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.

The Real Story Behind the “Random Walk”

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……….and What It Means for Options Traders

Before we dive into the details, a quick note — if you’re an options trader looking for clear, no-fluff education, I invite you to check out The Option Premium. The Option Premium is my free weekly newsletter dedicated to helping traders of all levels make smarter decisions with options. Each issue breaks down actionable strategies, market insights, volatility signals, and premium-selling setups — all through a risk-first lens. Whether you’re building your first iron condor or managing a multi-strategy options portfolio using poor man’s covered calls, you’ll find something here to add to your trading toolbox.

Most traders have heard it before:

“The stock market is a random walk.”

But what does that actually mean — and more importantly, what does it mean for how we should trade options?

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One Statistical Principle

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……. Every Successful Options Trader Follows

Before we dive into the details, a quick note — if you’re an options trader looking for clear, no-fluff education, I invite you to check out The Option Premium. The Option Premium is my free weekly newsletter dedicated to helping traders of all levels make smarter decisions with options. Each issue breaks down actionable strategies, market insights, volatility signals, and premium-selling setups — all through a risk-first lens. Whether you’re building your first iron condor or managing a multi-strategy options portfolio using poor man’s covered calls, you’ll find something here to add to your trading toolbox.

Most successful options traders don’t try to outguess the market. They rely on one of the most time-tested statistical principles: the Law of Large Numbers.

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Options, Be Gone!

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A few months ago, the entirety of my portfolio was options positions. Over the past couple of weeks, I have shifted more and more into equity positions (that is to say, short-sales instead of being long puts).

Options have been pretty good to me. Perhaps my biggest “achievement” related to them is the creation of Slope’s Options Charts, which is a true source of pride and joy to me. Importantly, it provides me insight as to when options that I’ve sold went on to much bigger price gains…………

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