As someone perpetually intrigued by quantitative finance from a mathematical perspective, I started lurking on the /r/options sub on reddit. It was shocking th

As someone perpetually intrigued by quantitative finance from a mathematical perspective, I started lurking on the /r/options sub on reddit. It was shocking the lack of basic knowledge people there have about the fundamentals of options pricing, their behavior and most importantly the risk involved. In itself this is not a big deal but through seeing conversations it was clear that many of these people are approved for very high level options trading and have margin accounts. Options are fun to study because they are the real world application of a range of probabilistic tools, and properly managing risk involves lots of cool stats. But precisely because of this trading them really should be left to people that know what they're doing, otherwise they become an incredibly powerful foot gun. But here's the thing. Options are a zero sum game, and currently 25% of options trading is retail. If I'm an institutional investor/trader this is great for me because it's like inviting a bunch of tourists to a poker table with professionals.