Eight Rules That Can Help You Master Options

• Once you know how a stock trades historically and how it reacts to news, then you can start looking for option trades and put the probability of success on your side.
• Remember — it’s not whether the news is good or bad. It is only how that specific stock reacts to the news that matters.
• Consider your portfolio like your own company. No company likes to take losses, and they are always worried about the bottom line. Don’t let a winning trade turn into a loser.

There are many profitable option trading strategies, but none of them work unless you are willing to stick to a set of guiding principles. We like to employ a number of rules that are helpful in maximizing profits, limiting losses and, most importantly, taking the emotion out of trading that all traders should learn to understand.

In this outline, we will go over our basic trading philosophy, why we decide to take profits or cut losses when we do and how these decisions can be used to limit risk, all of which will prepare you before you make your first Velocity Options trade.

Taking Profits

Our expectation for every directional option Alert (call or put) is at least a 100% return. Once an Alert reaches a 100% return, we can either:

• Exit the Alert completely.
• Close half, or a third, of the position, while placing a protective stop on the remaining position.

Once the option premium has reached our target, we typically close the Alert and move on to the next one. As an alternative, if the 100% profit target is reached, we might instruct you to take partial profits on the position. For example, if you bought 10 option contracts for a particular trade and we instruct you to close half of the position, you would close five and keep five open in your account. This takes all of the financial risk out of the trade because you now have your original investment back, and you are now trading with “the house’s money.”

Sometimes an option will zoom past the 100% target, in which case we can ride the stock higher or lower (call or put option) for even further gains. Once this happens, we will place a stop order to protect our profits in case the stock turns against us. Now that the option is profitable, we have a bit more flexibility with where we place our stops, and we can allow more room to accommodate market volatility.

We may also take profits on our Alerts BEFORE reaching the 100% profit if we feel something has changed dramatically with the chart, or fundamentals, since the Alert began.

Stop Losses and Stop Targets

We try to limit losses to 50% on higher priced options. Once a trade is down 50%, we usually cut our losses and move on. On some occasions, however, we may decide to give the trade some additional wiggle room. Keep in mind that if you have your 50% stop loss entered as an actual order, you will be forced out of the position. We like to use “mental” stops rather than stop limit orders so this does not happen. However, most of the time if we place a stop limit on a trade, it will be an actual “hard” stop limit order to take or protect profits.

Setting stops and exit targets is my most important trading rule. Traders can get greedy and often give back major gains by not having these protective profit stops in place, which is why we use them to take the emotional aspect out of our trading strategy.

Understanding Stock History

We love researching the market, and we spend countless hours studying individual stocks. As you start to do your own research, you will see patterns emerge. Once you know how a stock trades historically and how it reacts to news, then you can start looking for option trades and put the probability of success on your side.

Once you get to know a stock’s “personality” and understand how pending news — good or bad — affects it, then you have already won half of the battle. Remember — it’s not whether the news is good or bad. It is only how that specific stock reacts to the news that matters.

Open Interest

When we recommend an option, we make sure there is plenty of open interest. Open interest is basically the same as a stock’s average daily volume. When a stock or option has low volume, it can be harder to get trades executed at the prices you want. This is where limit orders come into play. When you place a limit order, you are saying you are willing to pay or receive no more than a certain price.

Out-Of-The-Money (OTM) Options

Most of the option Alerts we recommend are slightly out-of-the-money call and put options. We do not place trades that are too far out-of-the-money. These options almost always expire worthless. In other words, if a stock is at $50, we are not going to buy a call option with a strike price at $75, or buy a put option with a strike price of $25 (unless it is a LEAP). The odds of the underlying stock moving 50% in either direction in 3 weeks or less are slim.

Occasionally, we may consider buying LEAP options. LEAPs are longer-term options that won’t expire for six months or even several years. This allows time for a stock to make the significant move we might be looking for.

We normally do not recommend options that cost more than $2.00 ($200) per contract, which is why we go with out-of-the-money options, as they are usually much cheaper. Most of the options we recommend are priced between $0.50 and $1.50 per contract. Keep in mind that if an option has a premium (cost) of $1.00, then one option contract would cost $100.

Giving Option Trades Enough Time

Normally, we buy options that are at least more than three weeks away from expiration, which usually allows enough time for a trade to develop. However, there are times when we want to play options that may have one to two weeks before they are set to expire. These profits will be more explosive if we get the direction right, but also more damaging if we get the Alert wrong.

We will also occasionally recommend options with one to two months until expiration. These trades carry less risk because there is a lot of time premium built in due to their far-away expiration dates. These trades can sometimes lose up to 80%–90% and still come back to return profits in excess of 100%, depending on the action in the underlying stock. We have had trades look like complete duds only to rebound and generate stellar returns.

Selling Before News Announcements

Sometimes we elect to sell an option before news for the underlying company actually breaks. For example, if we are up 100% on an Alert going into an earnings announcement or an FDA decision, we won’t get greedy. We refuse to let emotion get the best of us! Always remember that a profit is a profit — not a loss. Consider your portfolio like your own company. No company likes to take losses, and they are always worried about the bottom line. Don’t let a winning trade turn into a loser.

Position Sizing & Money Management

There are no strict rules about how much money you should start with to trade options. However, please know that option trading is “speculative.” This means you should only trade with money you can afford to risk. A speculative account might make up 10% or less of your overall trading account and investments. The bottom line is this: Do not use you entire nest egg to trade options!

Consider risking only 5% of your trading account on any one position. For example, if you have a $10,000 trading account then risk no more than $500 per position. In a worst-case scenario, you would need to lose 20 trades in a row before you would be out of the game.

If you are new to trading options, then your maximum position size might only be 2%–3% of your trading account balance. Increase your position size as you gain confidence and get some winning trades under your belt.

We have known traders who have opened option trading accounts with $2,000 and risked half of that amount on their very first trade. Needless to say, if the trade went south, they were either done trading options or were forced to “reload” their account.

This approach is nothing more than gambling. It’s important for you to treat your options trading options as a business, and not a “get rich quick” scheme.

By trading the same number of contracts on every trade, or by always trading a fixed dollar amount for every trade, you will be more equipped to keep your emotions in check.

Before placing an actual option trade, you must decide the following:

• How many contracts you are going to buy?
• What will your profits be if the trade moves in your favor?
• How much money you are putting at risk?

Always keep your maximum position size in mind. If you are buying more expensive options, then you will need to reduce the number of contracts you buy.

For the riskier option plays — like buying options during expiration week or before an earnings announcement that is coming out on the same day — then risking only a few hundred dollars is okay. These trades can return 200%–400% profits in a single day.

The Bottom Line

Option trading requires discipline, and our trading strategy is designed to make staying disciplined and unemotional extremely easy.

As you can see, we make sure we take every necessary step to ensure that we collect profits when they are available, limit losses before they occur and only choose options with strike prices and expiration dates that maximize our chances for success.