ES

SwordfishBrilliant94

I see. For ES, what would you consider as high IV, also 90 percentile for 52 weeks? The DTE and strike to be determined depending on the situation. And for normal stock, sell a CSP when IV percentile spike up to 90 percentile. What about the DTE and strike? I am also thinking of opening one unit of long ES position when there is 20% crash next time. With enough liquidity without margin call to add on one more unit when it crashes to 30%, and another unit when it reaches 40%, that should be the max I can stretch. Do you think this can work? Or if it is better to manage via risk management to stop lost the 1st unit of ES first when the crash gets worst.

Ultimus_Omegus

I would sell puts on ES if i wanted to get assigned and didn’t care about IV. Otherwise for options on ES I want IV to be high. As for the duration and strike, you have to look at the numbers as they happen. If there was a big IV rise you could probably get same amount much further OTM. Make your opponent on the other side of the trade be forced tk shoot from half court not the free throw line, stack the odds in your favor. Further OTM = higher odds for you

SwordfishBrilliant94

Would you mind sharing why you think this is selling speculatively? I was using the support as the basis, and the distance to strike as the margin of safety. Would it be a good trade if there is an IV spike and then selling the same DTE and strike? What would be a general rule for you to open a ES short option trade apart from the IV spike? Thanks for taking time to answer me.

Ultimus_Omegus

No because the ES volatility is low unless your goal is to get assigned which is a different type of trade. If I am selling speculatively, the volatility need to Collapse hard and fast, that trade you will be stuck in it for almost the whole duration

SwordfishBrilliant94

On the ES option, I am thinking of opening a short position on ES 5800P Jul31 27DTE, it is selling at 11 now. Selecting 5800 because I think there is strong support. Selecting Jul31 expiry because it is regular and has more liquidity. Would you be opening this trade? Why and why not. How would you do it?

GotBannedAgain_2

U r golden. Shit is way overbought. 9 fucking Green Day’s in a row on ES. Market was waiting for 🥭 bukkake bill. Now that’s done, market will pull back. Sadly, my CCS is most likely fucked as it’s expiring on 7/11.

FanZealousideal1511

A milly and a half in SPY options? My man do you know what /ES and /NQ are?

samlinxia

What is your consideration of trading /ES options vs SPX options? I swing trade SPX options, but would like to hear your thoughts choose futures options over SPX.

Parunreborn

ES Daily RSI over 70 finally, looking for a top in a couple weeks max, then big drop

Emilio___Molestevez

$SPY reaches +1% at some point today but maybe after close, so I'm holding /ES

GotBannedAgain_2

I am never gonna touch fucking puts again. My SPX CCS is red as fuck. My ES short at 6310 is choking on Shrek’s dong. My clown ass brain is whispering: “it can’t keep going up!”. Fuck!!!😭

Ultimus_Omegus

Nothing, looks like my ES and NQ are doing well (I am long quite a few contracts) My strangles are also doing well Thus my play is go back to sleep

BasicDifficulty129

ES just did a dump and pump

SwordfishBrilliant94

What's your entry and exit criteria for ES options? Does it make sense to enter into short position today 60DTE 5% out

Ultimus_Omegus

Usually before a market crash the volatility is fairly low so typically I am not strangling something like ES (sp500 futures) because the vix is low And as they say, When the vix is low, watch out below My long positions will get exited as I have a set exit

GotBannedAgain_2

These will print. You’ve got time. We just closed 8th green day on ES. Sure, it can keep going up. But it’ll pullback and that’s when you’ll bank.

dub_soda

Much better off trading ES or NQ. Corn can be dicey

TimJC81

This is some shit action on the ES. Grindy ass shit chop .

TecmoBlow

The number of V shape recoveries in /ES futures this week is unreal.

Ultimus_Omegus

I am a trader meaning I am not trying to hold something long term unless its making money and hasn’t hit my exit. Thus, there are times I have cash, but my “portfolio” is constantly changing. There is one ticker SPY I will buy when it hits certain numbers like 10%, 20%, 30% down but once again I will sell it after a certain period. Example I have futures contracts on ES and Nq (sp500 and nasdaq futures) I have an exit planned should it reverse, but my profit potential is unlimited as I don’t have a target. For options, since I like to sell volatility (meaning I want vega exposure, and low delta) its easier to have “targets” because the amount I can make in a single trade is limited by the premium I took in.

