Forex Is Crazy

Hey Traders! I am not sure how many of you may be following this story or if you are even aware that its happening. But a while back the ISE exchange announced that it had created a new option product that they are calling mini options. The mini options are going to open up the playing field for people with smaller accounts to play big names like: AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, GLD, and SPY. The new mini contracts are going to be identical to the regular option contracts with the amount of shares it represents being the only difference. The mini option contracts will represent 10 shares vs the typical 100 shares. I don't know about you but I am pretty excited about this. Because there are times where I would love to play some of these names but the capital required to take delivery of 100 shares of say AAPL by selling a naked put at current prices is about $45,000, which is a significant portion of my portfolio. But with the new mini's it will be a tenth that size, which would make me more ...

I figured since this is really the only significant position type in my portfolio currently that I would share the different stocks that I currently own with high yield from the dividend they pay based on the stock price. They are: NLY, PBI, CLF, & VALE CLF: Current yield is 7% based on a $0.63/share dividend and current share price of $35.71, the next ex-dividend date should be announced February 11th based on historical information. The dividend has been paid out consistently for 23 years and has been rising on a consistent basis. I was also able to sell the Jan '14 $40/call for $3.95, which was about 11% of the stock price when I acquired the stock at $33.74. NLY: Current yield is 12.12% based on a $0.45/share dividend and a current share price of $14.85, the next ex-divided will be around the 28th of March. The dividend has been paid out consistently for 15 years and varied based on financial performance.  I was also able to sell the Jan '14 $15/call for $0.67, which w...

First let me start off by stating that my activity level in the markets is much less than it was when I first started engaging the financial markets back in 2007. If you are just starting off it is natural to want to be involved every minute of every day. But overtime you will find your rhythm or cadence as you gain experience and find an activity level that suits both your personality and lifestyle. I personally have many interests and pursuits, so over the years I have chosen to put on trades that don't require me to check in on a daily basis. But I still remember the time when I was glued to a screen watching every tick in the market. It was a rush, but overtime became a bit of a roller coaster ride. Every tick in favor of your P&L was euphoric and every tick against you was the end of the world. At least this is what it was like for me. Now I will be the first to admit that my activity level does ebb and flow based on my free time. If I have more free time I am a little mor...

So far I've read a lot of literature on the various forex trading. But not enough to say as professional traders. My knowledge is still very little and had to learn more. However, I can take some conclusions from what I've learned. And I want to tell you guys. Maybe get a little help for you. Perhaps you will find a lot of articles about forex. So that makes you confused and disoriented. You do not know which ones are important and which ones are more important. Well I'll just distill them into one course. What is it? My answer is REASON. Yup, Reason. For this reason you will know what you are doing against your forex trading account. The grounds also you will know how to determine the position. Do you want to buy or sell. All should be no obvious reason. If not then you will never know where your errors or where you get the opportunity to benefit. The reason is what will make you will be growing and evolving into a more intelligent trader. For this reason you...

As I suggested in the title of this post, HCA from a technical vantage is looking very extended to the upside. Upside price movement has gone parabolic. The RSI is showing a reading of >80 and we are trading at the upper bollinger bands. So based on the chart I want to be short this name for a corrective move. But I also want to be long the stock, I just don't feel comfortable getting long at current prices. We have decisively broken out above resistance around $34/share. And as the rule goes, what was once resistance becomes support (Around $34/share). So I put on the following position: Risk Profile for Aggregated Position Part #1: Sold 1 Mar '13 $38.50/$40.50 callspread @ 51 cents Part #2: Bought 2 Mar '13 $37.50/$36.50 putspreads @ 50 cents Part #3: Sold 1 Mar '13 $36.50 put @$1.45 Overall I collected a net credit of 96 cents or $96. Upside Breakeven: $39.46 Upside max loss: $104 Downside Break even: $33.54 Downside max loss: Infinite (stock could go to z...

How many of you like FREE stuff? Ok. Stupid question. How many of you like quality free stuff? If you are on this site, you are likely trying to make money trading options...and maybe other trading vehichles as well. So Tasty Trade could put you back $90/month if you didn't know any better. But we would not let you do that on our watch. The first thing you need to know is that if you use the Think or Swim platform to trade then its free. Oh, by the way, Think or Swim from TD Ameritrade is not only the most sophisticated platform out there but its FREE also . Now that you have this information, what are you going to do with it? 1) Go open up an account with TD Ameritrade and download the Think or Swim Platform. 2) Then once you account is set up and funded you are going to send an email to tastysupport@tdameritrade.com to get your free account at tasty trade setup. Once you get your tastytrade.com account, you need to start tuning in and learning. Don't forget to contact suppor...

