Think Like an Option Trader: How to Profit by Moving from Stocks to Options

Introduction: Why Traders Fail

“Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results.”

—Albert Einstein

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

—Thomas A. Edison

There are plenty of bad trading ideas. Unfortunately, the merit of a particular idea is not whether it has examples of success. A trade based on poor reasoning can still make money. While nobody would say “no” to making money, none of us wants to be that trader who consistently puts his hard-earned money at risk in a way that doesn’t really make sense. We can paraphrase on the inscription at the Temple of Delphi: “Know thy trade.”

Stocks and options are very different vehicles for trading, but they are both trades in a general ...