Customer Reviews

Getting Started in Options

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Options are a very powerful tool in investing. Any stock investor is running half blind if they do not consider using options as part of there investment strategy

This book is a great place to start for anyone who wants to have an understanding of what options are and how they can be used as both speculative and conservative investment tools.

The author provides a very through tutorial on what options are, what they are used for and how you can used them in your investment strategy. Many examples are presented to insure that each topic is fully understood. In fact there are so many examples that you may want to skip one here and there after you already understand the subject described. However, these examples are great in illustrating the various topics presented.

The book will be useful for both beginners and more advanced users who wish to know more about the various techniques used in options trading. Having said that, if you are a very experienced options investor who is looking for complex strategies, you would probably be better of with a more advanced book.

The ideal reader of this book would be a person who has been doing some stock trading and is now ready to move to more complex (and potentially rewarding) options based trading.

Explaining options from the ground up is hard, and Thomsett gets most of the particulars right... but the book itself is not well designed, making it harder to read than need be. Since no beginning options book is perfect, this one is worth buying. No matter where you start, you'll need to read more than one book.

Getting Started in Options does have some very strong points for beginners... presenting the results of a complex trade in a table format (if the stock goes to $40, you make $X; if it goes to $45, you make $X...) instead of the usual cryptic risk profile graphic is good. On the other hand, there's peculiar misinformation such as the claim that the "striking price" (read strike price) is always divisible by 5. Not true, options come at 7.50, 12.50, 17.50 etc. strikes. And then there are the weird post-split prices. The major points are OK, though.

However, the reviewer below, who complained that she (he?) stopped reading when Thomsett told her that if she bought a put she wanted the stock to fall, which outraged her, was completely off base. She needs to read this book again, or another. Puts have multiple roles, and Thomsett give several uses. Thomsett started with the simplest case, trading puts. You certainly do want the stock to drop when you buy a put in that case. But if you owned the stock or similar stocks before buying the put,that's a different purpose with a different objective. That's a hedge, which is an insurance move, and the reviewer is right... we usually don't want to collect insurance.

But this is the kind of mistake that can happen when reading this book, and it is more the publisher's fault than the author's. It's a case of very poor design and somewhat tatty organization. Wiley is an indifferent publisher... if a manuscript comes in strong, OK, but if the author needs a professional editor, Wiley's not the place to find one. In this book, some key points will sail right by the beginner, others are hard to find. I have the third edition, which even has barely readable light green type.

I love the "Getting Started" series on Options, Stocks and Online Investing. Getting Started with Options led me through the basics of learning about Options and with the information I was able to do my first Option trades. I made a little money and lost a little money - but I felt as though I had basic knowledge to work with. One would still need to learn more to successfully trade options ~ but this is definately the place for a beginner to start. I highly recommend it!!

I have bought over a dozen books on option trading and this is the one that I refer to over and over again. If you want to learn about basic option strategies and concepts, this is the book to buy.

First of all let me warn you ... "You will have to read this book atleast twice!". Not because of the way the book is written but rather due to the complexity of the subject itself. As you will see, the concept & language behind Stock Options is a bit counter-intuitive and at times weird.

None-the-less, the Author has done an excellent job of explaining what Call options, Put options are. What levels of risks and potential for profit exists in buying, selling each kind of options. Additionally, the Author has done an wonderful job of suggesting number of interesting strategies of using options in order to generate income, hedge your portfolio. The one relating to tax was really interesting and a novel idea to me at least.

The only thing I would have liked more in this book is ... more examples. More simplified & easy to comprehend examples would have made it even better.

Overall, it an perfect starting point for any beginner. Read & Apply!

-Sachin

After reading this book several times (mostly on planes, it is not a 'heavy' read considering the topic) and scanning options chains online, I understand that options investing can be a very, very risky way to make money in the market.

I also discovered that options can be a very conservative way to not_lose_money on existing long positions, as well as discount the purchase of stocks that I would take long positions in. If you are not the best stock picker in the world, options can be very useful as a hedge.

The book has an enormous amount of example trades. I could have used a few sample conversations between broker / trader to help with the lingo, but having said that the 'nuts and bolts' portions of this book (e.g. option symbols) got me far enough where I called my broker and my first options trade went perfectly (and fast). I was speaking the language and I am very confident in my knowledge.

The book is cheaper than a single options trade, it is worth every cent and has paid for itself many times over in money that I haven't lost ;-).

I read this book over a year ago and now i'm training to be an options trader in the CBOE pits. It opened a whole new world for me. The options world is enormous and this book is the best intro for someone who wants to learn about options. Prior to reading this book, I had heard that trading options is the way to make a lot of money but I didn't have a clue as to what options were. A friend suggested I read this book and I did. This book will not teach you everything about options nor will it make you an expert on options. What it will do is explain the basics of options and some strategies that are commonly used. And it does this magnificently! Its an easy read and everything is explained very clearly.

For those looking to get started in options but knowing very little about them, this is a decent book to begin with. I felt the addition of a few easy-to-read summary charts or tables adding a visual to the differences between calls/puts, sells/buys would have been helpful. But you're eventually hit with enough examples that it's reasonably easy to understand. I would recommend it to learn about options, but not as an options investment book.

Once again author Michael Thomsett has brought to the new and seasoned investor a concise manual on how to trade options in today's economic market. The examples and accompanying explanations are clear and easy to understand. Unlike other books, his isn't too technical nor full of "pie-in-the-sky" examples. The author provides side-bar definitions on all terms presented in the book. Strategies are laid out with "what-if" scenarios, risks are explained fully and repeated often. The book is a "must read" for new and seasoned investors wanting to get started in the options market. Best of all, it's reasonably priced for such a wealth of information.

Getting Started in Options does an excellent job demystifying the world of stock options trading. In clear, concise language, Thomsett explains everything you need to know about trading calls and puts in both long and short positions so that it's easy to get started immediately. After explaining how each type of option works, several hypothetical examples are given so that its easy to visualize the "how's" and "why's" of engaging in a particular type of trade.

In addition to explaining how options work, it gives the reader a good perspective on a smart option trader's thinking by explaining the strategic reasons for each trade. Later chapters of the book go into multi-trade strategies such as creating hedges or spreads. Aside from being a great reference after reading the entire book, the style of writing just keeps you reading so unlike other books, you won't fall asleep in the midst of technical mumbo jumbo!