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- How to identify and find your own trading style
Below are some tips for finding your own trading style. Starting with personal considerations, then looking into some practical ways to find your trading style. Personal Considerations: 1. Consider your personality and risk tolerance: Different trading styles suit different people, and it's important to choose a style that aligns with your personality and risk tolerance. For example, if you are a risk-averse person, if you have a small account, you should consider risk defined strategies. 2. Consider your goals: What are your financial goals as a trader? Do you want to make a lot of money quickly, or are you content with slow and steady gains? Do you want to hold onto your trades for the long term, or do you prefer to make frequent trades? 3. Evaluate your time commitment: Do you have a lot of time to devote to trading, or do you only have a few hours a week to spend on it? This can help you determine whether you are a day trader, swing trader, or options trader. Good Kids Trading (GKT) believes everyone should be an options trader! 4. Consider your trading environment: Do you have a lot of money to invest, or are you working with a smaller account? Should you focus on risk defined trading strategies, or mix in undefined risk strategies? These factors can influence your trading style. Practical Considerations: 1. Experiment with different strategies: Don't be afraid to try out different strategies and see what works for you. This can be done through paper trading or using a small amount of capital to test different approaches. It's important to keep an open mind and be willing to adapt your strategy as you learn and grow as a trader. 2. Keep a trading journal: A trading journal is a useful tool for tracking your trades and analyzing your performance. By keeping a record of your trades and the reasoning behind them, you can identify patterns and trends in your trading and make adjustments to your strategy as needed. 4. Seek guidance from experienced traders: There is no substitute for experience, and seeking guidance from more experienced traders can be a valuable way to learn and develop your own trading style. Good Kids trading, is the perfect place to learn more about options trading! Consider joining a trading community or finding a mentor who can provide you guidance. Next we will discuss common pitfalls to consider (and avoid) when evaluating trading styles.
- Common pitfalls when evaluating trading styles
So far we have discussed trading styles, how to find your own trading style. Today we will discuss several common pitfalls to trading styles and strategies that you should be aware of so you know what to avoid. 1. Overfitting: Overfitting is a common pitfall in trading strategies, where a strategy is tailored to fit a specific set of data, but performs poorly when applied to new data. This can happen when a strategy is based on a small sample size or when it is optimized to achieve the best possible results on a particular dataset. To avoid overfitting, it's important to test a strategy on a diverse range of data and to ensure that it is robust and adaptable. 2. Lack of diversification: Diversification is an important risk management tool in trading, as it helps to spread risk across different assets and market conditions. A lack of diversification can increase the risk of a portfolio, as it is more exposed to specific market conditions or individual assets. 3. Emotional trading: Emotional trading is when decisions are based on emotions rather than logical analysis. This can lead to impulsive decisions that may not be in the best interests of the trader. To avoid emotional trading, it's important to have a clear trading plan and to stick to it, even when emotions are running high. 4. Over-optimism: Over-optimism is the tendency to overestimate the likelihood of positive outcomes and underestimate the likelihood of negative outcomes. This can lead to unrealistic expectations and can cause traders to underestimate risk. To avoid over-optimism, it's important to be realistic and to carefully consider the potential risks and rewards of a trade. 5: Lack of discipline: Trading discipline is the ability to follow a set of rules or guidelines when making trading decisions. A lack of discipline can lead to impulsive or rash decisions, which can be costly. To maintain discipline, it's important to have a clear trading plan and to stick to it, even when faced with tempting opportunities or difficult market conditions. 6: Avoid large risks: Taking large risks can lead to significant losses, which can be difficult or impossible to recover from. Trading small is an edict at Good Kids Trading! By managing risk effectively, traders can protect their capital and preserve their ability to continue trading. Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Introduction to Good Kids Trading
I created Good Kids Trading (GKT) because I couldn't find a community that fit my trading style. A community that focuses on trading mechanically and using statistic and probabilities to my advantage. Since I could not find what I was looking for in a community I decided I should just build it! A quick overview of my background: I've been a full time trader since 2021 meaning trading is my main source of income now. I've been an active trader since 2017, but I kept my day job. I've have invested and managed my own long term accounts for over 20 years. My current trading style has been labelled as boring by some people, and it's probably true as I haven't double or tripled my account in a year, but my trading pay my bills. I have traded through bear markets as well as bull markets, I even traded through a pandemic. All of this without blowing up my trading account or losing it all. Sure there have been draw downs, very bad trades, bad strategies, but I'm still here. I've tried all kinds of strategies, trading styles, and I even used robots to trade for me. If you name it, I've heard of it, and probably even tried it. A lot of these sexy, self-proclaimed 'wildly profitable' strategies mostly ended with the same results, waves of big wins and waves of big losses. I've been part of many different trading groups. The communities often lose focus on trading mechanics, some communities start breaking their own