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Options in particular are a trap IMO because they require a LOT of active attention to the market day to day, and in the end aren't really worth it. I also dabb

Options in particular are a trap IMO because they require a LOT of active attention to the market day to day, and in the end aren't really worth it. I also dabbled in options a while back, and ditched them after losing much more than I should. I did learn a lot about the stock market while doing options though, so I guess that is a plus.

CSSer 4y ago
Your point about the attention required was my takeaway too. I traded paper in college for awhile out of curiosity, and I made a decent amount of "money" doing it too! I was surprised by this because I thought the stock market was insanely difficult to understand and constantly unpredictable beforehand. It was like that but not as often as I expected. For example, intraday movements could often happen at very predictable times. It can also be very cargo cult. Things like technical analysis seem to work (until they don't) only because enough people believe they will, so the signal to noise ratio can be very hard to suss out. Ultimately the time required and risk tolerance for those moonshot chances just didn't add up.
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rootusrootus 4y ago
> a LOT of active attention to the market day to day Exactly this. I played options for a while, just with my lunch money, because it was fun. But it quickly consumes your life, you have to stay on top of it all the time. The stress is what made me stop doing it.
4oo4 4y ago
This 100%. It's a trap to follow the advice of investment savvy people that recommend higher risk options without taking into consideration the energy it takes to properly manage risky investments if someone isn't doing it for you. They falsely assume that what works for them (higher risk/return investments and closely following the markets for signals) is what also works for normal people that don't follow markets and financial news very much at all. They mean well and are genuinely trying to help people make the most money possible, but it's a huge blind spot that the time/energy/attention costs of investing aren't also taken into consideration. It's the same reason I wouldn't recommend Linux to someone that isn't motivated enough to learn how to use it. It definitely can maximize what you get from your computer, but only at the expense of requiring more responsibility and time to learn how it works. Though, it's far easier to get solid Linux advice than solid investment advice and a bad financial decision is way harder to recover from than a bad technology choice.
vagab0nd 4y ago
This is exactly why I _do_ options trading. I used to only put money into index funds. But it's really boring, so recently I've allocated a very small amount to wheel strategy on a couple stocks I'm interested in. I know it's likely that they'll lose me money, but it's fun.

CSSer 4y ago

Your point about the attention required was my takeaway too. I traded paper in college for awhile out of curiosity, and I made a decent amount of "money" doing it too! I was surprised by this because I thought the stock market was insanely difficult to understand and constantly unpredictable beforehand. It was like that but not as often as I expected. For example, intraday movements could often happen at very predictable times. It can also be very cargo cult. Things like technical analysis seem to work (until they don't) only because enough people believe they will, so the signal to noise ratio can be very hard to suss out. Ultimately the time required and risk tolerance for those moonshot chances just didn't add up.

deleted 4y ago
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rootusrootus 4y ago

> a LOT of active attention to the market day to day Exactly this. I played options for a while, just with my lunch money, because it was fun. But it quickly consumes your life, you have to stay on top of it all the time. The stress is what made me stop doing it.

4oo4 4y ago

This 100%. It's a trap to follow the advice of investment savvy people that recommend higher risk options without taking into consideration the energy it takes to properly manage risky investments if someone isn't doing it for you. They falsely assume that what works for them (higher risk/return investments and closely following the markets for signals) is what also works for normal people that don't follow markets and financial news very much at all. They mean well and are genuinely trying to help people make the most money possible, but it's a huge blind spot that the time/energy/attention costs of investing aren't also taken into consideration. It's the same reason I wouldn't recommend Linux to someone that isn't motivated enough to learn how to use it. It definitely can maximize what you get from your computer, but only at the expense of requiring more responsibility and time to learn how it works. Though, it's far easier to get solid Linux advice than solid investment advice and a bad financial decision is way harder to recover from than a bad technology choice.

vagab0nd 4y ago

This is exactly why I _do_ options trading. I used to only put money into index funds. But it's really boring, so recently I've allocated a very small amount to wheel strategy on a couple stocks I'm interested in. I know it's likely that they'll lose me money, but it's fun.