Ultimus_Omegus

Oil has more plays when big OPEC meetings or geopolitical events like what happened recently. Corn and other aggs tend to be just twice a year. Gold is when it gets volatile. I tend to trade ES a lot its probabky my main one

vanisher_1

What markets are you trading more usually than others, stocks? Gold? ES? Oil? Corn?

TheBeasty_234

I’m trying to lend but ya I do understand though that SPX is probably the best to go to for boxes but I’m sadly not approved for SPX spreads but I am approved for futures spreads which makes no sense. Like how can I even be approved for futures spreads but not SPX? Like they approve me to like trade ES with like $250K exposure but not approve me for SPX? Makes perfect sense schwab

Ok_GAINZ

RTY instead of ES today

short-premium

yes that is correct, the cost of trading is slightly higher, but the capital you tie up is 3 times less. for e.g. to collect $150 in spx, you have to put down $1000 or somewhere close. and to get the same amount of credit you have to put down $350 in /ES. although this number goes up and down as market moves but still, give you better capital efficiency.

short-premium

Ok here is the proof. i just went into TOS, my preferred trading platform and picked up a 17 - 18 delta put option, 45 days out. this is what i would have sold if i was trading these vehicles. SPX spread is $0.80 and /ES is $0.5 saved it here. [https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Omu\_nfvZpQ8NfgF6kAvit3rkFNa\_JF49?usp=sharing](https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Omu_nfvZpQ8NfgF6kAvit3rkFNa_JF49?usp=sharing)

Adventurous_Way1999

Intriguing..pls share more details.. for /ES futures if I open a spread in TOS I pay like $6 for 1 contract..please share how you are doing it..

dip-the-buy

VIX is calculated and quoted 1 hour before the US *premarket* starts. Which is still far cry from covering SPX options GTH, but not as dumb as you picture. The lack of standardized ~around-the-clock volatility index sucks. For example, CME has a family of CVOL indexes on their futures: https://www.cmegroup.com/market-data/cme-group-benchmark-administration/cme-group-volatility-indexes.html , but they smartly omit one for the ES futures. Either to avoid IP fight with CBOE, or because they like to keep us in the dark.

Ultimus_Omegus

Your risk is dependent on what your position sizing. Future options trade almost around the clock with exception of weekends and have some great liquidity especially on ES. If you are doing that method of 1:1 your win rate can be above 80% and even in the 90’s.

Ultimus_Omegus

Its also an easy way to maintain consistency which is important as well. I mentioned before one thing I started with was trading ES futures options. Was easy to know if I sold a put for 3 points my exit was at 6 points

Ultimus_Omegus

I don’t trade LEAPS, if I am doing a longer term directional play I simply use future contracts. 2022 was an initial loss in Jan (because it started dropping) and then became a sizable profit. This is because I have risk management and a solid exit and solid rules for when to go short. 2% risk, long positions exit at 20 day low, enter short positions at a 55 day low. Once the volatility builds I weave into strangles and when ES (sp500 futures) is down 20-30% I became a willing owner and will slowly unwind shorts to become longs.

Ultimus_Omegus

If I can do the same strategy on futures I will always use that instead. IE if I was going to sell a put on SPY or ES (sp 500 futures) I would do the trade on ES always. My account is large enough I can position size accordingly to make the trade the same.

Ultimus_Omegus

Also the outside gaps is on ES futures open not the 930am EST gap. We had 3 gaps do the downside this year 1/27 2/3 And 4/3 The first two didn’t workout, The 4/3 one could netted a good 600 point run

Ultimus_Omegus

I personally don’t trade the DAX, I prefer the ES

Ultimus_Omegus

ES is the sp500 futures

Difficult-Text1690

What is ES?

Ultimus_Omegus

1) If you are selling spreads then you want them to be OTM, if you are selling spreads ITM thats the same as buying a spread OTM. Unless you mean selling the short leg slightly ITM and the long leg out which is more of a directional play (which I am not a fan of doing thjs either but it could work) 2) I don’t think Steve posts anything online, I will ask him when I talk with him though. I had just texted him today. Steve was very big into fibonacci‘s and knows the ES very well. I know he wrote a book before too

