Option

Emotional Options is like an old friend who knows just what to say when you're feeling unhappy or confused. Mandy Evans gives a clear guide to tackling your fears in a safe nonconfrontational way.
Old patterns can be dissolved by using a series of questions and the result is the creation of a fresh approach to life. The questions are simple but go deep to the source of our negative feelings--our belief structures that have probably been in place all of our lives.
Don't be fooled by the small size of the book. Each sentence is full and rich with wisdom that has changed my life on a personal and professional level. This is a book that can definitely make you happy.

Emotional Options is a concise, useful, practical tool for understanding yourself and the beliefs that get in the way of your happiness in the present. I have owned and used this book for over a decade and still find it helpful. It's better than all those other 'self-help' books with a million promises and a thousand pages. Mandy Evans writes with simplicity and wisdom making Emotional Options a book that is not only effective but real.

Many Evans' book is a wonderful introduction to the Option Method. It's simple, friendly, and easy to follow. I often give a copy to my clients after their first Option Method dialogue with me, so they can continue to use this wonderful self-help tool on their own. Mandy's book helps you discard those beliefs which no longer serve you, opening the door to dicovery of your own personal joys.

I agree that the story is sad and the author got the short end. That said, this isn't the Greek Tragedy that some seem to imply, nor is it a realistic account of David versus Goliath in the strictest sense.

First, Mr. Schooley brought much of the mess on himself. Not for raising the issues and bringing them to the attention of Merrill Lynch's management, but for hiding behind a facade of ethics and integrity while refusing to meet the company's internal investigators half way. Would that have compromised his ethics or integrity? I don't believe so.

Merrill Lynch's first responses seemed to include a sincere effort to resolve the complaints to the satisfaction of all. While Mr. Schooley refused to budge from his demands which he claims were based on integrity, he also had strange ideas about integrity. While he was rolling dice with his family's future by rocking the boat, he neglected to let his wife in on what he was doing. That is deceit, not integrity and is only different from adultery is degree.

Second, this book is supposed to be evidence placed in the court of public opinion. Yes, the public will side with Mr. Schooley because we always root for the underdog and he was treated unfairly. If he thinks that this book will make a difference in Merrill Lynch's bottom line I contend that he's naive. The public will do what the public does. They'll feel sorry for him, but will not hesitate for a second to follow Merrill Lynch's investment advice if it'll make them money. That's the way life works.

Third, I take issue with the claims made by Mr. Schooley and the attorney who wrote the forward that arbitration is a bad thing. From personal experience I think arbitration is useful, especially in our society where we litigate at the drop of the hat. Of course an attorney is going to oppose arbitration because in most suits the only winners are the attorneys.

I do recommend this book because does have lessons to be learned. What those lessons mean is up to you. The story reads well in spite of bogging down in places in the beginning. It has the usual metaphors reported by others: Greek tragedy, Biblical David versus Goliath, and the more philosophical Good vs. Evil. It even has a bit of Karmic irony. After Mr. Schooley's life started falling apart which included a divorce his ex-wife went to work for Merrill Lynch. What it doesn't have is anything that will cause the same outrage as the Enron debacle. You'll have to look elsewhere for that kind of story.

What happens if a stand-up kind of guy decides to follow the written code of ethics in his brokerage firm? Welll, the result is as if you sent a cub scout to join a den of vipers.

Keith Schooley, tired of the rollercoaster world of oil investing in Oklahoma, turned his hardworking skills to brokering for Merrill Lynch. He did well on all his exams, he was one of the top 10 rookie producers for his area. He read all the required codes of behavior and ethics as set down by the brokerage industry, and monitored by the SEC and the NSAD, the internal brokerage self-regulating body.

Schooley soon found out that his office co-workers and supervisors were playing a bit fast and loose with their own guidelines in order to pass exams and win contests. When Schooley notified Merrill Lynch of violations of the ethics code as set down in their own documentation, his findings were hardly received with cries of joy. Rather, a cover-up on the scale of the Watergate break-in resulted.

