Natenberg is good.. it goes from simple to more advanced.. it takes more than one read to consume it.
Perhaps McMillan expends too many words to be comprehensive, hence the heavy tome, so good to go back to certain sections from time to time. But when it comes to nuances and subtleties as relate to trading options, Naterberg is the best.
I have taken the Optionetcis 2 day seminar. I am not an expert, but I had been trading options for few years. There is really noting in the seminar that you can't get from a couple good options book. They basically teach you the basic calls and puts (for real greens), and verticle spreads, straddles, butterflies and so on. Just teaching these really basic options tactics. I found that 90% of the people attending are rookies, and after the seminars, they don't have clue what hit them, So they go keep going back, thinking that they will eventually 'get it'. Of course they don't. My sense is that 99% of the people loose some money and finally give up. ( I attend a Optionetics group in the city, and I talk to those people). After you learn some basic tactics, you need to pick a stock, and predict the direction. This is something they don't teach. So it's like putting the cart before the horse. Unless you have a good stock pick, and have a sense of direction, any option tactic is useless. This where the 99% of the people fail, naturally. Unless you are a good stock picker and trader, you can't be good options trader. It is elementary. BUT! BUT! optionetics comes to the rescue. They will sell you a $4000 Advanced Gett program for stock picking, and $1000 platinum site, and another $***** course on how to use the Platinum site, and so on. You get the idea. Stay away, and save yourself the $3500, and a lot of grief and time.
Can someone please explain how fly and condor prices will drop as volatility rises? Shouldn't it be the other way round? Thanks
When volatility is low, the probability of profiting from selling a wide body condor increases, right? Why should I then get better prices for my increased probability in a low volatility environment?
Sorry my bad.. only at the money put or call fly prices have the convexity.. (ie: 75, 100, 125 with S =100) Condor prices increase and decrease linearly with vol. if u really want to see, price them yourself at 5% 10% up to 70%, you will see what i mean. I think what I wanted to say, is that its advantagous to do the fly/condor trade when vol is low as when the S moves vol moves with it.. its a skew/distributional play. Also I think what I wanted to say is that the net vega exposure drops as vol rises with this trade.
I went optionetics seminar last Oct. I think it is just for beginner who didn't have any experience (me at that time). You can probably learn all the knowledge from a couple of books in a couple of months. If I had read some books or know this kind of thread, I definitely will not go there. The problem i had is the strategies are easy to understand but you still don't know how to trade after attending the seminar. Then they will push platinum, advanced get or other software. I regret I signed platinum which i am not going to renew and luckily didn't buy anything else. I have a question for more experienced traders her like volga. I started trading iron condor on index since I am a terrible direction picker. What is your guy's experience using iron condor as a strategy? What you guys normally trade, calendar spreads, diagonal spreads? Thanks, HB