Lets talk about options trading

[Dave Hounddriver]

I have a lot of time and a little money these days.  Searching through things that I like, I found a few people who trade options on the stock market.  It does not look as risky as some other methods of making money and I am planning to give it a try.  I would use the wheel strategy if anyone wants to google it.

So the question is, has anyone here done any options trading?  What were your thoughts on it?  Seems like something you could do anywhere, just like playing online poker . .  (old time members may remember when I had a plan to make money playing online poker . .  I made about $100 at that over one year and gave up on that plan.)

[Old55]

Jake lives in Las Vegas maybe he has some suggestions. 

[Mike J]

I did a really brief read of the wheel strategy.  Something to consider.  When you sell a put, there must be a buyer who is also planning to make money.  So either the buyer or the seller is going to lose what the other earns.  I assume the broker will earn a fee no matter what happens.  So I would advise you to research whatever is the reverse of the wheel strategy.   

[earthdome]

I have not done options trading but my financial advisor has for my account. In this case he is only using the options as a hedge to protect other investments in case they go south. An extreme case of investments going south is what happened in March 2020.

[OnMyWay]

On 8/7/2021 at 12:46 AM, Dave Hounddriver said:

So the question is, has anyone here done any options trading?

I have some options now.  I had some expire worthless recently.  Of the three call options I hold now, I think one is going to make me enough for to cover the loss if the others all die.  Yes, this is risk money.  If I were to advise you to make money, I would tell you to bet the other side of whatever I do! 

I briefly traded some currency options years ago.  I made some money that seemed like a lot at the time, but I really had no money to risk, so I got really lucky.

[Joey G]

The volatility is high enough where you can buy "best in brand" stocks on 10% downswings weekly and then sell making a 10%+ profit when they bounce back... it's safer than options... and historically even if they don't bounce back within weeks, the "guarantee" they will later out weighs the risk of options.

With that said... I know some who folks have certainly made a bundle on options this year... but the risk/reward is too high for me.