Wealth, Freedom & Options With Joshua Belanger

We have been told to follow the trend, right? That's all you need to do to be successful in the market. Trends provide valuable input in other parts of life, but not so much when it comes to the financial markets because they are random and efficient. There are many stable companies you can invest in like Microsoft, but the street only loves companies with hockey stick type of growth such as Amazon. However, does it make sense to buy stock of Amazon here right off its highs? I wouldn't, but that's what makes a market. You could if you wanted to, but what if you could profit from Amazon's incredible growth trend without the risk of owning shares? And still, generate higher returns without the market risk? Amazon has opened a door what that allowed people all over the world to become the "new money" millionaires online. We are talking about people with zero previous experience, beat up by the market or just looking for alternative ways to generate passive income. In fact, some individuals are making p

Just curious… Do you often talk to yourself? I ask because I'm always talking to myself. They say smart people do talk to themselves more often, but who knows because there's no one to verify it. (Queue the pun music) Today, I found myself doing a tribal chant around my Macbook saying "don't be a dick for a tick". Might be a little odd if you haven't heard of the saying before, but it's an old floor trader saying. It's a reminder that you could be too greedy or stubborn. A tick is a minimum price quote up or down for a futures contract. For instance, The E-mini S&P 500 tick size is .25, or $12.50 per tick. There are four ticks per 1 point move. So if you're one tick away from your exit area, and the market hasn't filled you yet, and you've been at that level for a while, maybe you should come to where the market is it. Here's why I was reminding myself that today. I was reviewing positions I had in the Silver ETF (SLV), which was a short strangle that I entered 18 days ago. The position came in n

Nicole and I were watching the news last night. They reported that a 74-year-old doctor died after he was hit by an SUV while out for his morning jog. The driver supposedly lost control of the SUV, rolled over and landed on its roof instantly killing him. What happened to this individual is very sad and unfortunate news. However, are you going to avoid jogging now? Likely not! While you know that being struck by a vehicle could happen; you also know that this isn't an ordinary event. I did a quick search on what the odds are dying from running or jogging are. 1 in 1 million. We take risks all day and every day. Most of the daily risks are not thought about because you've done it so often. Before the doctor went on for his daily morning jog, I don't believe he asked himself, is today the day? That is known as an outlier event. Just like in the market, there are tail risks in everyday life. However, we don't lock ourselves inside and refuse to live because of the possibility of one of these outlie

This past Friday, Nicole and I were at a friends surprise birthday party. While at the party, I got to talking to a couple who are about to married in a few months. They are about the same age as Nicole and I and live in the building next to us. Later in the evening and a few wines later the wife to be asked me what I do for a living. I told her I inspire and teach people investing skills and knowledge that will help them take advantage of the right opportunities and feel like they are in control of their financial destiny to create more wealth, freedom and options. Intrigued, she asked if I were a financial advisor or knew a good one. I smiled and told her I used to be a financial professional and left the industry in 2008 to start my own thing (OptionSIZZLE) to help people like her take back control of their money and fire their financial advisor. I explained that I was sick of watching investors make mistakes, bleed and lose money while professionals circle investors like vultures only focused on co

That was a question I received from a media outlet today for a piece they were writing. The writer asked if I had any recommendation on Nintendo, Google, Apple or the video game ETF, GAMR? In the old days, I would have likely pimped myself and forced a recommendation so I could be quoted because that's what they are looking for. What I wrote to them is very unlikely to be published because it's not sexy enough to publish. However, I'm going to share it with you so you can learn. Just because there is buzz right now, doesn't mean there's any opportunity. You're saying invest, which is a long-term approach. Pokemon Go is likely a short-term spike. The ETF (GAMR) is a terrible idea because it barely trades. It traded only 4950 shares today! That means liquidity is poor and because of that, there're no options listed for it. Americans can't buy Nintendo stock because it doesn't trade here in the states. If I could, I would be in the position to place a short-term bet against shares after soaring over

