(Part 2) Top products from r/options

Bookmark these sites: theOCC, which is the clearing organization for all US option exchanges. A part of their mission is to provide education to market participants and the public about all the products they clear. For example, if you go to the Publications page, you'll be able to view the by-laws, rules, and the publication for The Characteristics & Risks of Standardized Options that every broker will send you when you open an account. You might as well get a head-start and do some reading.

I would start here... OptionAlpha video tracks. Definitely watch the entire beginner track. You may or may not have to sign up, but it's free. His videos are hosted on YouTube, but I like his site better because he orders them in a logical sequence and replies to comments, unlike the unordered playlists on YouTube.

OptionsPlaybook for visualizing the profit and loss of different strategies. As a beginner, just focus on understanding long calls, long puts, short calls, short puts, and defined risk strategies like call spreads, put spreads, iron condors (basically a defined-risk strangle), iron butterfly (basically a defined-risk straddle), etc.

Alongside that, any options book that gives a good overview in a logical sequence. I see a lot of recommendations for something like McMillan. You can look at some of the bestsellers here or view other Reddit suggestions.

Doing is definitely better than just reading, so find yourself a trading platform that has a paper (fake) money feature, like thinkorswim. The guy that does the OptionAlpha videos uses TOS, so it's easy to follow along, and there are lots of learning videos on the web.

I bookmarked this subreddit with it sorted by newest submissions and read it everyday. The sub activity provides for a few new posts per day, which makes it manageable enough to still keep up with reading all the new comments on a daily basis.

For topics I want to find more info on, I do a Google search like this: learn options site:reddit.com/r/options. I find it to work better than using Reddit's own search.

More in-depth reading like I see a lot of recommendations for Natenburg. I've also read this book, which has a lot of in-depth graphs on the Greeks and time to expiration, etc. and helped me understand why people recommend certain parameters for strategies. There's a lot of interesting things in that book that I enjoyed learning about, but like the title, several chapters don't apply for retail trading in the amounts that I'm trading.

Timeline for understanding?.

I used this book for a cross listed (undergrad/graduate) derivatives course. It’s extremely dry, but covers almost all the basics. It does make a good amount of assumptions for your financial background, but with majoring in pure mathematics, I’m sure you’ll pick it up pretty fast. Good luck and congrats!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0321357175/ref=cm_cr_arp_mb_bdcrb_top?ie=UTF8

not OP but I thought about writing a post with more info on each book / recommendations / best summaries.

• Exploiting Earnings Volatility (Brian Johnson), portfolio manager / options trader. helped understand how to differentiate earnings vol vs regular vol + model them. I think his idea to use linear regression to impute the market's expectations across time is a good foundation but needs to take into account some extra things.
  
  
  
• Volatility Trading (Euan Sinclair), prop trader
  
  
• Trading Volatility /Correlation/Skew/Term Structure (Colin Bennett), Quant at Deutsche -- really interesting and if you've got portfolio margin you can use some of the strategies, like pairs trading / dispersion.
  
  
• Options Volatility Trading (Adam Warner), previous options market maker. prob the first book I read about vol trading.
  
  

Asked a friend who makes way more than me and is also much smarter than me to recommend something since I don't read much. He said this new text is great. I'm going to get it for myself.

https://www.amazon.com/Trades-Quotes-Prices-Financial-Microscope/dp/110715605X

I started out with Options for the Beginner and Beyond: Unlock the Opportunities and Minimize the Risks (2nd Edition). I can't say if it's the greatest book, It's just the one I started with.

After getting this basic understanding, I did the majority of my learning attending webinars at the CBOE website. I haven't been there for a while. I hope they still have them. Tasty Trade is another popular source for online learning.

Surprised no one has mentioned Tversky & Kahneman yet. Kahneman was awarded the Nobel prize in economics for his pioneering work in behavioral economics .

Their most famous/accessible work is probably Thinking, Fast and Slow

The Bible of Options Strategies is always in arms reach both at home and work.

Best reference book out there.

I haven't had a chance to give either a read but I've seen it recommended enough that I'll send it your way. Have you looked at either Fundamentals of Futures and Options Market or Option Volatility and Pricing: Advanced Trading Strategies and Techniques? Maybe that's the more of what you're looking for.

Not if you buy this book brand new. Ask me how I know lol.

Richard Bookstaber

https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0201001233/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_3_olp?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1526365805&sr=1-3-fkmr1&keywords=bookstaber+on+options

Nassim Taleb

https://www.amazon.com/Dynamic-Hedging-Managing-Vanilla-Options/dp/0471152803/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1526365899&sr=1-1&keywords=taleb+options

I'd start with Bookstaber first. Yeah the book is "old" but the basic concepts are the same. Taleb gets more into all the Greek gunk

[http://www.amazon.com/Options-Strategic-Investment-Lawrence-McMillan/dp/0735204659/]

[http://www.amazon.com/McMillan-Options-Lawrence-G/dp/0471678759/]

[http://www.amazon.com/Profiting-Iron-Condor-Options-Strategies/dp/0134394607/]

[http://www.amazon.com/Option-Strategy-Risk-Return-Ratios/dp/0692028293/]

Those will give you 90% of what you need to know. There are a lot of books out there, the more you read, the more you learn. I have a library of 100+ books like these.

I'd recommend this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Intelligent-Option-Investor-Applying-Investing/dp/007183365X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1458708610&sr=8-1&keywords=intelligent+options+investor

That guide lists some amazing books but weirdly it doesnt mention the "options Bible" which will teach You everything You look for.

Options, Futures and other financial derivatives - John Hull

https://www.amazon.com/Options-Futures-Other-Derivatives-9th/dp/0133456315

Plenty of pdfs online as well

This book lists each of the various options strategies, explaining who should do each one (experience level) and how to do each one (giving examples of when to buy each part):

Bible of Options Strategies

There is a newer edition that I haven't read, my guess is that this older one will work fine for half the price.

Amazon pointed out that there's a newer edition available.

http://www.amazon.com/Volatility-Edge-Options-Trading-Strategies/dp/0132354691

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=volcube

http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Option-Selling-Options/dp/0071837620/

http://www.amazon.com/Option-Traders-Hedge-Fund-Framework/dp/0132823403

General TA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlZRtQkfK04&list=PLyG201CX9K8Xwp2fsarUncC4jUlR-prad&index=3

Futures: https://www.youtube.com/user/PATsTrading

Books: https://www.amazon.com/Trading-Zone-Confidence-Discipline-Attitude/dp/0735201447

https://www.amazon.com/New-Trading-Living-Psychology-Discipline/dp/1118443926/

buy this book

https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Pricing-Formulas-Professional-Investment/dp/0071389970