A company in decline can be an opportunity for investors using options. When shorting a stock by selling shares in advance and purchasing them back when they decline to profitable levels, the risk that the stock could rise makes the downside virtually unlimited. With options, you can limit your downside… Read More

When a stock looks primed to rise, buying a call option is a good way to leverage profits without taking on the risk of actually purchasing the underlying equity. In fact, the only outlay is the cost of the call itself. Another strategy, called a synthetic long, can… Read More

A credit spread strategy known as a bull put spread offers traders all the benefits of put selling while taking on less risk. To initiate a bull put spread, the trader sells a put option and simultaneously purchases another put option on the same underlying asset with the same expiration date but a lower strike… Read More

A credit spread strategy known as a bull put spread offers traders all the benefits of put selling while taking on less risk. To initiate a bull put spread, the trader sells a put option and simultaneously purchases another put option on the same underlying asset with the same expiration date but a lower strike… Read More

A credit spread strategy known as a bull put spread offers traders all the benefits of put selling while taking on less risk. To initiate a bull put spread, the trader sells a put option and simultaneously purchases another put option on the same underlying asset… Read More

I recently covered the basics of a credit spread strategy known as a bull put spread, in which I explained that it offered traders the benefits of put selling while taking on less risk. To initiate a bull put spread, the trader sells a put option and simultaneously purchases another put option on the same underlying… Read More

Last week, I covered the basics of a credit spread strategy known as a bull put spread, in which I explained that it offered traders the benefits of put selling while taking on less risk. To initiate a bull put spread, the trader sells a put option and simultaneously purchases… Read More

While many traders want to consistently see triple-digit gains, there are opportunities to make relatively low-risk trades that could add up to income of more than 10% a year. The strategy I’ll detail below uses the idea of low-risk to capture a potential gain of more than 1% in less… Read More

Successful trading is as much about volatility as it is price trends. Many traders focus on prices and try to identify whether they are going up or down. If they are right they capture profits, but directional trades are actually only one way to make money in trading. Short-term traders… Read More

The bulls have kept pressing and knocked the bears against key resistance levels at 1,425 on the S&P 500. This got the bears riled up, and they are scrambling to do all they can to protect this level. Bears have been making a lot of money during this decline, and… Read More

There seems to be widespread agreement that tax rates impact stock prices. Unfortunately, for traders looking for an edge in the stock market, there is no evidence showing what that impact is. There have been… Read More