This morning I put on a short 150/160 call spread on SPY. We are approaching the highs from September of 2012 and I am not so sure we will be able to breakout to new highs. One thing I would like to point out is the fact that I went all the way to December expiration for this trade. I collected $4.06 for the trade. There are two reasons I did this. These days balancing trading with all my other ventures I don't want to feel compelled to be glued to the trading screen. When I first started I felt like I had to watch every tick in the market. Now I have periods of super active trading, but for the most part I pick trades I really like and can set and forget. And it doesn't matter whether I check daily, weekly, or every few weeks. Of course I can set alerts to let me know if I need to check in. The second reason is I have a few long covered call positions that would benefit on the market going up. But I just want a little more downside protection in the event the market does indee...

Trading with Chris & Mike #1 Good morning and welcome to a new blog educational series that I will be hosting weekly. I have a few friends that want to learn how to trade and invest online. I will be meeting with them in person and turning our lessons into blog posts. Our first lesson was last Friday and the objective was to cover the basic steps of how to start trading and investing online. Critical First Steps: Put together the funds that you will use to open the account. I  recommend  $2,000 to start. But if you can't start with $2,000, then as much as you can put together. The reason I  recommend  $2,000 is because it gives you a lot more  flexibility  with the types of trades you can make. Choose an online broker. There are a lot to choose from, but if you need help selecting, please reach out to us. We have our favorite platform. Negotiate the commission rate. Most people don't even know that they can ask for a lower commission rate with out any m...

Just as it has been a long time since I have posted on this blog, it has been equally as long since I last posted about any trade ideas.  BTW, you have by now seen some visual changes to the blog. We are still detailing and finalizing the changes for the "Official" re-launch. One of the strategies that I have utilized over the course of the last year in my IRA account is high yield covered call position. Some of the stocks that this has worked out well with are VALE, NLY, and now PBI . I use a pre-defined scan that I have set up within the TOS platform to look for stocks that have had recent sell offs and made for very attractive dividend yields. Then I do the following due diligence: 1) Research the regularity of the dividend. You can easily check history from the company's website. Most of the time you can even see them within the TOS platform. Checking the company website for PBI I confirmed that it has had 30 years worth of consistent and increasing dividend payments....

One of the most difficult in forex trading is to produce consistent profits. It is almost impossible to always win every trade we do in forex trading, especially for beginners who are new to the world of forex. Suffered losses in forex trading seems to have become a necessity. Even a trader who has reached the professional level has ever experienced a loss, or more commonly referred to as loss. However, losses experienced by different professional trader losses traders. So what is the difference? the difference is the way to address these losses, which in turn will determine the decision or action to be taken against a trader's account. Whether it's opening a new position again, out of the market, or do not do trading. Of course, the attitude of a professional trader and the novice trader attitude would be different. Professional traders almost has a lot of experience, trading systems, risk management, strategy, and a good understanding of analisia. While the novice t...

Understand the ins and outs of forex trading first before we decide to do forex trading with real money. If you do not really understand what forex trading is and how it works, do not ever depositing your money in the broker / broker. We must first understand the theory and practice with a demo account until proficient. Once we gain an understanding of which is considered sufficient and practice with a demo account, then we decide if we are going to open a real trading account forex or not. Understanding is not enough, must be accompanied by exercises to really get. Like we plunge into the pool without being able to swim, it's just committed suicide. Though we know the theory of how to swim even memorized all our swim styles, but without practice and training, it all does not mean we can practically swim. Likewise, in forex trading, capital theory just is not enough to say can trade forex. Enjoy the demo accounts provided by broker / broker as an exercise. Find informatio...

  Hello and welcome to 2013! It has been a long...long....long time since I have last posted to the blog. Jason and I started this blog back in May of 2009 as a place to share our trade ideas and market analysis. Eventually it grew to a few other contributors and developing traders posting off and on over the past few years. A big part of the time of no activity from me was due to the fact that I was trading professionally for an oil company for about 2 years, and I really could not post about the proprietary trades I was making in house. My focus internally led to way less trading activity in my personal account. I have since moved on to new endeavors and am ready to re-launch and revitalize this trading blog and community. I have a vision of what I want this site to become for myself and the rest of the community. Be patient, and over the next several weeks and months you will see this community come alive. Stay Tuned!  Dominic