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.

When Looking Up Is the Trade

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It’s been a while since I’ve posted here on The Slope. Life has a way of pulling you in different directions. But I always find my way back, and for good reason. To Tim: thank you, as always. Fifteen-plus years posting on The Slope, and I remain genuinely grateful for this community. There’s nothing quite like it. For those who don’t know, I’ve spent the past several years building The Option Premium, a site dedicated to real options education with no hype, no flashy promises, and absolutely none of the marketing nonsense that plagues this industry. Just straightforward, honest strategy. I’m proud of what I’ve built there, and I hope some of you find it useful.

Most options traders do one of two things first: they buy a call, hoping for a rally, or they sell a put to collect premium on a stock they’re willing to own. Both are bullish plays. Both assume prices are going higher. But what happens when you don’t like the setup? When the market feels stretched, momentum is fading, and you want to express a neutral-to-bearish opinion with defined risk? That’s where bear call spreads quietly become one of the most underutilized tools in a premium seller’s arsenal.

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War is Peace

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The conflict in Iran is only a few days old, and as yet it is hard to see how it will develop, and there seems little agreement as to whether it counts as a war. Both Trump and Hegseth have referred to it repeatedly as a war, but as only Congress has the constitutional authority to declare war in the US, there have also been numerous explanations from administration officials and the Speaker of the House as to why it is not actually a war. I think President Trump described it as a ‘Special Military Operation’ at one point yesterday and for a number of reasons perhaps that is the best way to describe it.

I wrote a post on Tuesday looking at the possible major disruption in oil markets that could happen if Iran can close the Strait of Hormuz to commercial traffic and the US is trying to prevent that, but we’ll have to see how that goes.

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The Bigger Picture on … Oil

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Over the last year on my The Bigger Picture videos I’ve been watching a potentially very bullish setup form across the oil markets and I was planning a post on that this week before the expected attack on Iran. That attack happened earlier than I expected on Saturday so I’m doing that today.

Before I look at that though, I’ll go through the reason why this conflict in Iran could cause a really serious problem in world oil markets in coming weeks and perhaps months.

World oil demand is currently about 105 million barrels per day. In the absence of major supply issues there is currently a surplus of two to three million barrels per day in oil supply above that demand level which is the reason that prices have been soft and kicking around the big support area at $50 to $55 in recent months.

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