Wealth, Freedom & Options With Joshua Belanger

It fails many Americans! So says the father of the modern day 401(k). Do you mind if I share some of my insider viewpoints why this is? Great! The 401(k) passed into law under the Revenue Act of 1978. The... Revenue Act? Hmm... What's more unusual is that IRS was in charge of the 401(k), which is the same government body in charge of getting as much money from you. That's a little conflicting, right? Before the 401(k), companies offered pension plans to employees. Companies started to realize the amount of risk that these pensions had put on the company. The way the could transfer the risk and responsibility from company to employee was through a 401(k). One of the common rebuttals is that it's tax-deferred. True... But here's the fine print. Federal Income Tax is deferred, but Social Security and Medicare are taxed 7.6% a year. The 401(k) tax benefit was to help executives on their yearly bonuses, not the middle-class worker. That is why I make the case that most people are not in a position t

You’re a scam! That’s the reply I received back from a self-proclaimed “not your average financial expert.” I had reached out to ask if he was open to having me on his weekday investing radio show. He copied and pasted the whole sales page for our Weekly Options Income Course, saying he didn’t understand why I would need more exposure since I can generate a 6% return every week. It’s an approach by creating high probability outcomes using the S&P 500 options with defined spreads. I can see why it may turn off someone at first if they just read the headline, but he’s insisting that we’re saying it’s guaranteed. So I replied: “Don’t you talk to your audience about how to use options to enhance returns, reduce risk and increase the probability of success?” Keep in mind this guy has a weekday radio show telling people how to manage their money and he manages money for others. Here’s his full reply: “I don’t. I certainly don’t suggest people use options unless they are wealthy. Options can be a nice str

It's the internet of money... It's tough to understand how it works at first. But... so is how the FED keeps creating helicopter money. The future is here, and it will be a dancers dream come true the day they don't have to lug a hefty bag full of singles to the bank teller. Only 8 years old… Bitcoin has become a game changer for finance. You probably remember hearing how Bitcoin traded up over 1000 and then collapsed two years ago. Since then, more volume (adoption) has stabilized Bitcoin prices. The CME Group just launched a pair of indexes designed to track the cryptocurrency's price. It's the starting foundation for a derivatives market, which means the chance to start trading options on Bitcoin is very near. Today is a big deal… Because we announce that, OptionSIZZLE will start accepting Bitcoin. I'm very excited to finally share that with you and also keep learning about it. I've already seen a lot of fiction around Bitcoin similar to trading options. Can I ask you... What do you know abou

It's not savvy approach... ... If you ask a professional. They'll laugh at you and mumble, amateur. Success in the financial markets doesn't work any different than everyday life. We're trading something due to supply and demand every day. Let's travel back to 1983. If you invested $100 into the S&P 500 ahead of one of the largest bull markets in our history. That $100 would be worth around $3,300 today. You went against common wisdom and blew your money with buying Star War Action Figures. Each one cost around $3, so that would give you about 33 action figures. Well... those Star Wars action figures trade anywhere from $1,000, up to $12,000 for rare ones. It paid to challenge conventional wisdom. In part 2, I will share the #1 mistake collectible and stock owners make. It's something I discuss it detail in "Fearless Investing With Options." Learning how to trade isn't about options... ... Or about money. It becomes life changing. You'll become fearless because you'll start to approach life,

In 2008, I went down the rabbit hole. I thought I could make money in any market. A naive and unrealistic perception. I was starting to manage client accounts while working on a trading desk. And then, I was fired! It was time to go full time on my own. I tried to be superman, but realized it was only a custom. I lost money! I panicked! I became desperate. I needed a quick fix, and that's how it started. It's like a baseball hitter who's struggling mid-season who tries to change their mechanics. I didn't stick with what I knew and allowed things play out. I invested a lot of time and money chasing returns following other people's proprietary systems that used indicators, candlesticks, charts, fundamentals or when Jupiter crossed the 3rd Solstice. Maybe they do work, just never for me. I guess I'm average, but over the years I've mastered an approach that has consistency worked, and the numbers don't lie. If you're like me and haven't been able to find success with going down those other roads,

So while I was walking back with my coffee earlier, I was listening to a podcast. The guy on the podcast was talking about the recent discoveries related to turmeric such as how it can help lower cholesterol. They continued testing and found adding a little black pepper enhanced the body's consumption of the turmeric by 1,000 times. A little fun fact of the day, but here's how it relates to investing, trading and business. For many years trading options I would let my short options expire. Selling options have a higher probability of success than buying, but I started to realize that coming into the last week gave me trouble at times seeing profitable trades turning into losers. One reason for that is because of the options gamma, which becomes more sensitive to directional moves as expiration approaches. With only having the experience, I had a hunch that managing trades earlier could be more beneficial. I wasn't sure because it flys in the face of what everyone believes in the market with, let your

