Just to give some context, I have been a trader for the past 9 years, I started with typical forex technical analysis, went into deep rabbit hole, then went into stocks, then crypto…. This includes technical analysis, automated trading… indicators….
The approach for all these instruments was more or likely the same. But recently I started to read about options, and to my surprise there alot of concepts and ideas that I have absolutely no knowledge on. This surprised me as I have read countless books and spent more than 30k hrs in screen time watching charts and reading/learning.
I am still not a consistent profitable trader
And yes math is my strongest skills
So my question to all you folks out there who actually make consistent profit from options,
Is it worth it? Is it worth me learning about options?
And as a trader I know alot of you will hate this question as I do hate it myself when someone ask me but
How much did you start? And how much do you make on average per month/year
Much appreciated
Posted by Beneficial-Block-923
4 Comments
Traded for years before starting options for the first time in July. Started with just $180 and have successfully rolled that into $10k +
Not amazing compared to most, but I can go weeks day trading sometimes and only see red.
Also, it’s just so much more relaxing. It doesn’t take over your life. You choose a few stocks and an expiry date for your overall assumption on where that stock is going. Then you wait. Its great.
I have been trading longer than you and it took me longer to get profitable and it took options actually, at least for me. Because they are so unforgiving the discipline you need to do options correctly is what forced me to get more disciplined! I would just let trades get lazy and go to shit, now I cannot do that.
Trading is really about finding what works for you and how you can capitalize on your understanding of what is going on. So options, futures, forex, whatever…. you just need to understand and be disciplined.
“Patience over greed”
Whether it’s options or any other instrument, having a long term outlook and patience has always paid off for me.
I would consider the wheeling strategy to begin with for consistent income. In a nutshell:
1) Only consider stocks you don’t mind owning for awhile.
2) Sell cash secured puts
3) If assigned sell covered calls with strikes ideally above your cost basis
4) If not assigned sell another/ more put(s)
5) Rinse and repeat
I am in the learning phase of more “complicated” plays such as spreads etc. Probably the largest rabbit hole in all of investing. But fun stuff!
The reason I mentioned number 1 is because it WILL happen occasionally that your put will get assigned and the stock will sink for awhile and you can’t really sell any calls that are worth it so you just have to hang on to the stock for awhile. Hopefully you might hold long enough to catch a dividend.