Replies to post #108318 on Biotech Values

[DewDiligence]

I'm sure you know the options game as well as anyone, even though you more or less disdain it, and you know that a lot of options plays--selling married calls, for example--are certainly not meant to be a recipe for "excitement". Quite the contrary, it's a risk-reduction technique, as well as--at times--a way of generating remarkable gains without taking on excitement (risk).

Hogwash, medchal. If one cannot tolerate the risk of owning X shares of MNTA outright, then one can reduce the risk by simply owning Y shares, where Y<X.

Most investors who play with options will end up losing money as a result, even when they believe they are engaging in clever hedging strategies that purportedly reduce risk without commensurately reducing upside. In addition to the cumulative drag of transaction costs/bid-ask spreads on options trading, investors can’t ascertain the timing of market-moving events as well as they think they can. Show me an option strategy for MNTA and in almost every case I’ll show you an optionless strategy that works as well or better once you dispense with the pretenses about event timing.

[HattieTheWitch]

I too have made some good money selling covered calls on MNTA - but as a previous post of mine mentioned, I'd like to control some more shares for speculation purposes: so I may also be an option buyer.