Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

Spanksgiving Week and Beyond

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(First off, to any American readers, I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving season gorgefest and good times with your families.  You will need the energy as we all prepare for the coming onslaught of decorating, carols, and christmas shopping in the coming weeks!)

Now, as I’m sure all are aware, Thanksgiving week was a snoozer for movement.  Despite that fact, market participation is strong across the board (with the exception of commodity-related equities which have been getting smacked around) and are not giving back any serious ground despite elevated levels.  When these conditions persist, they tend to cause shallow, grinding moves in the indices.  Moves like this can carry on for weeks or months.

Here is a chart of the VXV (3-month implied volatility) compared relative to the $VIX (1-month implied volatility).  It creates a ratio with which we can measure what option players are anticipating for the coming month(s).  Click to enlarge. (more…)

Roads to Riches

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The journey from trading novice to trading pro requires picking up a number of skills. How you get there is an important decision. There are three main ways that I am aware of and the main difference between them is how long it will take to reach your goal, assuming that trading is right for you at all. The main differences between them are the difficulty and the time to learn. They are: (more…)