Today was the day the iPhone 7 was unveiled to the world. I admit, I watched most of on my iPhone 6s Plus using Google's free internet at Starbucks during my mid-day break. While I walked upstairs to sit outside and drink my coffee while I streamed it, I noticed a dozen people watching the event on their devices as well. There's a lot of excitement about these events with Apple. These are binary events, and when there's uncertainty, there's opportunity. Looking at the options that expire this Friday, the market was pricing a $2.30 range with prices closing at $107.70, yesterday. Because the market knew this event was coming, the shorter dated options had more priced in risk. This is the #1 reason why so many lose money trading options. Some may buy a call because they think the iPhone 7 is going to blow everyone's mind, while others may think Apple's run is over and purchase a put. Either way, they are choosing a direction and buying option premium before this event which implied volatility is eleva

A fellow Sizzler wrote in yesterday asking, "You don't discuss a lot about investing in stocks, why?" There's a good reason why and remember, this is just my opinion. Very few probably know a high-level executive at a publicly traded company. However, let's pretend you lived next door to one. If you owned shares of the company and asked them any question related to the business that wasn't already made public, they'd tell you it's against the law. Now there are good reasons why this is, but that's the reason why firms and investors created things like P/E ratios and such to provide confidence on why a stock maybe a great buy. The truth is that no one knows because all the relevant information to run a business is unknown until everyone is told at the same time. And even then not all the details are released. There's no edge, and all you're doing is following everyone else. That is why I'm adamant about having control of risk and having an edge. People lie, but the options don't. There are times the

I feel like a hypocrite saying this because I loathe financial institutions, but I got back from making a deposit. The reality is that there are no other great options available. It's similar to the current U.S. Presidential Election. Good hearted people are working at these places, but the whole operation is made to nickel and dime us slowly. I'm not sure why JP Morgan would publish this, but I just read that investors have taken out nearly $106 billion out of actively managed equity funds in 2016. It's a large number, but overall it's not that much to tip the needle on money under active management. However, it could be a signal that people are starting to have the confidence to manage their money themselves. Though the money has moved into passive index funds, the message and teachings I and others provide become more important than ever. That's the first step, but money flows and it could flow back. My goal is that I don't want that money to flow back. The good that has come from the FOMC keepin

When I first learned about options, I was studying to take the financial industry exam to become a financial advisor (Series 7). After I passed and scored high on the part related to options, I quickly realized I didn’t know how to trade options successfully after losing $2,000.00 on my first options trade. Despite being a licensed professional, the financial industry wasn’t interested in teaching me how to become successful trading options, only how to gather assets. After reading a lot of books related to options trading, I noticed that most provide a broad overview of how options work just like I had learned when taking my exam. They leave out the most important aspect of how options work with leaving out implied volatility, which is #1 option component that every person needs to understand if they want to be successful trading options. That is why most lose money starting out with options because they thought a book or some rehashed information on the internet was all they needed to learn. Then like

I just got done reading the current positions that hedge fund manager Carl Icahn's filed with SEC. If you recall, he created a video a few months ago warning of a massive market crash. Well, it hasn't happened yet... He believes that the FOMC monetary policy has created a bubble with its low-interest rates. I don't disagree with him at all. Here's what has happened because of the FOMC policy. With low-interest rates, companies have been more encouraged to buy other businesses or do buybacks than they are to invest in new equipment and machinery. This phenomenon inflates earnings for the short term but is detrimental in the long term. When you make bold predictions, and they don't come true right away, you fall to the waste side regarding the media. The media only wants people who are making predictions the market is only going higher. We all know about the housing bubble and those that were taking the other side; took heat for some time. However, you only know about the ones that made huge returns,

That is a question we've all had, and I receive several times a week. I remember asking myself this the first time after seeing the calls I bought the day before drop to a 90% loss on my first trade. It went to become a max loss that wiped out my small $2,000.00 account at the time. Forward to today after hundreds of thousands of trades, research and experience, I can confidently provide the right answer to you. That answer is, doing nothing is better than doing something. The reason why is because options allow you to know your max loss and exceptions before entering a position, which is why it's a better investing instrument than stock. Most people think they can control their risk after opening a position. That's not true because anything can happen, such as a flash crash. Stop losses are your enemy because people don't let their position play out or understand the probability getting stopped out before hitting their ideal profit target. The only way you can control risk is before entry. All opti

A few days ago, I was watching the women's gymnastics. What they can do is incredible. Team USA dominated this event. As I was watching them, something stood out to me. I've seen it some of the other events as well. These girls practice the same routine over and over again to a point they can do it in their sleep. I saw these girls do the same routine as a group and then individually. Why is that? Well, because the routines aren't about one amazing flip or jump. It's about the whole body of work and being able to do it without any mistakes. Despite their endless practices, which helps them at the moment. There's also something that can happen during their routine. That is what they train for. Doing it perfectly is nearly impossible to accomplish, but being able to recover from a slight mistake is why they do it over and over again. That is how you need to approach investing and trading options. It's not about one trade; it's about your whole body of work. It's about having the right training t

