Best Practices

Mechanics for Losing Positions

| Dec 20, 2016
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    Best Practices

    Mechanics for Losing Positions

    Dec 20, 2016

    Our studies have shown the advantages of managing winners, where our exit point for winning undefined risk trades such as short Strangles is 50% of max profit and 25% for Straddles. However, the question of what we should do when either an undefined- or a defined-risk trade moves against us remains.

    First, we analyzed the potential risk and reward on defined-risk trades and explained why we don't manage losers in trades such as the Iron Condor before expiration. Since the max loss is defined, we keep the trade on until it either meets a profit target or until expiration.

    When we sell a Strangle, however, it is more difficult to define our risk at order entry. Tom and Tony talk through the mechanics for rolling untested sides and rolling for duration. Historical results show that most winning trades dating back to 2005 were losers at some point, and thus Tom reports that managing losers too early can be a detrimental. However, having some maximum loss amount that is specific to a trader’s risk appetite in mind when initiating a trade could be helpful to those afraid of large moves in the underlying.

    Watch this segment of Best Practices with Tom Sosnoff and Tony Battista for the valuable takeaways and a better understanding about what to do when a position shows losses.

    This video and its content are provided solely by tastylive, Inc. (“tastylive”) and are for informational and educational purposes only. tastylive was previously known as tastytrade, Inc. (“tastytrade”). This video and its content were created prior to the legal name change of tastylive. As a result, this video may reference tastytrade, its prior legal name.

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