Hi Void,

If youd like some more info on the Greeks, you could have a read of an article series I wrote.
Here is part 1.
http://www.optionetics.com/market/articles/19033

enjoy,
regards,
Matt

thank you for the reply.
what's this platinum stuff?
i see this on optionetics site as well.
looks like it's a subscription only access.
any details on platinum?
cost and platinum features you like etc.?

i haven't used any risk graph
analysis tool till now.
i will try it for various strategies and
hopefully, that should increase my understanding.
i need to first get access to this tool.

BTW: I really appreciate your clear and organized
thinking. It's evident from your message.

Thanks.

Hi Void,

Just punch in your 4 legged position into Plantinum or Think or Swim Analyze Risk and it will give you the risk graph and the greeks for the position.

If you are having trouble understanding the greeks go back a few steps. First we need to get our head around the greeks for sinle options: Long Call, Long Put, Short call, Short Put. Then step it up to 2 leg positions: Long & Short Verticle spreads, both Puts and Calls, then Time Spreads, long and short, same strikes & diagonals.

If we have missed something with 2 legs, we will struggle to understand 3 & 4 Leg Trades. Similarly, trades involving different months are more involved than all the legs in the same expiry month.

Cheers,

PS. It is probable that you will get more specific answers if you do ask more specific questions.

Folks,

i am new to this stuff and getting confused
about the greeks. please let me explain my
confusion so that some one may be able to
clarify this for me.

i am considering 4 legged positions involving
debit and/or credit spreads and possibly
diagonal spreads.

there are many possible characteristics for the
entire position:

- long or short
- bullish/bearish/sideways/breakout scenarios
for the underlying asset price
- bullish/bearish/neutral/breakout scenarios
for the underlying IV

also, the position has different states,
max loss asset price(s)/range,
break even asset price(s),
max profit asset price(s)/range,
and the delta, gamma, theta, vega are dynamically
changing as the asset price is moving among
these different states of the position.
you want different characteristics for these
greeks in those different states of your
position during the life of your position.

to start with, are there any
graph/chart kind of tools for the greeks of
a position covering those different states
of the position. in other words, i want to
see the values of the greeks for my position
in a chart form for different asset prices
covering those different states of my position?

what i am visualizing seems to be complex.
may be i am simply getting confused.

can someone give me a gist of this following:
for each possible position scenario,
what is desired.
(+ve delta, -ve gamma, +ve theta, +ve vega)
kind of an answer is what i am looking for.

if you think this is too time consuming,
and i think it is,
please refer me to some good book at least.

Thanks.