I am not an investor in the stocks so I may be speaking out of turn here. But I wonder why equity options are not a greater part of the daily discussion among my friends who invest in the stocks.
Equity options give one the right to buy or sell stocks at a set price, but no obligation is entailed. What turned me to this subject was an email from an American who mentioned his stock options had expired. He tried to explain it to me.
On the site Investopedia.com there are explanations aplenty but they make my head spin. I suppose if I had more money to spend I could play the markets and see what came of it. But I shy away from such things.
If you look at the market charts the numbers are all over the place. I suppose the most important thing is that the lines are moving up not down. Is it like this all over the world at the same time?
Apparently not. Although one market may do well today another market could edge down on the gist of some local news. And the wars in the Middle East make everything a bit nasty.
My email partner is thinking of investing in an exchange fund. They manage these with software from firms like TradeStation and the money is almost never handled by humans. Without that man in the middle the contract fees are held small. That sounds like a plum way to make money. Buy on the cheap and sell on the high.
But when I looked at a review of this TradeStation I could not see from the article if the company services the international market. Their website was not helpful either.
If you live outside the United States but you want to participate in the US markets how do you do that? My overseas friend could not answer that for me. I guess you have to work through a local firm who handles the international regulation.
Not that I think I would want to do such a thing. But my friend showed me this article about Warre Buffett, the American genius who is credited with revolutionizing finance. Everyone in America wants to be like him now. I guess he is their idea of a perfect businessman. He even wishes to pay more taxes on his wealth but their conservatives won't allow that. Poor bloke.