While the violations that Schooley uncovered were not of the type that got Michael Milliken and Ivan Boesky in trouble, they were disturbing. Financial institutions hold themselves to a strict code (theoretically) of behavior because they deal with other people's money. This is why the words "fidelity" and "fiduciary" and "trust" are adjectives in so many financial institution names. Their self-regulating bodies and the SEC are supposed to watch over their activities and punish unacceptable behavior. But "quis custodiet custodes ipsos?" or "who's watching the watchers?" The effectiveness of the self-regulating NSAD was a bit like asking the mastiff to guard the roast.

Schooley became obsessed with getting justice and setting things to rights. He ended up escalating the incidents to the point where his entire life was consumed.

What's interesting about this book is NOT the nature of the scandal; frankly this is small beans compared to some of the violations we've seen in the courts. What is interesting is the peek into the inner world of a regional brokerage office. The culture encourages contests "pour le sport" that is, just for the joy of winning; the prizes were nothing these guys couldn't have put on their platinum cards. The contests were a way to one-up the next guy and for the bigger bosses to enrich their bonuses. As far as taking care of the customer, including doing all in the customer's best interest and fully informing a client about the financial products they were investing in, that was not even a consideration. As one supervisor put it "Just sell."

Why read this book? The arbitration proceedings, which form a greater part of the book, are interesting to see how these guys operate. The view into a brokerage office will make you think again about the trust and faith you may be putting in your own broker. More Latin: Caveat Emptor (Buyer Beware.)

Memoirs are necessarily selective and subjective. They simply cannot cover everything as they share the thoughts and feelings as well as the perspectives and opinions of their author. to the extent that author wishes to share them (selectively). My own experience suggests that, in the "alley" of contemporary business, most of the "cats" are gray. It is therefore important to keep in mind that this is Schooley's account of what he believes happened...and did not happen...during his association with Merrill Lynch and thereafter. To his credit, he draws upon as many primary and secondary sources as possible to establish what he calls the "record," one which "can speak for itself."

What does it say? First, that an earnest, eager, and ambitious young man went to work for Merrill Lynch with the proverbial "high hopes" and "great expectations"; by the time he concluded his relationship, he had lost all respect for Merrill Lynch's organizational integrity. In this book, he explains why. Also, various circumstances and developments forced him to conduct rigorous soul-searching. Was he naive? Were his requests unreasonable? Should he have conducted himself differently? Was it all worth it to challenge such a large and powerful organization? Schooley responds to these and other questions in his book. Finally, the book says (to me at least) that it is difficult but not impossible for an individual to initiate and then sustain such a challenge. Perilous? Of course. Doomed to failure? Not necessarily.

Dante reserved the last (and worst) ring in hell for those who, in a moral crisis, preserve their neutrality. According to Schooley, there were many senior-level executives within the Merrill Lynch organization who did so as did officials at various regulatory agencies. I admire Schooley's efforts to act upon his principles when he composed a memorandum for Merrill Lynch's senior managers, informing them of various improprieties and possible illegalities as well as efforts to conceal them. I admire his efforts even more after he was dismissed and then threatened with litigation unless he remained silent (i.e. preserving his neutrality). His personal as well as professional sacrifices were numerous and substantial. Nonetheless, he persevered.

As Schooley's reader, I have no reason to question his sincerity or integrity and am unqualified to comment on the merits of his allegations. Nor do I presume to suggest that his book will achieve all of the objectives he had in mind when he wrote it. (Organizations as large and complicated as Merrill Lynch remind me of the fact that "jumbo" oil tankers must travel approximately 30 miles to reverse their direction.) I rate this book so highly because I think it raises a number of questions which must be addressed by senior-level corporate executives, especially now as other allegations are made by other Schooleys in their respective organizations. Schooley obviously believes that our society needs more "white cats" and fewer "black "cats," not only in the private sector but in publicly-funded regulatory agencies which have fiduciary responsibility to all citizens. Within the limitations of the memoir genre, I think this is a brilliant achievement.