Earnings season is upon us, and usually, I receive several questions asking the best approach to using options to trade underlyings. Is it better to buy or to sell options? My answer is neither. There's no edge with trading earnings. It's taken a lot of experience and research for me to learn that. 75% of the time, the market usually priced the underlying move perfectly within the expected move. However, there's the 25% chance it doesn't. When it moves outside the expected priced range, that's when things get ugly. To name a few that have down that in the past are companies like Amazon, Netflix and Google. When prices move outside the expected range, they usually move about 2-3x the expected move. Those moves cause massive drawdowns to option sellers and wipe out all the other winners. Or gains for option buyers who may have been long options, which only gets them back to break-even for all the other losses they had. So what that means is that no matter if you're a buyer or seller of options, it's

Yesterday, right after the market closed. I headed over to a JP Morgan bank branch near my home to speak with one of the private client reps named Jackie. I was looking at opening a new business credit card to diversify the lines of credit we currently have. She asked how they could earn more of my business with moving our main account to them. If I didn't loathe all big banks, it would be pretty easy for them to win me over because I'm fed up with BofA and not wanting them to make a dime of my deposits or fees. However, it's which terrible firm will not rip you off the most, which you don't know until you move everything over. She told me about how good their mobile banking and other features that don't mean too much. However, as I started to ask a few questions about money sweeps and deposits, she answered with, "we are not supposed to talk about that." She provided options like putting the money into a CD. Ahh… Products that tie up your money that provide zero return. And when you ask the toughe

I was watching an episode two nights ago talking about if Great White sharks are trying to hunt dolphins. If you're not sure why it's Shark Week on the Discovery Channel this week. :) Researchers wanted to understand how; since dolphins are faster than most sharks except for the Mako, who can swim upwards to 40 mph. They were talking about the differences with Great Whites and dolphins. Metaphorically speaking, the financial markets are like an ocean, and you need to understand how YOU can survive. Great White Sharks are loners, and they can survive by themselves because of their size and strength. Dolphins survive with using their smarts, quickness and swim in numbers because there's safety in numbers. Large hedge funds of mutual funds can try to be the Great White Sharks of the financial markets with having large positions; that's fine because that's how they have to work. However, investors like you and I have to be like dolphins and use our smarts, quickness and find safety with playing the number

This morning I was looking over positions after this recent market move. Nobody would have predicted this, and if they did, it was a lucky guess. That's how the markets work; they are random. However, I was glad that I managed the winners I had days before because they would have become losers today. I have a saying that goes like this, "When you've earned the right to take profits, you take them." It took me nearly 10 years to learn how to make investing using options a non-zero–sum game by managing winning trades. In the old reckless days, I would hope and pray they expire. Most of the times they did, but then there were times they didn't. I had winners that turned to big losers, which is frustrating going into a weekend. I started to figure out I needed to close out trades before expiration, but I didn't know exactly the optimal number until recently. You can either let the market close you out, or you can do it on your terms. I prefer to be on the offensive and do it on my terms. It

That was a question Ronnie wrote me over the weekend. He thinks that Gold ETF (GLD) will run higher into the end of the July. That's great, but who knows. The reason why I am telling you this is so you avoid this very costly mistake most make with trading options. Not only do sell offs in the market like this give people a good old slap in the face, but it also exposes the self-proclaimed experts in the space. I saw a proclaimed trading expert with several hundred people paying for his trade ideas recommend buying calls in a stock today on Twitter. I sighed and shook my head because I know he's leading investors down the wrong path. When you buy a call, you need to be right on time, direction and also volatility. That is the trade off with using options Vs. underlying. If you want to be successful with options, you must understand volatility and how it affects options pricing. With volatility higher across the market, option premiums are more expensive. If you've read my book or past emails

