Well alrighty then. Guess I’ll be calling Fidelity.

Would it be possible to do a defined risk spread such as an iron condor in BrokerageLink? I’m having trouble getting another brokerage to let me do iron condors. In that account I can do an Iron Butterfly but not a Condor... I don’t understand why the difference in permissible trades and am curious if BrokerageLink is the same.

you might be right, but after reading a thread on Chit Chat Investing Finance it seems there are quite a few pilots trading a “method” of covered calls and cash secured puts in their 401k. They said you need permission from Fidelity...that seems to be the hang up!

oops NM I just saw earlier posts answering the option questions.

As I read this and see new traders wading in I can’t help but think....

please please do not trade options in your retirements accounts if you are new to it. It’s like flying a 737 bc you want to fly when you’ve never done it. Options if used incorrectly can decimate you financially.

Start very small and outside your retirement accounts. By the way paper trading is the equivalent of using Microsoft Flight Simulator and saying you can actually fly an airplane. It’s a lot different when it’s for real. It’s best for learning the platform.

Like flying its all about risk management, knowing your temperament for risk, and be careful entering orders bc if you enter an order wrong it can really hurt you.

this is a true statement! Although you’re limited as to what you can do in your retirements, I recommend what most have been considering, covered calls.

example; Buy 100 shares of something lower priced, say DAL for instance ($4056 outlay) and sell the Feb $45 call for $1.40 ($140 credit).

Your net debit should be $39.16

Two things happen; the stock shoots up to $60 and your shares are called away (sold) at the strike price of $45 (you collect $4500) or it stays under $45 and the contract expires, you keep your $140 And your shares. You can also roll the contract out to March and beyond the closer you get to February expiration and collect more credit, assuming the stock hasn’t gone bananas.

risks; stock shoots up and your shares are called away at $45 (if stock goes to $100, you forego $55) or stock goes to $0 and you lose all your $ you bought the shares with less the $140.

Spreads complicated things a little more when it comes to management of the position, so starting with one contract is best.

Do not go out and sell a put in Amazon to collect $10k, even if you have the cash, or unless you want to buy 100 shares of Amazon. And avoid naked calls entirely at this point until you’re more comfortable.

Just started to use them, love that platform for futures.

I have been trading for two decades and I completely agree. Any type of active trading is only for risk capital. Your retirement funds should be used for carefully selected stocks and covered calls. If you don't have the time or expertise to carefully select stocks (this takes research and the ability to understand balance sheets and earnings statements) then you should be in no load index funds.

Naked options can kill your account. Do not do them unless you can take a loss when needed. Most active traders lose money because they can't take small losses and end up wiping out accounts hoping for the price to come back. Futures and options have way more leverage than you can get with stocks. That 225.00 I made yesterday in ten minutes could easily have been a big loss had I bought instead of selling and then refused to take the loss. Trading is not something to just pick up and think you will succeed in your spare time. It took me five years to stop losing money trading futures and I am in a very small minority who actually receive a 1099 each year. Most lose, some lose a lot. I know of traders who have lost hundreds of thousands and never got it. A humble personality and understanding of probability is key. The best trading strategies will only win maybe 60% of their trades. You have to understand that you will lose forty to fifty percent of your trades and be ready and willing to take those small losses. You also have to have the intestinal fortitude to hang on to winners and not take a profit too early. Your winners MUST be larger than your losers.

Lastly, If you want to trade, watch some videos but be careful. Much of what is on the internet with respect to trading is pure junk. Many people sell training and most of them are failed traders. If you are considering asking for help and buying a course, ask the trainer for audited trade records for the last few years. If they refuse and start giving excuses walk away they are a scammer. The scammer to real ratio is about 500/1.

Trading can be fun. It can also ruin marriages and empty accounts. Be careful.

I like them so far. I was with Tradestation for many years but they won't negotiate their commissions any lower. Tradovate has the yearly fee and no commissions so I gave them a try. I am about to pay the fee and go with them in the new year.

Marcal, Misspoken, Seneca—interesting discussion on the risks of options. But couldn’t someone argue the exact opposite—that it’s better to start learning in a retirement account?

In an IRA, the brokerage literally won’t allow you to make high risk trades such as naked calls/puts. This guards you from getting into trouble. In a non-retirement account, I could make a mistake while putting in an order, or just think that selling this put on Amazon is really going to pay off because my buddy said so, and then the market moves against me and I get a margin call... this is simply not possible within an IRA.

Either way, I agree that a new trader needs to start slow and limit risk. It just seems like using some IRA capital to learn options is a way to force that limited risk on a newbie.

You cannot refill an IRA account if it gets wiped out. If you lose the capital in an IRA, you have not only lost money you have lost years of tax benefits. If you get wiped out in a taxable account, you can refill it. Start with paper trading to learn the process, then you can try IRA eligible strategies in a taxable account. As others have pointed out, using real money changes the game. The discussion of real vs paper trading reminds me of the movie Ender's Game.