This provides an excellent overview and introduction to VaR and issues surrounding it. A must read for any body involved with financial risk management.

Cannot think of any other book that gives you the basics and beyond of VAR. As an MBA student I liked most the practical examples. Mathematical stuff is kept to a minimum, even though it can be sometimes quite demanding. Jorion is one of the laeding academics on VAR. He "defends" the properties of VAR very well after some criticism on VAR (see Nassim Taleb's web page).

Dr. Jorion's book formally introduced the concept of VaR to me several years ago. It's written so that a novice in risk management can understand the concepts with ease.

A great book.

The book began with the author's recall of the suicide of his bond trader friend who lost about US$60K in one single Friday in 1982. Quite a sad story, but it did tell how serious the author was about trading and his sincerity of writing a good book that attempted to help traders and those aspiring ones. In my opinion, he did a very good job.

With fifty chapters of individual trading rules (one can refer to the sample page on Amazon.com), the author had discussed, with abundant of real life samples and without nonsense, most of the essential trading rules that I had read here and there in other trading books and had personally experienced, though not effectively put into practice. One might had already read a lot of trading books. I did. However, this one was so well written and organised that I would like to recommend it to anybody who wants to buy a book for easy reference to keep himself/herself well guarded against the ups and downs of trading life.

Written by a floor trade on the cbot, this book is simply a list of rules with brief 5 page explanations for each chapter. I found about most of the rules to be elementary to an intermediate trader. However, almost any trader regardless of experience can pick up a few tidbits in this book .. which is more than I can say for most trading books.

I give the book 3 stars for content, another star for being a very quick read, and another star for being cheap ...

This book is about the mindset and mental habits a trader needs to be successful in the markets. Every successful trading career has been a process of learning the "rules" in this book. If you can imagine a good friend with years of experience giving you advice on how to improve your trading; that is exactly how this book reads. This book IS NOT a "how to place a trade book." It IS an excellent book on what not to do once a trade has been placed. No book can replace the school of hard knocks every trader has to go through in order to succeed, but if you embrace the principles contained in this book and make them your own; you will save yourself a ton of money. You may even save yourself enough money to stay in the game.

This book has a few sample drafts of term sheets and other legal documents. That is not the primary focus of this book. You can hire that kind of talent (legal drafting) on a per hour basis. This book helps the owners make the BUSINESS decisions necessary to avoid hamstring their new venture during this difficult passage. Included is information about what to pay your independent directors, advisory board members and senior management. Also included is what percentage of the company the founders should expect to keep, how to avoid excessive dilution during an unfortunate down round and how to present your opportunity to potential investors. All of these BUSINESS decisions are beyond the discretion of attorneys in this area, they typically instruct the entrepreneur to reflect upon the topic and then the attorney will draft it to suit.

Wilmerding interviews individuals that are representative of players an entrepreneur will encounter in getting his business funded. These real world examples of how business (strategy) items are handled or viewed by third parties are the best part of his book.

As a corporate attorney specializing in the area of venture capital and private equity I just completed reading "Deal Terms." I found the book to be insightful and a good resource, particularly in areas that are outside of my traditional bailiwick as a lawyer. A recommend this book for those new to the venture capital area as well as experienced investors, entrepreneurs and professionals.

Mr. Wilmerding's book is a great reference for every venture capitalist, entrepreneur, and investment banker. I was very impressed with the analysis of actual deal sheets, and the recommendations on specific points within a deal.

Also of particular value is the focus on the preferred and convertible stocks. The in-depth analysis of both the simple and complex types of offerrings brings to light a lot on the topic, and what to watch out for with new laws and regulations regarding these documents.

This book is a must read for anyone doing financial deals of any type. Although I have been doing deals for over 20 years, there were a couple of points in particular that I took away from this book that I now use in all the deals I do. We also had one of our portfolio entrepreneurs read it, who took away a lot and now uses this book as their "standard" for the types of deals they do.

Want to know what venture capitalists really think about deals and how they structure them? It's in this book.

