Will I be able to make tons of $ after attending a $6k course?

Is it the follow-thru impact after my InvestFair 09 talk two weeks ago? I got frequent questions from a number of people who are asking for my opinion on options courses that are being run in Singapore.

If you are in a rush to pay $6k to attend a 2-day or 3-day options trading course, and your objective is to make quick bucks in the shortest time frame possible, I would urge you to donate the same sum to charitable organizations in Singapore because you can get 2.5 times of deduction against your income in 2009, and you will help other folks.

The market is cruel. However, what makes us think that trading is as easy as writing "ABC"? What makes us think that by putting $6k with someone, we can make quick bucks in the short period of time. Is this guy selling us a dream?

Options trading is a tough game, and yet it is possible to make money when one is committed to learn in the manner in which professional options traders are trading. For every hour of actual trading experience one can clock, he/she would have to put in at least 10 times of the effort.

In some of these advertisements in the Straits' Times, it was alleged that one can spend only 15 to 20 minutes a day to do trading. While I don't deny the correctness of this statement, it must be read in the right context. It is true if we are referring to people who have been in trading business day in day out. In other words, we are talking about seasoned traders. It cannot be applied in my opinion to newbies.

If you think by putting $6k with a trader who is teaching you how to trade options successfully and allow you to make lots of money from options trading in a short period of time, please do your due diligence by asking this person a couple of things. You are doing yourself a favour by asking these questions so that you know this "teacher" is not selling you a dream which is not real in the real world (perhaps it is true in lala-land).

I have nothing against anyone who is committed to learn and master options trading. However, I continue to stress that one should learn the stuff from someone who is ex-floor trader or at least has been trained by ex-floor trader. if whoever taught you cannot explain the things I wrote in my blog, and is however telling you that you must believe in those myths, please re-consider.

Whoever told you that you need not study delta, gamma, theta and vega, and you don't need to pay attention to the volatility, and whoever told you not to buy out-of-the money option without explaining in maths why this is the case, you know what to do.

Whoever told you that you must be options sellers because 80% of the options expire worthless, and whoever is teaching you to do high risk high probability trade without explaining profitability versus probability, you know what to do.

Finally, if whoever is telling you to do short-term trading (like intraday trading), and if he fails to explain to you the PDT rule, you know what to do.

Trading is not as easy as what the public might think, I reiterate. Trading consists of hard work, and is an art. If we are willing to spend time and treat this as a business (I have discussed this in my Optionetics February 09 monthly online forum), then it is possible to survive in long run. If we are not prepared to spend that kind of hours, I would recommend that you forget about trading, and you pass me the money instead and I will spend it for you.

Good luck for those who have read the ST and are about to pay $6k for an options course thinking that they can attack the market immediately. We love you!