THREAD ON DELTA (The most important GREEK)

Many traders don't indulge in understanding GREEKS because they think they are very complicated.

There are 4 primary greeks:

Delta
Gamma
Theta
Vega

In my experience, understanding DELTA is enough to take benefit of greeks.(1/n)

A THREAD

Topic: Why triple straddle has no real benefit.

A triple straddle is essentially an ATM Straddle & one or two step away straddle on either side. The position is almost neutral strategy just like any other neutral straddle or strangle.

1/

We can also view the position as an ATM straddle, a strangle & inverted strangle.

For example

Nifty: 14700

Triple straddle: 14600,14700,14800

Another view:

14700 straddle
14800-14600: strangle
14600-14800: Inverted strangle

2/

So the real question is what is the advantage of an inverted strangle over it's otm counterpart?

The answer is none.

They both have same premiums/theta. Only that slippages will be high in inverted strangle when we do the required adjustments plus liquidity issue.

3/

So isn't it better that instead of a triple straddle, we can just do ATM Straddle & 2* OTM strangle.

So in the above eg. the position will be

14700 ATM straddle
2* 14800-14600 otm strangle.

Same premium received, similar range just that there's no nuisance of ITM options.

4/

The question arises:

Why trade in an ATM straddle & 2* OTM Strangles? Why over-complicate?

Options are in itself a complicated instrument. Wouldn't it be better to stick to one straddle or a strangle & adjust accordingly?

Lesser the strikes, more there will be clarity.

5/

THREAD ON IRONFLY

These days the most preferred strategy for option sellers due to improved margins is IRONFLY. It's essentially a short straddle with long strangle. Long strangle acting as 'WINGS', which help in capping the unlimited risk associated with a short straddle.(1/n)

You can also view the position as a combination of Cal & Put credit spreads, if that makes it more easy for you.

There are 3 important things to understand while trading this strategy:

1) Initial size of the Wings
2) Risk Management
3) Adjustments

(2/n)

Since we are selling an ATM straddle, the 1st question is how far our wings should be? Ideally i sell .50 delta straddle & buy .20 or .10 OTM strangle, depending on my view on volatility. So the distance of wings depends on the IV setup. Higher the IVs, greater the distance.(3/n)

If you don't understand greeks, then ideally with 30 days to expiry (dte), wings should be around 300pts either side. If your trading in weekly then it should be not more than 200pts. Higher the premiums, higher the distance as we have more cushion of theta. (4/n)

It is important to understand that we need to reduce the distance of wings with time so as to manage our RISK in gap openings or sudden volatile move. So for eg. if you started with 300pt wings with 30dte, the wings wouldn't give the same protection when there is 7dte. (5/n)

AN ESSENTIAL THREAD ON OPTION ADJUSTMENTS

Adjustments can be done in variety of ways & depends totally at the discretion of the trader. To get a clear mind we need to know the following:

1) What to follow,
2) How to make the adjustment,
3) When to make the adjustment. (1/5)

1) We need a way to measure the imbalance created by a delta move in an option strategy. We can measure through premiums, distance from index or delta of greeks (i personally use delta). So basically whatever way of measure we use, both sides should be equal in it. (2/5)

2) Adjustment can either be done by selling extra quantity of profitable side, buying the quantity of losing side or shifting both the sides. I personally shift the sides because with extra quantities our Gamma gets imbalanced & the risk increases if market reverses. (3/5)

3) While the first 2pts are objective, when to make an adjustment is totally subjective. It can be fine tuned through experience. It also depends upon what strategy u are using. For a short strangle the adjustment required is faster than a ratio spread or an IC. (4/5)

Straddle/strangle require faster adjustments because they are more vulnerable to delta or IV spike. Any other strategies like ratio spreads, ironfly, butterfly have some bought option, which can negate the spikes for a while. So we need a defined system as to WHEN to adjust.(5/n)

I'm having difficulty seeing the need for any other currency in the world other than G$.

If it works, and it is decentralized, then why would we need more than one global-reach currency?

If it does the job perfectly, then why do we need another?

I don't mean there won't be others. What I mean is that maybe Crypto UBI will be like the existing non-democratic crypto market ranking. There will be a first-place market cap amount, and exponential decay to the #2, #3, #4, etc.

This is in contrast to the simplistic view where we assume there will be X systems and they all have more or less the same abstract Y market cap or reach, and they all add up to an integrated system with X*Y market cap.