If you dont understand what the words Futures/options are and you want to know it, this is the place to start. hull(from McGil i think!) has excellently presented information on these subjects for the student as well as for the practitioner. As a student of MBA(finance) this was the prescribed text and I can safely say this compares with the best. sepcifically this book deals with the entire gamut of Futures/Options/Swaps with mathematical models where required. From CBOT to this day!!

Hull wrote a classic book for the introduction to futures and options markets. It's for the serious reader who doesn't want to all the deviations and basics of option pricings. If, after reading this book, you're still interested in derivatives you cann proceed with Hull's "Options, Futures, and Other Derivative Securities", Kolb's "Futures, Options, and Swaps", or for the very ambitious student Wilmott's "Derivatives or Quantitative Finance".

The material is similar to his other book, Options Futures and Other Derivatives, but much more easy to read. With Brealy & Myers, this forms a good complementary text.

Although I doubt that a DM without the Munchkin syndrome can lead several PC to such apexes of power without getting a few clues on how to run the campaign, the high level campaigns has several very good guiding lights for those DMs that have strayed into the darkness and can't get out ( overpowerful items, characters, and other forms of blight). This should have included some type of section dealing with STRIPPING overly mighty characters of their powers within the bounds of rational role-playing. Overall, I find that some sections of this book should have actually been included in the basic rules several years ago, rather than be used as a leaky life-boat for a dying game. Useful, but less than spectacular.

This book is excellent, it can help extremely to improve the real role-playing of a high-level campaign. Not only does it help the DM make very interesting adventures, but it includes some very cool high-level abilities for characters that manage to get to high levels. It also includes a section devoted to characters who achieve 30th level, and how a mortal can attain godhood. Highly recommended.

Chapter 1 is about how to avoid irrealistic powerful characters! (very useful with high level characters)

Chapter 2 is about how to plan and organize an adventure. It shows clearly on what a DM has to take a look. (very helpful for every DM)

Chapter 3-5 is about the dangers with magic. It explains how to integrate magic in the right way in an adventure. (very very good!! it's so simple to destroy the game with to much magic)

chapter 7 : learn managing high level characters

This is a very good and usefull book, and I have the impression that good books are becomming rare; to much comerce!!

Now in an fully updated third edition, The Entrepreneur's Guide To Equity Compensation from the Foundation for Enterprise Development provides an excellent and highly recommended introduction to the hows, whys, and wherefores of employee ownership, as well as how empowered employees can help build a cutting-edge, proactive organization. Individual chapters address both individual-based and company-wide stock plans, savings plans that can hold employer stocks, crucial issues that can interfere with success, and much, much more. A recommended primer for any employer, for The Entrepreneur's Guide To Equity Compensation costs far less than what an unwise stock options decision would impose upon a corporate bottom line!

This excellent and clear explanation of approaches to equity plans, provides a guide to creating an employee ownership strategy. The book covers: stock grants; direct stock purchase programs; stock option plans; qualified employee stock purchase programs (ESPPs); employee stock ownership programs (ESOPs); 401(k) and other qualified retirement plans; nonqualified deferred compensation plans; stock appreciation rights and phantom plans; stock programs for American companies operating abroad; and the most suitable equity arrangement for various types of legal forms of companies. Explains the concept, pros and cons, and tax and cost implications. Viewing this work as a compensation consultant, I find it to be an outstanding reference, providing highly accessible explanations. Very highly recommended.

I have used the Entrepreneur's Guide for several years. It is an excellent tool - comprehensive yet easy to understand and logically organized. It presents a very complex area in a clear fashion that goes a long way to helping the interested person decide on a general approach to equity compensation that will fit their needs and help reach their goals for a very reasonable cost. I recommend it to anyone considering exploring an equity compensation strategy of any kind.

If it so good why would SOMEONE bother writing the same review over and over again. I have written many of covered calls and 25% is a bit lofty for a return. Look into more honestly reviewed/written books for details/strategies and see what you can do experientially. Start small and watch what happens to your returns on an annualized basis. Have an exit strategy before you start.