rules looking for profits instead of following the trade plan. Many experts turn out to be salesmen who only profit from their subscribers monthly fee and/or selling their strategy. I've seen firsthand many experts who don't even trade! Often times the communities discussions go off tangents, rants, or topics not related to trading. What is GKT: We have designed GKT to be a supportive community where personal bias and opinions aren't discussed. We acknowledge personal views and opinions exist, but instead we focus on trading mechanically using math based decisions and statistics to our advantage. The admins of GKT actually trade. We trade often, keep our risk small and letting probability work to our advantage. Options trading is complicated, of course there are risks, but knowledge is power. The risk is options trading is reduced as long as you understand the power of leverage, and make sure you are not over leveraged in your option trading strategies. Do not expect a follow me system at GKT. There are not official trades, we are not providing trade advice. We are sharing trades we are taking as ideas and discussions to help educate everyone in our community to become better traders and learn new ideas on how to make money through trading. GKT provides a forum to discuss mechanical and consistent trading. There is also discussions on mindset, growth, and self-improvement. The cool thing is you don't have to make 100% of your account 'boring'. Come participate in our discord community: start, grow and give with us!
- When an option expires In The Money SOMETHING will happen to your account
All options have an expiration date. When you hold an option to the expiration date it will either expire In The Money (ITM) or Out of The Money (OTM). If an option expires ITM something will happen to your account! It's critical to understand how important options expiration is because you do not want any surprises to your account balance. The expiration date for an option is often discussed using the term Days To Expiration (DTE). DTE is expressed as a number reflecting the amount of days left before the option expires, for example: 21 DTE means the call or put has 21 days before it expires, 0 DTE means the option expires today. Many of the strategies we use at Good Kids Trading (GKT) involve managing an option contract before expiration. However, sometimes we use theta decay to our advantage and trade shorter dated options. The underlying (Stock, Futures, Commodity) has a set frequency for expiration. Options could expire daily, weekly or monthly. If you want to trade future dated option contracts you will likely only see quarterly or yearly expiration dates after 60-120 DTE as weekly and monthly timeframes are only added when there is enough demand. Some underlying's do not have more frequent expirations and only have monthly options. It's important to mention that ANY option that is currently ITM can be exercised early even if there are days or months left before expiration. If you have options that are ITM you should understand the risk and likelihood that an option will be exercised early. Generally options are not exercised early under normal circumstances, but this is something to understand and monitor. We will discuss this in upcoming articles. The majority of options expire worthless, when an option expires OTM, meaning that options strike price is outside of the underlying's current trade price at expiration the option goes to "heaven" and disappears. Nothing happens to your account, you either collect the premium you were paid, or you lose the money you paid for the option. When an option expires ITM that is when something happens to your account. You do not have to do anything your broker is normally going to handle executing all of these trades in your account for you over night. If you do not want these trades to happen it is your responsibility to close them before the market closes on 0DTE!! Lets discuss the basics of ITM Calls and ITM Puts when the market closes at 0DTE. There are countless combinations and variables, we're just going to look at calls and puts for stock options today. A long call obligates you to buy 100 shares per contract at the strike price. When you allow 1 long call to expire ITM you have agreed to buy 100 shares at that strike price. If you have 5 calls, you are agreeing to buy 500 shares. Make sure you have the capital for this in your account or you will be margin called. A short call that expires ITM obligates you to sell or short 100 shares per contract at the strike price. When you allow 1 short call to expire ITM you have agreed to sell 100 shares at that strike price. If you have 100 shares of the underlying this strategy is defined as a "covered call" because you have 100 shares to cover your short call. So your 100 shares would be sold at that strike. If you do not have 100 shares your account will be short 100 shares of the underlying the next trading day. A long put that expires ITM obligates you to sell 100 shares of the underlying at the strike price. If you have 100 shares of the underlying this is referred to as a protective put and your 100 shares would be sold at the strike price. If you do not have 100 shares you will be short 100 shares of the underlying at the strike price. A short put that expires ITM obligates you to buy 100 shares of the underlying at the strike price. If you are short 100 shares of an underlying a short put would cover your short at the strike of the put. Otherwise you have agreed to buy 100 shares for every short put you allow to expire ITM. If you have a spread, you are defining your risk where you are agreeing to buy and sell calls or puts using the descriptions above. For example. If you are long the 100 call and short the 105 call and the stock is currently trading at 106 you have agreed to buy 100 shares at $100 and sell 100 shares at $105. It's very important that you monitor all of your position's Days To Expiration and closely watch any options you have that are In The Money. Understand what will happen when an option expires In The Money and what the option obligates you to do if they are exercised early. Options trading is powerful, trading an options contract is an amazing way to leverage your account, but its also important to understand the risks so you do not end up with a surprise or undesired result.
