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Stocks fell again yesterday, illustrating three important lessons for traders. The first lesson is that activity focuses on indexes and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) when the market crashes. For example, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) traded more than 6.1 million...
Financial stocks got hammered yesterday, and someone's watching a key level. Check out this giant put spread in the SPDR Financial ETF (XLF), which holds key names like Bank of America (BAC) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM): 72,540 November 26 puts were bought for...
Options are definitely more complicated than stocks. Their prices don't just go up and down. They also fluctuate based on things like time, implied volatility and underlying stock movements. You may need a system to keep all the moving pieces straight. Options Greeks...
Some options traders seem to think one of the market's most active stocks is ready for a rally. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) has barely moved for the last month, but a surge of volume yesterday looked for a rally by the end of this week. Traders amassed more than...
Options confuse a lot of investors because several factors impact their value. Unlike stocks, they don't just go up and down based on supply and demand. This post will explain three of the most important concepts you need to get started: time, volatility and intrinsic...
Trading volumes surged across the energy space yesterday after a drone attack clobbered the heart of Saudi Arabia's oil industry. Crude oil futures (@CL) traded more than 1.3 million contracts, the busiest session in at least a decade. Several other securities...
Stocks keep grinding higher, and one trader is inching up protection on the small-cap index. Check out this morning's options activity in the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM): 52,825 September 145 puts were sold for $0.1252,825 September 142 puts were bought for...
While options can be traded by themselves, investors often use them in conjunction with other securities. So before going further, let's consider the four basic ways that options trades are structured. You Can Trade Options by Themselves As we learned in a previous...
Most clients understand buying and selling stocks. Options are similar, and can be traded in the same brokerage accounts. However, you should know some basic differences. Bid / Ask Spreads Matter A bid/ask spread is the difference between where you can sell a security...