Earlier today I noticed a large option trade hit the tape in the Financial ETF (XLF). The trade was a block of 18,430 August $24 puts bought to open for 20 cents. The total volume was 24,090 contracts at that strike vs. an open interest of 6,363 contracts. Now, I don't pay too much attention to large contracts traded in ETF's because there's not much edge because ETF's are used for a lot of hedging. However, I wanted to point out a few reasons why this could at least be a short term directional trade. The XLF was down .79% compared to the SPX .29% today. A few names in that ETF were down even more like Bank of America closing down 2.50%. The XLF weekly options that expire on Friday are in backwardation. What that means is that the market is pricing in elevated short-term risk, which I'm not sure why. The current implied volatility percentile is on the low end of the range at 7%. Which means selling options here is not advantageous. That doesn't mean buying option premium is a layup either because y

And is the biggest Ponzi scheme in the world. In fact, it's experiencing a $32 trillion shortfall right now. This swindle was sold to good, unsuspecting, God-fearing, salt-of- the earth, trusting Americans who thought their government was always going to take care of them. Just like most Ponzi scheme's the first in usually come out fine. However, you and I are going to get the short end of the stick. The house of cards is starting to fall and very close to crashing down. In fact, VERY soon. Some experts suggest it could be the financial KO punch that will bankrupt innocent Americans. Have you guessed it yet? Social Security. Laurence Kotlikoff, a Boston University economics professor says this: "We're not broke in 20 years to 30 years; we're broke now," Kotlikoff said. "All the bills have been kept off the books by Congress and presidential administrations for six decades." This concept needs to be taken behind the barn and shot. Retirement support you thought you had years ago is becoming to loo

Slumps suck! That's how things are for me right now. There's just not much opportunity with how I approach trading options right now. And the few opportunities that have popped up haven't worked in my favor. The financial markets are a great equalizer. Just like in sports, players go on streaks. However, at the end of the season, their averages normalize because they end up going through slumps as well during a season. No one can have a consistent hot hand in the financial markets. It's about being consistent which means doing the same thing even when things aren't working for you in the short-term. While looking for opportunities today, I saw this interesting fact today. According to The Wall Street Journal, the S&P 500's price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio is now over 25. That means investors are willing to pay $25 for every $1 in current earnings today. That's 56% higher than the historical average P/E of 16. The S&P 500 has only had a higher P/E ratio two other times in history… Can you guess when

Earlier today, I stumbled upon an article titled, "Stocks Your Parents Should Have Bought the Year You Were Born". Now, this article was for the baby boomers, because I wasn't born yet. One example they provided is if my grandparents had bought $1,000 worth of stock in General Electric in 1943 and held it to now, it would be worth $197k + dividends. However, $1,000 in the 1940's isn't the same buying power today. A $1,000 investment back then would be $16,894.64 in 2016 due to an annual inflation of around 4%. My great grandma, June wasn't an investor, she was a hoarder. While cleaning her house after she passed, we found a small amount of money hidden in odd spots. In one place, we found $10,000 stashed in a pocket of an old sweater, which was buried under years of other clothes that she accumulated. She would rather stash her money even though it depreciated and also risk losing it all in a house fire. That is how most approach investing. They stash it away or give it to someone else to deal with

Many experts thought Japan would curb their monetary stimulus program, but they decided early this morning to approve $130 billion fiscal. All this helicopter money should concern you because I'm very concerned. With markets just right off all-time highs and with every extended bull run in the books, buying anything in the market right now I believe is too risky. Many are not comfortable with shorting as I am or are seeking other types of investment opportunities. That's why I've been talking about how to create a passive income stream from Amazon lately. Remember the financial crisis? What company thrived during that time? Amazon did because people still need their toilet paper, TVs, etc. Right now, you can get in on the ground floor by partnering with Amazon with selling private labelled physical products; which is paying out HUGE DIVIDENDS for those getting involved. It's just like buying a stock, buy low and sell higher. When partnering with Amazon, they take care of the inventory, advertising,

If I told you that I generated a 1200% ROI, you'd be skeptical... And you should, I would be as well. For some, though, it makes their buttholes pucker up. However, It's unlikely you will achieve those same results if you invest into the same opportunity I did. Because you're right, I'm not you. You could do worse or even better, but even doing worse isn't too bad. I was lucky, who knows. However, I can talk the talk because I've walked the walk. That's important to you, right? We are all different. I hate posting numbers publicly because it doesn't matter. You can't spend my money nor can I spend yours. I'm happy if you do better than me, that's my goal. It's not a who's d*ck is the bigger contest. There's always going to be someone better than us or further down the road. We can't control that, but we can control our journey and enjoy it. Stay in your lane and focus on what we can do with our resources. Once you let your ego get too large, that is when you lose discipline. You got keep mov

This might be a shocker, but they don't rely solely on the stock market. They usually have a stake in other businesses, real estate, etc. Having a skill set or business outside of trading that can help generate income is a must in my view. Having a valuable skill set or something creating side income will take a tremendous amount of pressure off you when you're going through that learning curve of trading options. Not only that, but it brings balance into your life. I know for me, it helps with getting in the right mind frame when I'm a position goes against me. I approach trading options as a business with the goal of making money. However, every day isn't going to be profitable. Sometimes, markets will be slow; sometimes you'll experience drawdowns. You will lose and be humbled. That's life! I believe one of the best ways to stay consistent in the markets is to eliminate the fear of having to make money consistently from the markets to put food the table. You want to avoid being at the mercy of t