Yesterday, I found myself into a little debate related to Tony Robbins. If you're not sure who he is, he's a well-known motivational speaker. I read that over 30 people were burned at one of his seminars in Texas after walking on hot coals, which he calls a "fire walk" for one of his motivational exercises. This "fire walk" is intended to help people conquer their fears by walking across hot coals. At this event, more than 7,000 people did the "fire walk" with about 30 sustaining minor burns. Of course, you have to sign a waiver, which states you will get burned. And people pay anywhere from $650 all the way up to $3,000 to attend one of these events, which some say is life changing. I've never been a fanboy of Tony Robbins nor listened to any of his stuff. I posted the article talking about this on Facebook yesterday with a comment about how this sounds like a cult. That stirred up a debate with a few of my friends that support him. When I got into trouble as a kid and would tell my, mom, t

This morning someone asked me if I heard about the hedge fund manager who recently committed suicide. I didn't, but I was quickly was able to read the details on CNNMoney. Hedge fund manager Sanjay Valvani was found dead by his wife in an apparent suicide, which was less than a week after he was arrested on insider-trading charges. His fund oversaw $8 billion in assets with the funds primary focus being in health care. That's a good chunk of money under management. Prosecutors alleged he was part of an insider-trading scheme that spanned from 2005 to 2011, which illegally traded on confidential tips about drug approvals. In fact, he supposedly profited nearly $25 million in profits with one of those insider tips. This guy was a smart dude. He received his MBA in 2001 from Duke University's Fuqua School of Business and founded his fund in 2005. So what, right? Well, it's sad especially leaving a wife and kids like that and only being 44 years old. Yes, I agree he did a bad thing. I wish he had

This past Saturday, I attended a trading event here in Chicago put on by TD Ameritrade. The event was about a mile away from where I live. One thing I've learned is that you need to be humble and willing to keep learning no matter what level you're at. While walking around the event, I heard one of the experts tell one of the investors, "it's about limiting your bad trades" in response to his question. It was tough to bite my tongue, but I did. While this may sound like good advice and something you've heard before, I don't think the guy explained it well enough. Of course, we would all love to erase our bad trades or investments. If we knew they would lose money after the fact, we would have avoided them. However, life doesn't work that way. So many teach investors to focus on eliminating the losing trades, which is entirely the wrong thing to focus on. It's like telling a professional basketball, don't miss the basket. No shit, Sherlock! I refer to this as playing not to lose instead o

Every afternoon I take a break during lunch and head over the Starbucks on Rush St. here in Chicago. Without a doubt, this is one of the nicest Starbucks I have ever seen. It's two floors, and I love to sit outside on the second floor, drink my coffee and listen to a podcast. The area is a tourist hot spot because of the shops on Oak St. Every day, I see several double decker buses and sometimes the people on the top of the bus will wave at us while they are taking in all of what Chicago provides. Two days ago, I heard about a tragic story on the news. A bicyclist was killed a few blocks from that corner who had just gotten off work as a messenger. He was hit by one of those very same double-decker buses I see every day. People at the scene who saw this occur around 6 pm said they saw the bicyclist run through two red lights. The second being the fatal. What a sad situation to occur and a reminder that tomorrow isn't guaranteed. You've probably heard that saying in investing or trading,

Imagine you're on vacation with the family. Everyone is all excited because you're heading west to see all the sights. All of a sudden, there's a cop behind you with its lights on. You pull over. The officer comes up to the car asking for your license, insurance and registration. He runs your information. The officer comes back and asks for you to step out of the car. He asks if you have any cash in the vehicle? You tell him $2,000.00. He tells you to put your hands on the hood so he can search you. Then he says those fatal words while grabbing your wrists; you're under arrest. You look over, and you can see your wife trying to calm the kids down at this point because they are crying. The officer tells you that he is going to seize all of the cash. You say that he can't do that. You need that for the vacation you're taking the kids on. He tells you that an ordinary family shouldn't have that kind of money traveling. The law is called civil asset forfeiture. It's a shady proce