- 10 lessons I learned from trading options
If I understood these when I started trading, I would have been successful faster with less mental and financial pain. 1. All options are overpriced! Options have time and volatility added to the price of the call or put. The further out in time and the more uncertain the future seems, the more expensive the option is. Although this might sound like a negative, it doesn’t have to be. It’s important to realize and accept this truth. 2. I sell more options than I buy. I like to sell overpriced products more than I like to buy overpriced products. If I want to own a product at its current price, I love buying it at a discount. The opposite of this is also true! If I’m looking to sell something at a certain price, I’m going to be ecstatic to sell it for more than I expected. 3. Do not trade illiquid options! A tight bid ask spread, high volume, and good open interest are required for options trading. 4. Risk a consistent amount of dollars for all trades. If a trade is too big don’t take it! Big bets rarely pay off. Chasing premium that seems too high or making bets that aren’t sized appropriately to your account normally do not end well. In my experience the cumulative losses of the big trades or long shot bets aren’t covered by the infrequent but large wins. 5. There is no holy grail and there is not a perfect system. So many people are trying to sell or convince you they have the found an edge and that they have the perfect trade strategy. These people are trying to sell you on a plan that may or may not work for a while. The only thing for certain is they will gladly take your hard-earned cash and they will make profits by selling you their system, not necessary by trading their system. 6. It’s ok to be wrong in trading, it’s not ok to stay wrong. You are going to make plenty of bad trades, and you will be wrong a lot. The stock market and the options market are going to humble you if you think you are smarter than everyone else. It’s important to cut your losses before they get out of control. Lose small, take your winners, and you will be successful over time. Do not let your ego or “what ifs” keep you from managing a loss while it is small. 7. Everything works… Just not all the time. A strategy might work for a few days, a few months or even a few years. It’s important to consider macro factors and the optimal market conditions for your strategy. If you don’t believe in your strategy, you are likely to exit at the exact worst possible moment. It’s much easier to trade a strategy where you totally understand how it works. Learn and practice a strategy before you trade. Not many things are going to work in every single market condition. Keep notes of what works and what doesn’t. 8. Have a plan, keep it simple, be mechanical. Simple plans with clearly defined rules are easy to follow. If a rule says you should do something, follow the rules! You did the thinking when you wrote your plan. When the trade is on, be a machine and execute the plan. After 10-15 trades, assess the results and adjust the plan accordingly. Don’t FOMO or chase trades, don’t pick up and drop strategies every other day. There is something so simple, yet powerful about simple trading plans. 9. Emotions and revenge trading will blow up your account. The stock market doesn’t care about you. It doesn’t know who you are and it can care less if you lose every dime you have. Afterall, someone on the other side of the trade won from your loss and is happier for it. Do not get caught up in a game of emotions where you think you should double down or “get your money back”. This will end badly 8 (or 9) times of out 10. 10. The stock market will be open tomorrow. In fact, it will also be open next week, next month, and next year. Do not force a trade or look for trades because you are bored. If you are having a bad day, do not trade! Remember, you don’t have to trade every day to be a profitable trader. Bonus Tip: Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! The entire GKT community is glad you are here. Do not be afraid to ask questions, make suggestions, and exchange ideas. If you have concerns or want to chat, feel free to contact me directly through Discord’s Direct Message, or via email justin@goodkidstrading.com
- Taking Profits with GTC orders
Good Kids Trading (GKT) is a proponent of setting up Good Till Cancelled (GTC) orders as soon as a trade is filled. Get in the habit of entering a GTC profit target after every order fills. You can do this at the end of each day or before the market opens each morning so you do not have to watch your account constantly. This habit will give you the freedom of not having to monitor your positions throughout the trading day. There is comfort in knowing if the trade works you will profit without any further action. If you have day traded or swing traded it's likely that you entered an One Cancels the Other (OCO) order so your stop and target are set as soon as the trade is established. When trading options OCO orders are less likely, often they aren't needed or desirable. I've seen some options traders who do not setup a GTC orders until their position is almost to the target or they wait for the target and exit manually. While I understand the appeal of making 500% on a trade, having a realistic defined profit target is important when you are looking to be a consistent and profitable trader. Most trading strategies have general targets or guidelines. Math based trading strategies have