Ultimus_Omegus

Think or Swim ES futures

Ultimus_Omegus

I explained it in a couple replies: 1) Using ToS Iv Percentile 2) Using the various Vix’s. Lot of commodities have Vix’s and so do some stocks. There was a day too when the futures had Vix’s until CME and Cboe’s partnership ended. I learned a lot from watching those 3) Charting the premium of the option itself. Majority don’t know you can pull up the chart of the specific option and see what its been trading at. 4) Some of it is experience too. When you trade long enough and have watched products you know when something is high. IE feb 2018 in ES futures options ATM for 6 hour duration were over 100 points. I have traded ES so much I can look at the option pricing and typically know.

sidenote

I guess I mean, if you are looking at an option strike chart, it’s influenced by the market movement - so if /ES is down 1% then of course the puts are going to be elevated vs their recent history and so price alone seems like a difficult way to look at vega / overpriced option, no? I believe you probably have great intuition after so long, I’m trying to understand a more mathematical way to look at it.

Ultimus_Omegus

Most simple one is cash secured putd and covered calls. For more speculative plays, strangles when vol is high and or selling puts on dips on ES futures

Ultimus_Omegus

If the market dipped sell a put for assignment on ES futures and take that premium to buy SPX calls. If it rips upside you get a signifcant win and cash settlement. I have actually done this

nnellutla

How are you able to trade NQ ES future options with such pathetic liquidity. Please share your insights. I want to trade them as the margin requirements are less compared to SPX, NDX but with the liquidity, I'm not able to.

nnellutla

How are you able to trade NQ ES future options with such pathetic liquidity. Please share your insights. I want to trade them as the margin requirements are less compared to SPX, NDX but with the liquidity, I'm not able to.

jrp_123

Have you ever employed options spreads to capture the volatility moves in the NQ or ES moves at the open or at red folder news events?

AdditionalNothing997

Try /ES options, they trade with daily expirations and are fairly liquid

Ultimus_Omegus

I traded options on futures to start with. Basic strategy was timing my premium entry on SP500 futures and selling around 20 days out with an exit at about 50% premium gain. Stop loss was if premium doubled against me. I risked about 2% but when I started having a win rate over 90% I then upped it to 5% (I have since dropped back to 2% as my account grew) The way I timed it was looking at a strike and charting the premium of that strike (with a delts less than 10) and looking at the premium range for the last 7 days. I would go looking when the ES pulled back about .25-.5% . If the premium was trading at higher than 66% of the last 7 day range I would do a trade. Ie if the option ranged from 1 to 10 points and was at 7 points, I would sell it with a stop if it doubles to 14

Ultimus_Omegus

I prefer the SPY over VOO (more options) but over those I prefer ES because of tax purposes (yes ES has same tax as SPX but ES has less margin and you can get assigned contracts vs cash settlement)

prana_fish

This some bullshit choppy ass NQ/ES price action. I get pod bros are out in the Hamptons, but come on now.

OsoPlato

There are likely a few problems here. 1. Does ToS show live quotes for boxes? Most retail platforms don't and you probably need to see the existing quotes to get an idea of which strikes and dates are attracting interest. If you are seeing live box quotes then you should be able to trade at those prices or else something is wrong with the platform. 2. Boxes are usually traded using european options. ES and MES options are the standard monthly options and are american style. You want to use the weekly and EOM options on ES or MES futures which are european. Always check the contract specs to be sure the options are european. 3. Boxes are predominately an institutional trade so placing a retail sized mid-market order probably won't attract much attention. As you can see on [boxtrades.com](http://boxtrades.com), many trades are $1M+ with some as large as $100M and expiring months or even years from now. Its unlikely institutional traders are interested in a 5900-6100 3-week box unless you are offering significant size at a very attractive rate.

Maleficent-Ad987

Could you add ES and NQ futures contracts?

ConfederacyOfDunces_

ES with a new ATH. The globex session is early, but that is a classic P-shaped profile forming at the top. That profile means short covering. Low volume, short holiday week ahead. Makes sense for shorts to get out of the way, but there still needs to be a bid in the absence of short covering for this to at least hold or make everyone comfortable with a few ticks higher throughout the short week. What you are witnessing right now is a lot of short covering ahead of the low volume typical of a holiday week that is masquerading as buying.