All you have to do is design the controls the way they want to be designed. If you don't introduce some unneeded damage in it, then there won't be the need to come up with another system that fixes the damage and actually does complete "the system" that we will use.

E.g. Bitcoin would have worked, except it introduced the damage that is Proof-of-Work, which means it is unusable and will be replaced by Ethereum, which will use PoS, thus fixing the damage.

A thread about GameStop:

Big hedge funds made big bets that GameStop’s stock was overvalued. The way these bets work is the hedge fund borrows shares of the stock and sells those borrowed shares.

When it comes time to give the borrowed shares back, they buy them on the market, hopefully at lower prices. For example, they might sell the borrowed share at $50, hoping to be able to buy the share back at $30, to make a $20 profit. This is called shorting.

The hedge funds were so sure that GameStop was going down, that GameStop was the most shorted stock on the market. 140% of the shares in existence were “borrowed.” Imagine Bob borrows from Jane who borrows from Sue who borrows from John.

Shorting is risky, but the hedge funds were so sure that they just didn’t even care. People on Reddit realized this and basically thought “what if we all just bought shares and refused to sell them when the hedge funds need to give their borrowed shares back.”

The price goes up, the hedge funds are forced to buy back the expensive shares and lose money. Except the hedge funds kept doubling down as the price rode up, expecting that it would eventually fall. The Redditors weren't scared off and with "diamond hands" refused to sell.

As a former professional poker player, I'm very clear about the importance of psychology in investing/trading.

You can have a very solid strategy, but if the mental aspect fails, everything fails, no matter how good you are.

Thread 👇

In this thread I will briefly describe the most important aspects of trading psychology, and give some simple tips to try to improve them.

It's good to always be aware of these aspects, to be able to detect them and act in time.

1) FEAR

This is one of the most important. It can make you get out of a position at the wrong time.

One of the main reasons you can have fear is because you are putting more at risk than you are willing to lose.

Tip: reduce the size of your position until you are comfortable.

2) GREED

Greed can be even worse than fear. It leads you to be overpositioned and to destroy your average entry.

Tip: learn to conform to what you have. Practice gratitude for everything that comes your way. Remember that the most important thing is to stay in the game.

3) TILT

This is well known in poker. There are many reasons why tilt can appear (downswings, injustice, mistakes...)

Tilt takes you away from your perfect strategy. From your A game.

After a losing streak you may think that the market is being unfair to you.

"90% of the traders lose money, But do they lose it all the time?"

Most of them do make money, its just that they give it all back.

Lets analyze why and how a trader makes and loses money
[Thread]:

Below is the equity curve which is most traders dream.

This is equity curve of an average trader:

Most traders do make money, but they give it back to the markets .

Because of trading errors.

What are trading errors?

Trading errors are those errors which happen because of wrong Position sizing, Leverage , etc.

I am not making this up, check your P&L, 90 % of your losses would have come from less then 10% trades.

Most of these happen because of No knowledge, No plan, bad position sizing .

Now, we know what's the problem, lets talk about the solution.

1. Learn the Basics first-

If you don’t get the basics clear then how can you make money?

Learn How to use Support and resistances
Learn How to use trend lines
Learn about trend, it will solve 90% of your problem

Thread on 'no stop loss', 'adjustments' and 'Risk'
----------------------------------------------------

Wanted to share my thoughts on this topic for a long time but this email sent by someone yday woke me up from slumber

Pls read the email 1st before delving into thread

(1/n)

In the past 1-2 years, there has been a sudden surge of traders who just talk about theta decay, option selling, adjustments and stuff like that..

It is all fair as long as the trader knows what he's doing. But the reality is far from what we see/perceive...

(2/n)

Many of these folks were told that one can 'adjust' their way out of any situation. Any sane options trader know that you cannot come out of any situation by adjustment

One of my friend used to do that(he is famous in options selling desi fintwit) for a long time until..

(3/n)

..he realized that one cannot possibly do that and its gonna burn him one day. He's pretty smart and hence, he put a portfolio level SL & when that hits, he will stop dancing, gets out and calls it a day

So, risk is managed at account level and he is quite clear about it

(4/n)

Unfortunately, 1000s of traders who does option selling(with adjustment) dont have this risk mgmt in place.

They think (i dont know if i had to call it false confidence or ignorance) their skills in 'adjusting' will take them ashore 😅

(5/n)