You might have heard about this, but since reading this article last week on CNN, I've been scared to take a number two. It's a little personal to share that with you, but to think nothing can happen to you sitting on a toilet reading the paper isn't true after hearing this. So here's what happened. A man in Thailand was sitting on the toilet when all a sudden a python latched its fangs onto his penis. It makes me cringe just thinking the amount of pain that caused. The man is recovering, but a rescue worker on the scene with more than six years experience said that he's seen snakes in toilets before that have bitten people's leg or thigh, but never a penis. Talk about being unlucky. That reminds me of how investors get bit with their pants down with trading options. So many times you hear about services or systems that have a high winning percentage. For example, let's say 90% of the time. Which sounds good to most novice investors, but then there's the other side of the coin. The other

I was just sitting out on our sundeck with Nicole enjoying this beautiful day here in Chicago. Today is that day we take the time to remember our fallen heroes here in the United States. America is great and always will because men & women who don't know you make the ultimate sacrifice to protect & keep our freedom. I honor those soldiers who lost their lives with humility, honor and a personal drive to become better every day doing my part to empower others who seek the same. Freedom isn't a privilege; it's earned. When you're grilling out today with friends and family talking about various hot topics right now such as transgender bathrooms or fleeing to Canada if Donald Trump becomes president; remember that those men and women lost their lives for that freedom you're exercising. Also, it could be much worse. We could be in a country where we would have to watch a bare-chested Vladimir Putin ride a horse on TV or playing a rigged hockey game. To your wealth, freedom & options! Joshua Belanger

I just got done with my morning workout and walking around the Farmers Market to get fresh eggs and bacon for the week. I wasn't sure what I was going to talk about today, but luckily there's the internet, and things will find you. I was sipping my coffee and saw an article on MarketWatch talking about a high schooler who turned $900 into $55K in just 12 days. Jeez... here's another article that got picked up because of fake profits that nobody took the time to check the facts. The article talked about a Reddit forum with 38,000 active subscribers who happened to be mostly millennials who idolize Martin Shkreli, the former CEO of Turing Pharma that increased the drug 5000%. Here's a quote from one of the members about Shkreli: "He is living their dream. He got rich. He might have lied and cheated along the way, but [on the forum] that's encouraged." Yeah, the same guy that is facing seven counts of securities fraud and conspiracy in connection with previous work at a hedge fund, and he faces up to

While in line this morning waiting to order my cup of Joe, this lady walks up and asks if I would buy her a cup of coffee. Without hesitation, I said, No! She was a little shocked and asked again, but she received the same response. While walking away, I could hear her mumble a few things. Did I feel bad? Not at all. For her, though, she was in shock that someone said no. However, it was bound to happen at some point. One thing I've learned over the years is that common sense is not very common. Here's a recent story about this: There was a pop star in Indonesia who used to go on stage with poisonous snakes and "wear" them while performing. Apparently she typically used pythons, but in this case, she was dressed in a Cobra, which she had thought was defanged. Well, as you probably expected the snake bit her onstage. Now, rather than doing the sensible thing and stopping to get proper medical attention… she continued and tried to finish the show, but 45 minutes later she collapsed and soon after

While laying out by the pool drinking a Pina Colada reading a few articles on my phone two weeks ago in Mexico, I was reading about this software that monitors Internet activity and then compares the patterns to historical data. Apparently, it ACCURATELY predicts when political unrest or terrorist attacks are likely to occur. They base their reasoning on the Internet being littered with material that provides important clues about where and when the next attack will be. Yeah, right! At least they admit the software won't replace human analysts. If they didn't, I'd be seriously worried about our safety if it ever did. Think about it… It's the same principle as traders who rely on charts to predict the future as well. Just about every trader swears by charts who uses them. In fact, some couldn't live without them and would feel crippled. But… You have to ask yourself the question: If charts were that and predicted the future direction greater than the 50/50 coin flip, then why do most people struggle