I didn't understand put options until this month. Today I bought puts w/ 1 or 2-week expirations on virtually all of the top 20 companies (by size) that were at their 52-week high. Didn't matter that I never had heard of some of them (AWK is a water company?), made gains on everything. My only mistake was not betting against Phillip Morris, thinking that people will probably want to vape/smoke even more during this crisis, but nope, they fell 7% too.
Obviously it can't be that easy, but seems like the market still thinks Trump might just do a complete 180? I guess he's done so multiple times the last two months, but those threats/alarms seem like dry runs from which he's crafted his current policy.
> made gains on everything
Just remember you didn't make gains until you sell those puts. If you made a lucky bet and won, sell!
Oh I sold them before the market was closed. I’m just looking for something to distract myself while “line go down” on my 401k.
301k
It can be that easy, but you are gambling. If the market turns for whatever reason, then all your positions go near to zero.
Countries acquiesce
Or Jerome Powell does an emergency rate cut like the President keeps demanding
Or Trump acquiesces
Or everyone just decides they oversold everything
enjoy the volatility, the first hit is free
It can be that easy, but you are gambling. If the market turns for whatever reason, then all your positions go near to zero.
They’re options, they can go all the way to zero, not “near to zero” (which is what happens to the majority of options contracts regardless). That said, with options you leverage a lot more shares than buying outright, so the risk can be smaller. And if OP has any sense, they’ve unloaded those positions already and made some serious bank.
> And if OP has any sense, they’ve unloaded those positions already and made some serious bank.
Absolutely not, I am a coward and only buying options around the $50-range and selling out for +$20 to +$100.
only reason I wrote near to zero, is because if I left it at zero, someone else would have chimed in about something pedantic about how there is still theta to decay
specifically because OP bought 1 to 2 week expirations, so a market reversal at the other end of the weekend won't set them to zero