EggyRepublic

just made $50 going long on ES. will be handing in my resume to citadel tomorrow

FullTard2000

Ive wasted 5 years trying to day trade the ES, that thing is designed to steal my money and I hope i never see it’s ugly chart again

jonnycoder4005

Is the SPX trying to compete with /ES for options volume? Outside of the difference in settlement... I fail to see why this is even a thing. Will the SPX start to track outside of normal market hours like /ES does? Is there some beef between the CME and the Cboe that we don't know about. Further spreading out liquidity among SPX and /ES widens the bid-ask spread and only benefits the HFTs and other market making firms that make money between the spreads--hurting all traders, retail and institutional. The move to every day expirations (< 35DTE) in both SPX and /ES has already increased slippage and increased bid-ask spreads, albeit by a small amount. What is the true purpose here?

Riptide34

It just means post-market. Supposedly the terms stems from back when they'd gather curbside outside the exchange to trade after-hours (in the early days of the stock exchange). Not really any difference, other than liquidity might be a tad better in Curb than GTH. I rarely trade curb. During the GTH hours, I usually have to give up a dime or so off mid-point to get filled. I usually trade the /ES futures options if I'm trading at night.

GrumpsMcWhooty

> Within 60 days I made 1760 SPY OTD trades.. My highly regarded brother, why TF did you not just scalp ES/MES instead?

dub_soda

Big money trading ES on that reversal. Humble brag but I called the exact bottom and top of that V. Have a good weekend degens

dub_soda

Big money trading ES on that reversal. Humble brag but I called the exact bottom and top of that V. Have a good weekend degens

dub_soda

lol I called 6223 for ES. Pretty close!

dub_soda

ES 6188.25 is the magic 50% level of the old daily gap. That’s the pivot point if it’s going to reverse

Parunreborn

RSI on ES 2H reaching 90, holy shit, overbought af

bornofsupernovae

That’s not true, I trade SPX and /ES. 😂

ConfederacyOfDunces_

ES just printed an all time high. Go figure that would happen in globex. Another function of the flows and structure that explains why we have so many fucking gaps in this chart.

MattZimm137

Not yet, but you know the market even a rumor of handshakes behind closed doors sends ES flying 50pts.

GotBannedAgain_2

Both ES and NQ r flying. TSLA staying in its hole. It’s killing premiums left and right. Holding over the weekend will make things worse, theta wise. And next week is a short week. I’d definitely reconsider holding this past tomorrow, Friday. But plz…not a financial advice. U do u. And good luck!

597822ARDILLA

Not unless /ES breaks 6174 IMO

597822ARDILLA

Can’t do shit here unless /ES breaks 6184.50 or 6174.00 😡

dub_soda

Mad respect to MMs for holding ES in this microscopic range since 3am.

Reasonable_Handle291

Don't vote for ES Futes. They're too low energy.

NationalOwl9561

Kinda confused because you recommend trading ES futures to OP to not blow up his account but now your'e saying "blowing up your account quick" with regards to trading futures. I don't personally trade with R:R explicitly drawn out. More of a mental note thing. I DO wonder if Schwab/ThinkorSwim has one of those features that locks you out if you lose a certain % of your capital.

SpaceViking85

I think it depends on your broker. I used Ninjatrader. You need $500 min per for ES contracts. $50 for the E-Mini contracts. ES is like $12.50/pt and MES is $1.25/pt. I personally only trade the S&P (ES/MES). I dont mess with the Nasdaq (NQ) or Russell. But, if you wanna talk about blowing up your account quick... lmao. You really gotta be good on planning entries and exits. I strongly recommend looking up R:R strategies (i usually put my profit target at 1pt, stop loss around 2pt. But it really depends on how volatile the trading session is). When my acct got big enough to safely do more than one contract at a time, I had it do two contracts. If it hit my first PT, then it would close out one contract and shift the second contract up so that the stop loss was now 1 tick above breakeven. That way, even if you get knocked out on the second contract, you profited from the first and got enough extra to cover the trading fees. I also made it so I have an auto-lock feature (depends on brokerage) in case I fuck up too many times in a day or week. It'll lock me out so I dont blow my wad immediately. This shit forces a little humility and control of the fear/greed shit.

SpaceViking85

Just move to trading the ES futures lol

Parunreborn

Ok I've been checking ES for 10 hours here and there and it seems it’s trading at 6140s forever, wth

Tasty-Laugh-5618

If we sell down to 6040 on ES_F Tesla should crash to 290 I will buy a Tesla call at 290 for a move to 320 The robotaxi event was great for the cult but the reality is uber and Waymo are heavily competing for the same space

Foreign-Coconut3500

so, meaningless, less than 1% increase in the margin. but guess what makes it even more meaningless? the fact that you should never trade futures with a broker that requires that much margin for a single NQ. last I checked my brokers require only 1k in margin from my acct balance for a single NQ and 1/10th that for the MNQ. ES = $500 or $50 for the micro. Much easier to leverage a smaller account using this lowered margin requirement.

bzboy

fuckit, I'm putting in a buy on Micro ES... it will probably just trickle back up through the day.