I found this book to be very interesting and powerful in that it not only provides a simple covered call strategy but a stock selection method that complements the overall strategy. The book gives any one the basics to set up a conservative covered call portfolio that should provide a comfortable income. You can order a set of CD's that implements the book's basics and the CD's are very reasonable.
I have set up my IRA account to implement the covered call/ stock program set forth in this book.

Over the last five years, I've examined hundreds of schemes for making money in the stock market. Now, I don't want to say anything bad about all those schemes, but I will say this: The concepts in The Money Tree actually work as advertised! I am retired, and need to make my meager resources last out my lifetime. My lack of success in the market had me ready to put my money in a 2% savings account and hibernate. But then I read this book. It has literally changed my life.

If you are brand new to the world of stocks and options (like me), this is NOT the book for you. This book is 180º from "easy". Reading this has been an exercise in massive frustration. Every other sentence was greek to me, even from the first chapter onwards.

I purchased this book based on the customer reviews below. All gave it high marks. The mistake I made was not recognizing that most of the reviewers were already well versed in not only trading, but the language of trading. Furthermore, all of the other editorial reviews and quotes that I found on this book are from people in the business of stocks. This is like asking a Unix coder if a piece of software is "easy to use." They will not be able to give a true answer because they no longer remember what a beginner's mind is.

This actually may be a very, very well written book. The only error may be the incorrect cover and title, saying that it was written for the complete beginner, the complete and utter idiot. That is just not true. Scott Barrie may be the best options trader in the world, he may also be a brilliant writer. Neither of these qualify him to write a beginner's book. It takes extraordinary skills to take a complex topic and describe it so that anyone can understand.

If you have to start somewhere it might as well be here. This book is one of a kind. It opens up the world of futures and options perfectly. The author, Mr.Barrie, doesn't hesitate to tell you about your risks potential. He emphasizes it over and over in fact. The only thing he doesn't develop fully is why futures and options are so risky.

In my 11 years as a futures investor, broker, and author, I have come to discover that leverage is the criminal that makes futures so risky. If Mr.Barrie had spent more time developing that along with some solidly proven money management techniques I would have given him a 5 star rating.

I personally prefer stock, bonds, and mutual funds, but you can make a ton of money trading futures and options. As the author says "People can reap huge profits, or lose their shirts".

The book gives a very good overview of all the major markets, including history of futures trading as well as how large an order should be, the typical margin put up, and how volitle of and investment a particular futures market can be, like advising corn as a good starting point and staying away from metals. I also agree with that philosophy. Another thing the author does in explaing the markets that i like is that he informs the reader of all the factors that can influence price fluctuations and how to try to time your movements into and out of the markets based on these trends. I also like that he does admit that there is a time to sell a winner and to sell a loser to cut your loses instead of going deeper in debt. sometimes it is best to get out after your first margin call.

The thing that I think makes the book most valuable are the options strategies. These also work very well with stocks and some index funds. As the author states these are very limited profit potential, but there is also very little risk. If you guess the market pretty well then there is almost no risk. My favorite of these is also the most basic the straddle option. Here you can make money if prices go up on down, but not if they remain fairly consistent. You typically purchase and at the money call ( right to buy) option and an at the money put option ( right to sell)the only risk involved is the money that is initially paid for the option. Both are purchase at roughly the same strike price so if a price swing up or down will net the option holder some money. Their are other strategies such as the bear put spread, and bull call spread as well as married options were you are actually buying futures. I personally do not like the three becasue all involve selling an options contract which theoretically can have unlimited loss potential. Unless you are very experienced and have a good track record stay away from them.

In conclusion options and futures are very risky intruments. I would advise simply playing the stocks and funds, but if you like this market i would advise buying optiosn, the most you risk there is the amount you paid for the options, and there are no margin calls, I persoanlly know someone who was almost driven to bankruptcy becasue he did not know what he was doing and got into the futures market. I must admit though that the futures market intrests me more than and other area of finance and investing.