It appears that the last round of financial sanctions heaped upon Russia may have spurred some of its citizens to go into a small cash panic. I only discovered this as I watched the overnight S&P markets open in quite a frenzied fashion. At 5PM CST they promptly dropped about…

As a trader, extended periods of volatility above historical volatility tend to be seen as blessings. Trade flows better, you can be in and out of positions faster and easier without having to sit on your hands too long, or assume too much risk to make too small of a…

Nothing says “Happy New Year” like a new fear! Last year we fretted about the potential economic disaster that might have arisen from an extended bout of worldwide pandemic. The prolonged illness came to pass, but the economic malaise did not — at least according to the markets. Whatever long-term…

Anyone with even the slightest understanding of basic options theory will tell you that the value of an option decreases over time. This is known and often referred to as “time decay.” As a greek parameter it holds the title of “theta,” and colloquially some will call it “burn,” but…

I learned about FOMO four years ago as friends laughed at my continued ignorance of modern terms, or as I like to call them, lazy abbreviations. I can appreciate this particular shorthand a bit more for its muppet-like goofy sound and its lexical proximity to FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee)…

After a month of very little (good) trade, last week gave a glimmer of hope that near-term volatility might improve. The move could be blamed on a variety of culprits but the key component seems to be the looming possibility that inflation is rising faster than previously anticipated. Sure, the…

The market continues to rise and volatility continues to fall — somewhat. Although the relationship between market direction and volatility trends inversely, there’s obviously a limit to this. Stocks can rise forever, at whatever speed, but vol can never drop below zero, and its movement will slow tremendously as it…

Near the end of the ol’ floor days, a small minority of traders routinely supplied the vast majority of markets for customer-quoted prices in the VIX pit. The advent of negotiated trading (where brokers proffer hypothetical offers to secure their cut of a marketable order) permitted non-market-making traders to wait…

At 5:00 PM today, when the market reopened after its brief two day slumber, buyers quickly forced a 20 point rally in the S&P index. Not to be out done, a couple hours later the sellers decided they’d had enough of the optimism and swiftly pushed things in the other…