2mPike

You be better off trading ES on the e-mini markets than SPY 0dte.

Squamsk

Judging by the squiggly wigglies on ES, we're gonna dump, crab, then crawl

Squamsk

Judging by the squiggly wigglies on ES, we're gonna dump, crab, crawl

EnthusiasmSea850

If you trade spx or spy then you should know they follow ES future. I only look at ES chart when I trade. I got few screenshot that I can show it to you when market chop chop inside the range for few days or week before it either break out or down . How can I sent you those screenshot .

bvvr19

I'm sorry I'm new I don't know what you mean by MK chop or ES future if you happen to see this can you dumb this down into english? LMFAO

Diamondhands4dagainz

Lmao everything starting to run AH, tomorrow we hit ATH. ATH on the ES00 is 6166.50, We breached 6150 today lmao bers fuk

EnthusiasmSea850

No you don't need wider wing. I did with 25 points wide as long as mk chop and stay inside the range like last week when ES future stayed in range and pivot level was 6k or 6050 with sep contract. I stay out when mk either break down /out. I think tomorrow is good for iron butterfly after this . Usually mk will chop after squeeze then you can see the new structure

Proof-Conference-765

Futures much better /ES you can exit no theta

JoJoPizzaG

Not sure I understand the reason to join a prop firm to trade products that is already with crazy leverage.  I understand why with stock as you are limit to 4:1 and less if less than 25k.  Options and Futures have no such limits. Ampfutures for example has a $400 per contract for ES. 

Tasty-Laugh-5618

I just want a 40 point dump on ES_F 🤤

bzboy

ES sitting right on the PMH for the last 20 minutes. Just ... Waiting for something to happen.

Tasty-Laugh-5618

ES_F at 6150 Spy puts have a nice risk reward right here 🐻

Tasty-Laugh-5618

Just got filled on spy puts 6150 ES_F Crash now 🐻

Tasty-Laugh-5618

Come on spy keep pumping just a little bit more than crash 6150 should be a tremendous resistance in ES_F

Ok_GAINZ

NGL that spike down really fucked my ES position.

Tasty-Laugh-5618

We will see a push higher into 6150 on ES_F I will buy a spy put at 6150 for a crash down into 6100. Now 6130

Independent-Tree-985

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ES2WFevGM0g

933404

ES, NQ, etc., dipping. Commodities flat. Hmm 🤔

EggyRepublic

most obvious short on ES right now

Manic_Mania

Did /ES make a new ATH?

Khonsku

Things are far different in the year of 2025. The swings are not the same year before or 3 years ago. But it was similar to Trump's first presidency for couple of months. Instead of getting whipsawed from both side. \-Do this instead, draw your support and resistance levels the night before. \-Look at ES futures before market open, to get a sense as to market direction. \-Look at Gamma Exposure, are in positive gamma or negative gamma. (Unusual whales, spot gamma, barchart ) \- Wait 15 mins after market open, look at the GEX levels again. As they change after option prices get adjusted. \- Now you have a sense direction. \- DON'T fight the trend. \- If you're doing 0DTE sell a 14 delta credit spreads ( based on direction short/long ) \- If you're doing 7DTE sell a 20 delta credit spreads \- Profit target min 40% \- Credit received at least or close to 1/3rd of the width \- Start small as in do 1 trade, to get your feet wet. \- Journal these trades, add a screenshot of the chart, what was the delta when you sold, where was SPX , if you made a mistake you can look where you messed up. If you made profit, look at why this trade worked and how can you improve your trade. \- Good luck

Reasonable_Handle291

Bols over here drooling over ES pumping AH while Calls are forzen, and also over the statements of the 1 person with the least control over the situation. Ballistic missiles take 12 minutes to travel from Iran to Israel. F35s take under an hour along the same route. There's ~720 minutes between now and SPY/QQQ for absolutely nothing to happen in that time. Good luck Bols! 🖕🤡🖕

Foreign-Coconut3500

they better. im long ES.