profit targets based off of best practices calculated from previous results and Probability of Profits (POP). For example, it's common to look for 50% of the credit received when trading a strangle. You might target 75% of the credit received for a put you sold. Setting up the GTC order for your desired profit lets your positions work while you aren't watching the screen the entire trading day. As you start trading with more frequency the number of your open positions will grow. We are trading smaller and trading more and while it's important to monitor your trades on a regular basis. It would be difficult to track all your positions constantly throughout the day without devoting a lot of time to watching your screen. GTC orders allow you the freedom to work on other things knowing if a trade hits its target your order will fill no matter what you are doing. We discussed previously the concept of trading without stop losses, and while this is true for many of my trades I always set a GTC with a profit target for all my positions. There is a very rewarding feeling when you get a notification, or you check your account and see a position hit the profit target and all you did was let probability, math, and time do the work! Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Key concepts for Beginner Option Traders to consider
Learning to trade options can feel intimidating for beginners. Here are few tips to reduce fear or intimidation, and encourage you to start trading options today! Understand the basic mechanics of options: Options are contracts that give the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell an underlying asset at a specified price (the strike price) on or before a specified date (the expiration date). There are two types of options: call options, which give the holder the right to buy the underlying asset, and put options, which give the holder the right to sell the underlying asset. Learn about the different option strategies: There are many different option strategies that traders can use, including buying and selling options, selling spreads, and using leverage. It is important for beginners to understand the different strategies and how they work in order to make informed trading decisions. Know the risks and potential rewards: Options trading involves significant risks, you can reduce risk through education, trading small and trading often. It is important for beginners to understand the potential rewards and risks of each trade. It is also important to consider the overall risk-reward profile of a trade and to ensure that the potential rewards justify the risks. Understand the importance of implied volatility: Implied volatility (IV) is a measure of the expected volatility of a security's price. It is an important factor to consider when trading options because it can affect the value of options contracts and the potential profitability of trades. Practice and educate yourself: As with any new skill, the best way to learn about option trading is to practice and educate yourself. This can include paper trading, which allows traders to practice without risking real money, and taking advantage of educational resources such as online courses, books, and webinars Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Trading Stocks vs Trading Options
Options and stocks are both financial instruments that can be bought or sold. Stocks represent shares of ownership in individual companies, while options are contracts with other investors. Good Kids Trading (GKT) is a proponent of options trading, let's discuss some key differences to understand about options and shares of stock. Purpose: Options are financial contracts (similar to insurance contracts) that give the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell an underlying asset at a predetermined price within a certain time frame. Stocks, on the other hand, represent ownership in a company and entitle the holder to a share of the company's profits and assets. Leverage: Options can be used to leverage a position in the underlying asset, as they an 1 option contract normally controls 100 shares of the asset for less capital than owning 100 shares. Stocks do not offer this leverage, as the price of the stock reflects the underlying value of the company. Risk and reward: Options involve a higher level of risk than stocks, as the value of an option is derived from the underlying asset and is subject to changes in the market. Some of the risk can be mitigated using advanced strategies. However, options also offer the potential for higher returns in a shorter period of time as they allow the holder to profit from price movements in the underlying asset. Expiration date: Options have a limited lifespan and expire on a specific date after which they become worthless if they expire out of the money (OTM), or they are converted to shares if the expire In the Money (ITM). Stocks do not have an expiration date and can be held indefinitely. Trading strategies: Options can be used in a variety of trading strategies, such as covered calls, spreads, and strangles, which allow traders to take advantage of different market conditions and profit from time decay, volatility, and price movements in the underlying asset. Stocks do not offer the same level of flexibility in terms of trading strategies. If you want to learn more about the differences in stock trading and options trading, and you would like interact with other Option's Traders, join our community! Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Focus on Risk as well as Profits
