Hey guys. So I am 40 and have an interest in options trading. I have been learning for a while now and have made some investment and would love advice on the best place to look for forum advice on the following: 1. First and foremost: How can I find option chains with more liquidity? It seems I am finding trades which have high open interest and zero volume. I am clearly doing something wrong and my iron condors are not selling so I close them and move on. 2. I'd like to find a place to discuss newbie questions for the options trader... even if it's a different forum entirely, I'd love some advise. thanks! -Kevin
@kevagonia Most equity options have the most liquidity ( SPY, QQQ, IWM ) and some of the more popular stocks like AAPL, etc.
Thanks for your reply. I stick to the big stocks which have underlying liquidity in the stock, but still run into some blank spaces and am not sure why. Today I created an iron condor for UPS which filled 2 minutes into the session. The second one: Pfizer (PFE) just sits there like an old dog... Buy to open Normal Iron Condor: MAR16, strikes are 31, ---32, 37 ---38. Volume is nonexistent in this stock in Tastyworks and there is no "open interest" option. Of course AAPL is easy, but I should trying to spread the butter thin over the bread with more stocks. Once again, appreciate your reply. -K
which month? just looked....doesn't matter on PFE unless you're near or at the money....no volume at all
I see, so just a no volume issue. Interesting that such a large important stock would have so little volume in options trading. Much appreciated,, K
Welcome @kevagonia! I have issues finding liquid underlyings as well. I use a screener that filters out stocks that A) Don't have a penny-wide option chain B) Don't have a volume of +1,000,000 in the last 90 days That could help if you aren't using it already. Alternatively, you mentioned TastyTrade and they have a key you can use on their platform to expedite the process: As for learning Options information, although I disagree with the trade strategies that they use over at OptionAlpha personally, they have a great podcast that is very educational regardless of your skill level (and free). I believe they have a forum as well but it might be for paying members only. Good luck!
