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Please don't post specific VIX trades here. There are dedicated members topics. This topic is for general VIX discussion.

Moved.

Since I started an options trading newsletter over 3 years ago, I met a lot of interesting people. I also learned a lot about human psychology. I would like you to take a look at this article. It provides some good perspective about Wall Street and human emotions. Click here to view the article

Absolutely! The main goal of paper trading is to learn the strategies and the platform, so any mistakes that you make while placing trades don't cost you money.

Hello Praveen and welcome to SO! Please see my answers below. 1. It is the best to post on the relevant forum so everyone can learn. The main purpose of this site is education, and no question is too dumb. If you don't ask you don't learn. 2. I suggest to start with Useful Links. It has a lot of links to topics where we discuss our strategies, and also to list of recommended books. 3. Check out Placing a trade on Interactive Brokers. 4. I would suggest paper trading on IB if this is the platform you are planning to use. 5. We recommend 10% per trade. All trade alerts come with suggested number of contracts for 10k portfolio. And always remember: like you said, this is a journey. It will take time, commitment and effort, but you have our whole community here to help. Kim

Yes, I considered this trade. But we already have too many calendars, and BIDU looked very cheap as well. But I would be interested to see the outcome.

GOOG trade was definitely very unusual. Most of the time, even if the price runs away, it's only by few cents, and many times it comes back. So I don't think it's really critical to get the alert in matter of minutes. And as always, I recommend members to be more proactive, based on our discussions.

I still would like to do straddles, but all straddles I looked at have been very expensive lately. Now with VIX back to 12, we hopefully will be able to find some suitable candidates.

Here you go. It's the same as IB for Canadians - they don't allow us to have account with IB US because they don't want to compete with IB Canada. Same with TOS. Are commissions with IB Australia the same for US options as IB US?

We have few members from Australia, so I assume trading US stocks and options is possible. And you still remain US citizen, so I'm not sure why they should care. You can always use mailing address of a friend or relative. Today all communications is electronic anyway.

No, I believe you should create a spread row in a separate Tab.

Today we closed our VIX calendar trade for $0.80 credit, after opening it just two weeks ago for $0.25 debit. What percentage gain did we make? This is not a tricky question. Well, maybe a little bit. Any high school student would tell you that 0.80/0.25=220% gain. Correct? Not so fast. Click here to view the article

I agree. And previous cycle was an anomaly, usually prices ended up around 0.75-0.80, so 0.55-0.60 should provide good risk/reward.

Thanks for sharing. I looked at FFIV, and it does look attractive. But we already have 4 calendars that provide better risk/reward historically. if you don't mind another one, this is a good option.

While most major indexes continue to straggle, SteadyOptions continues to deliver strong gains. SteadyOptions flagship service produced 121.5% ROI in First Half 2015, based on fixed $1,000 allocation per trade (non-compounded) and 6 trades open. This translated to 72.9% return on the whole account, based on 10% allocation per trade. The winning ratio was a remarkable 82%. Check out the Performance page to see the full results. Please note that those results are based on real fills, not hypothetical performance. Click here to view the article

In simple terms, implied volatility is the amount of stock price fluctuations. Being on the right side of implied volatility changes can enhance the chances of success. In general, implied volatility increases when the market is bearish and decreases when the market is bullish. This is due to the common belief that bearish markets are more risky than bullish markets. Consider selling strategies when options are being traded at high implied volatility levels. Consider buying strategies when options are being traded at low implied volatility levels. Click here to view the article

Thanks for sharing. For trades that we rolled, there is still P/L mentioned in the closing alert.

I usually build a strangle. I don't recommend legging out.

Not exactly. Anchor uses different number of long/short puts, so the number of sold puts has time value just enough to pay for the long puts.

If you want to buy SPY puts as a hedge, I would probably go with longer expiration. At Anchor Trades, we implement similar strategy and trying to pay for the hedge by selling short term options.

You are welcome. I'm planning to do some webinars on some of our strategies. Right now I have a technical issue with gotowebinar software (there is a 5-7 seconds delay in screen sharing), so maybe I will just do videos and not live webinars.

Think of it this way: When you have a combo with a positive number (like FDX call spread), and you buy it, you pay a debit. When you sell it, you get a credit. When you have a combo with a negative number (like iron condor) and you buy it, you get a credit. When you sell it, you pay a debit. If you remember this concept, it becomes pretty simple. it took me some time to get used it, but when I accepted this concept, everything became simple.

Absolutely. In combo trader, you build it as call spread (buy low strike, sell high strike) and then just sell it for a credit.

Just to clarify so we are on the same page: you want to sell the body and buy the wings, right? If this is the case, you just build it in combo menu as a standard strategy and simply click on ask (Buy). Then adjust the credit to get as much credit as possible.

Trading options without an understanding of the Greeks is like flying a plane without the ability to read instruments. Unfortunately, many traders do not know how to read the Greeks when trading. This puts them at risk of a fatal error, much like a pilot would experience flying in bad weather without the benefit of a panel of instruments at his or her disposal. In this article, I will try to describe how to use the options Greeks to your advantage. First, a quick reminder for those less familiar with the Greeks. Click here to view the article