Monitoring open risk is critical to successful and profitable trading. It's common for traders to put all their focus on finding trade setups, setting up every trade they find, and closely tracking the Profit Loss Statement (P&L) without considering how many trades they have open, and what happens if the market has a sudden move in one direction. Good Kids Trading (GKT) understands the importance of monitoring open risk, managing a positions risk, and trading small! Too much risk open, not managing your losses, and taking large risks can quickly erase profits. Earlier in my trading career I would risk 1% of my account on each trade I took. There would times where I would have 6- 8 trades (maybe more) open at once. In a trending market there were no issues. I was making money quickly and the communities I traded in never really discussed monitoring open risk, there was some discussion of moving stops and risk to reward, but the focus was more about reward and less about risk. I remember the first time the market had a sudden move and I was stopped out of all my bullish trades on a large drop down (a falling tide sinks all ships). Then a day or two later the market went the opposite direction, because of course the drop was an over-reaction, so then I was stopped out of bearish trades (I did move my stops so it wasn't a full loss on all trades). However, in one single week I erased a month of profits because I wasn't tracking open risk. It was a hard lesson, and I would like to say that one week caused me to re-evaluate monitoring my open risk, but it didn't. I wrote that event off as an anomaly, a one off that probably wouldn't happen again. I continued setting up almost every great trade I saw and had a similar experience where a quick move in the market took a chunk out of any progress I'd made. Sharing my experience with you, so you don't have to learn through pain. You do not want to work hard for a month to see your progress erased in a day! Every trading plan, every strategy you choose for your account should have a plan of managing your open risk. You need to have a set target for how much buying power you use. Know what conditions or market levels would cause you to ramp up or down your buying power. Understand how buying power changes as the underlying for your options positions moves. Remember to keep up with how many trades you have open at all times, track your positions delta, (are all your trades bullish or bearish?), have a plan for reducing position size, and for exiting positions to reduce your risk. Don't forget cash is also a position. In 2022 it's been more obvious than ever, cash is a position as the headlines say: "inflation is at 6% any cash you have is losing value"; if you had money in the market in 2022 (bonds and stocks) or in crypto you are well aware losing 2-6% on your cash might have been the best alternative. This discussion has been high level to remind you how open risk and managing risk is very important to your success as a profitable trader. If you'd like to get more in depth, if you would like to continue this discussion join our discord! Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Trading without Stop Limits!
What if you traded so small you didn't need a stop limit? Good Kids Trading (GKT) advocates trading small and trading often. With many of my risk defined trades I don't have a stop limit order because the amount I have at risk is negligible compared to the amount I would need to risk for a swing trade or day trade using stock shares. I can setup 10 small option trades that equal the amount I risk when I setup for 1 trade using shares (this is of course depending on your risk unit, but still applicable to some degree no matter how small your account.) Putting on smaller trades also allows me to have more diversification and I'm able to manage my accounts delta and theta more easily. For newer traders, you may not be familiar with stop limit orders, here is a quick explanation: when traders setup a day trade or a swing trade it's best practice to setup an One-Cancels-the-Other Order (OCO) where you have 2 orders: a profit target and a stop limit order to lock in your win or set a maximum loss for your trade. By setting a stop loss you can trade a larger quantity of stock because you sell the shares at market price if the stock hits a worst case level. But there are negatives with stop loss orders, if the stock drops quickly to your stop loss level, the order is executed at market price, so if your stop limit was $95 your order might execute at 94.85, this is referred to as slippage and while it might not seem like a lot when you are trading larger quantity of shares, pennies do matter and your loss is often more than your set amount. Your orders are also visible to the market, and many people set stop limits at similar places on the chart, or round numbers so it's common to get stopped out, only for the stock to bounce right after your order gets filled and you have taken your max loss. If you are a stock trader you are well aware of the scenario where your trade gets stopped out only for the stock to bounce and hit the target without you (or it keeps dropping, but let's not think about that). When you trade an option with no stop limit if the underlying recovers or bounces you can still profit if you have bought enough time! If the stock never bounces, you can still close your option trade while there is still some premium