least it wasn't another one of those "get rich" day-trading books about scapling 1/8s with nothing but speculation and a lot of BS. I have enough of those books on my self, wish I could sell them. McMillan's book is the only other option book that I have found useful.

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Options are an investment vehicle that can enhance virtually any investment philosophy. Fundamentals of the Options Market provides a clear, concise picture of this global marketplace. Using examples drawn from contemporary financial news, this completely accessible guidebook describes why and how these versatile tools can be used to hedge risk and enhance return, while explaining popular products including listed stock options, index options, and LEAPS.

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Commodity Options: Trading and Hedging Volatility in the World's Most Lucrative Market Review

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(More customer reviews)First of all I don't read the book. My review is not on the book but on the reviews itself. So, if you don't want to read my review, this is the place to stop.
Still here? OK
The reviews available to this date have some common things that I found... strange
Let's see:
- All the five reviews were written on a period of one month, ending on april 21, and then... silence.
- All reviews have 5 stars
- All reviews have about the same length
- Look at the words used: "fantastic!", "by far the best book on options ", "great book for beginners but an even better book for the seasoned trader" (?) by the way, this last one was written by a person who did only 1 review
- 3 of the 5 reviews were written by people with only 1 book review, and the ones with more than 1 review, did no other reviews on options books. There in only one review on "The complete idiot's guide to options" (By the same person who said this is the best book on options)
Well, all the things listed above get me very suspicious.
This is the kind of reviews that get me away from the books, instead of towards it. Make your on judgment...

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The New Options Advantage: Gaining a Trading Edge Over the Markets, Revised Edition Review

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(More customer reviews)A good choice for stock option investors despite it mentioning commmodities. This book will overwhelm a beginner, who should start with Charles Caes' great "Tools of the Bear" (which works for bull and bear markets). Far superior to George Fontanills. Caplan is creative, he writes well and gives the studious reader many important tips. I made two pages of notes from this book. With even a little experience, an options investor will truly ascend to a higher level of knowledge and trading mastery with this book.

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No-Hype Options Trading: Myths, Realities, and Strategies That Really Work (Wiley Trading) Review

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(More customer reviews)"No-Hype Options Trading" is a great guide on how to go about consistent delta neutral trading without being overly optimistic about large windfalls. The author is quite frank about this style of trading being conservative but not easy. He spends his chapters on detailed strategies for placement of trades and more importantly how to adjust the trades or exit. He pays particular attention to iron condor trading. The book provides a range of exit strategies based on risk/reward, experience trading, and the Greeks. You can feel his concern for the trader's financial well being. He explains how to determine and set up the signals for exit and adjustment. He insists that a successful trader needs these potential exit/adjustments in place right after the original investment trade is put in place. It is not safe to make these trades without a strategy and adjustments that are in play on the day of the trade. Constant vigilance to the trade is necessary for success.
The chapter on calendars pushes the concept that while the underlying price effects the trade, even more basic and extremely influential is a drop in the positions volatility. He dwells on the significance of the volatility difference in the legs of the trade also. These points alone may change the way you trade calendars and increase your success and profit.
If you are looking for some precise guidelines on how to make delta neutral option trades in the condor, butterfly, and calendar world and detailed methods for exits or adjustments, you will be taking notes out of this text. I feel that I will make back the price of this book in my trading this month, many time over.


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Profiting with Iron Condor Options: Strategies from the Frontline for Trading in Up or Down Markets Review

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(More customer reviews)The iron condor is basically an option trade that involves selling and buying two out-of-the money calls and two out-of-the money puts in the same month for one stock or index. Actually, you are really putting on two vertical spreads, one on each side of the current price of the stock or index.
The author favors trading the SPX, RUT, and NDX mainly for reasons of liquidity and the fact that as European-style options you do not have to worry about exercise prior to expiration date. Interestingly, the back cover stresses the ability to earn consistent returns very month with "surprisingly modest risk," but the author himself states early in the book that this should not be considered to be an income strategy and then he goes on to stress that there are a lot of risks with this strategy. In fact as he explains, those risks make it imperative that the trader keep a watchful eye on both "wings" of the condor so that adjustments can be made as needed. This is definitely not one of those trades that you can put on and then just check every week or so.
Although many traders who use spreads typically like to leave their trades on for as long as possible in the hopes of keeping most, if not all of the amounts that they were credited when the trade was opening, this author actually recommends against holding trades open for this long. He definitely is more in favor of going for singles rather than home runs. For example, he claims that "the exit strategy that works best is to give back almost all of the credit. If you take in an initial 16% credit and keep only 3%, 4% or 5%, you're giving back most of the potential profits. How many trades have you made that can consistently make profits of 3% in a few days regardless of the direction of the market?" I see his point, but if you are someone who has only previously traded options from the long side, be prepared to change your way of thinking.
Those who have been involved in other types of spreads may already be familiar with much of the material found in the book, but those who have not been involved in selling options or in spread trading of any type will find this book interesting. If you read the book and decide that you're really not that interested in this particular strategy or type of trading, you won't have to waste much of your time since the book can be finished in one sitting.

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