• Use the upper left quote system from Stockpoint to get data.
• Enter the stock symbol in the text box.
• Click the Go button to retrieve Optionetics stock option quotes and option chains.
• Index symbols require that a $ be in front of the symbol.

Symbol lookup for the Optionetics Platinum web site is performed using the text box in the center of the page.

• Enter the first few letters of the stock name.
• Click the symbol search link.

This link is in the left side navigation bar. Clicking it brings the user back to the Optionetics Platinum Login page.

On the home page, on the right, are navigation links which are explained next.

The stocks login link at the top of this help page takes you to the Optionetics Platinum Stocks Login page. You must be a registered user and have a password to login. New users can register for a free trail period on the site using the Free Trial link on the Free Trial gif. We recommend reading the Online Manual before obtaining the free trial. After the free period you must pay the monthly or yearly fee to continue using the Optionetics Platinum site. Use the How to Subscribe link to become a registered member. Try again at a later time if the site does not interest you. We are continuously improving the Optionetics Platinum site. Platinum v2.0 will be released by June 2001.

The Help Manual Online link loads the online help manual for reading. Chapter 4 > Quick Start gets a user "up to speed" fast. The Download link allows you to download the entire help manual and read it offline. Read the "Readme.txt" file located in the directory where you unzipped the help manual to start using the offline manual.

Ranker: The Expensive and Cheap links brings up the high and low implied volatility rankings for the stocks in our database. The percentile IV ranker is used. We do not rank stocks with a closing price of less than 12.5. We allow stocks with no volume that day to be in the ranking. Multiple stocks are often at their highs or their lows. The ranking reverts to ranking by volume for all stocks that have the same implied volatility rankings. The rankings can be used to form trading strategies based on the fact that volatility usually returns back to the mean. A simple strategy is to buy options that have historically low volatility and sell options that have high volatility.

Explosive and Quit use the highest high and lowest low IV for the ranking. Breakout Hi and Breakout Low use the Bollinger Bands to determine if the IV is breaking out of a channel.

Our historical data starts 2 years and 1 month from today's date. The ranking will use up to 2 years of historical data. We began using full historical 2 year data rankings in Feb 2000.

Each stock name in the tables is linked to go to find a trade for that stock. CLICK the stock name to go there.

Call Top % Inc finds the option call prices that had the largest 1 day increase and ranks the options according to the percent increase.

Call Bot % Dec finds the option call prices that had the largest 1 day decrease and ranks the options according to the percent decrease.

Put Top % Inc finds the option put prices that had the largest 1 day increase and ranks the options according to the percent increase.

Put Bot % Dec finds the option put prices that had the largest 1 day decrease and ranks the options according to the percent decrease.

Highest Volume finds the options that had the largest 1 day total trading volume and ranks the options according to the volume.

Highest Open finds the options that had the largest 1 day total Open Interest and ranks the options according to the Option Interest.

In the above tables, clicking an option symbol takes you to the risk graph with that option trade loaded.

Bollinger bands around the implied volatility are created as follows

• Compute today's 20 day moving average of the IV (the mean)
• Compute today's 20 day standard deviation (the 1 sigma value)
• Compute the IV Bollinger band value + 2 standard deviations above the mean and -2 standard deviations below the mean.

During periods of high volatility, the bands expand and during periods of low volatility the bands shrink. Bollinger Bands are often used with stock prices.

When a stock price crosses a Bollinger Band, the crossing is an indication the stock price possibly breaking out in that direction. An implied volatility that is near the high Bollinger band (the values in the Bollinger web page column marked "high") and is breaking out from a period of relative low volatility to one of higher volatility is an indication these options may represent buying opportunities. For example, buy a straddle. An implied volatility that is near the low Bollinger band (the values in the Bollinger web page column marked "low") and is breaking out from a period of relative high volatility to one of lower volatility is an indication these options may represent selling opportunities. For example, sell a straddle.

The Bollinger web page column marked "Current" is today's implied volatility value. The Bollinger web page column marked "%Chg" is the percent change in today's implied volatility value versus the prior trading day's value.