left, so it's not always an absolute zero or max loss. Trading option contracts gives you built in leverage (remember 1 call or 1 put controls 100 shares). This can be a positive or a negative if you aren't sizing your options trade correctly this can blow up an account, but if you use a good strategy and proper setup this leverage is powerful in the risk reward profile of a trade. Trading small and trading often is a different style of trading than many groups and communities do not discuss. If you setup defined risk trades with appropriate risk reward, you can afford to trade without stop limits. You should still manage losers before they get unmanageable, but you can afford to take some full losses when you are risking less than you win on a consistent basis. Trading without stop limits might sound like a dangerous idea to seasoned traders, but GKT's strategies make trading without a stops possible and profitable! Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join
- Options Trading with a Small Account
Option trading with a small account size is absolutely possible. All the admins at GKT have at least one account that is small. When you trade with a small account it's important to realize some trading strategies, some possibilities will be unavailable until you grow your account, but these 'limitations' are not a reason to not trade options. It's important to start somewhere and there is no need to wait! If you live the US and your account is under $25,000 understand the rules for Pattern Day Trading (PDT). There are restrictions on the number of times you can open and close a position in the same day. Most of the strategies we discuss at GKT aren't day trades so this is not a major obstacle, but still important to understand. Margin accounts aren't available with most brokers until you have a balance of $2,000. You can still make trades if your balance is under $2,000 but focus on risk defined and small trades! Learn these rules and understand them, you do not want any surprises from your broker including Violations or Margin Calls! A scary sounding warning before we get into the details of trading with a small account: You should only trade with money you can afford to lose (don't borrow from credit cards, you should not use your last few dollars of savings to trade the stock market). If you have a solid trade plan, good knowledge and understanding it's unlikely you will lose all your money, but there are outside factors you cannot control that could make all statistics and probabilities not matter, and although it's a low chance it still is there! Below are some factors to consider when options trading. These actually works for all size accounts (as account size grows you do more trades). Look for high probability trades, and trade often: the biggest issue most of us face is not enough occurrences. We have been trained and conditioned to wait for the "perfect" time. The more frequent you put on trades the better the probabilities work in your favor when you are making trades with high Probability Of Profit (POP). It sounds like its more risky, but not trading with enough frequency is is a major factor to your trading success. Don't force trades: trading often is important, but don’t put on trades where there is not enough premium. If there isn't enough volatility you could have positions that don't match what you really want. We want to trade often, but we also don't want to put on bad trades and have to deal with managing positions we shouldn't have setup! Trade small: trade with consistent risk size. If a trade looks to good it probably is. Understand that incorrectly sized risk for a trade can erase all of your winning trades if you trade too big and it goes against you (which is normally does). Diversify trading strategies: We get caught up in the thought this worked for me last time it has to work again. GKT is a big proponent of using different strategies depending on market conditions. Do not stick to strategies just based on previous results, always look to diversify! Trading during binary events: Have a plan for trading around earnings or any binary event. Recognize that theta decay slows 2 weeks before earnings. You can't always plan for all news events, but FOMC decisions, CPI announcements (at least starting in 2022) are known events and market awareness is important! Choose the correct Days to Expiration (DTE): Option trading is often times duration over direction. Make sure you choose the right timeframe for your trades. Don't sell weekly options if there is little to no premium. Options don't always trade like shares of stock, if you are trying to get a direction give yourself more time! Exiting positions: A good trading plan has a defined exit strategy, exiting a trade is more important than entering the trade. Have a plan before you enter a trade. Actively taking profits and manage your losses before they become unmanageable is smart. Options need liquidity so you sell when others want to buy, take the money when you can, not when you have to! Remember, you do not have to sell at the very top or buy at the very bottom! If you get a move in your direction there is nothing wrong with taking profits as long as you also manage your losers. Do not allow a winner to turn into a loser. If an assumption changes, if your trade hypothesis changes, you should exit your position. Trading in a community of likeminded people is far more fun, educational, and profitable! Join our discord today: www.goodkidstrading.com/join