Explainers

Let it expire only if it will clearly finish out of the money. An option that ends $0.01 or more in the money is exercised automatically, so each long call you hold…

Buy only as many contracts as you can afford to see go to zero. Set a risk amount for the trade, such as 2% of the account, divide it by the premium per contract…

The most you can lose selling a put is the strike times 100, minus the premium you collected, per contract. You only reach it if the stock goes to zero: sell a 30…

Usually for one of three reasons: time decay ate part of the premium, implied volatility fell after an event such as earnings, or the stock moved less than the…

A swing trade is usually held from a couple of days to a few weeks. The setup sets the clock: a pattern on the daily chart should work within days, while a base on…

A cash account works for most swing traders, since holding overnight avoids day trade rules and T+1 settlement frees sale proceeds the next business day. A margin…

Put the stop where the setup would be proven wrong, which for a long trade is usually just below the most recent swing low. Add a buffer for normal price noise,…

It depends on the firm. Some ban opening or closing trades in a window around scheduled high-impact releases such as the jobs report, CPI and FOMC decisions, some…

You pay a fee to trade a firm's account under its rules. Reach the profit target without breaching a rule, such as the maximum drawdown or the daily loss limit, and…

Once you've passed an evaluation, you can withdraw your share of the profit in the funded account under the firm's payout rules. Most firms set conditions first,…

Breaching a hard limit, like the maximum drawdown or daily loss limit, usually ends the evaluation or funded account at once. Softer breaches, like some consistency…

Yes. If you still held the shares when the market closed on the day before the ex-dividend date, you get the dividend even if you sell on the ex-date itself. A buyer…

In a taxable account, dividends are taxed in the year they're paid, even if you reinvest them. Qualified dividends get the federal long-term capital gains brackets…

Divide the yearly income you want by your portfolio's dividend yield. At a 4% yield, $40,000 a year takes $1,000,000 invested; at 3%, about $1,333,333. Taxes raise…

The dividend is cash leaving the company, so each share is worth about that much less once it's paid out. From the ex-date on, buyers no longer get the payment, so…

Each row gives a company, its report date, the release time (before the open or after the close), whether the date is confirmed or estimated, and the consensus…

Most US companies release quarterly results either before the market opens at 9:30 a.m. Eastern or after it closes at 4:00 p.m., so the news reaches everyone at once…

Sell-side analysts at brokerages and banks publish their own forecasts for a company's earnings and revenue. Data providers collect those forecasts and average them,…

A beat on the quarter just ended is often outweighed by something else in the report: guidance below expectations, a revenue or margin miss, a beat that was smaller…

Rising rates tend to push dividend stock prices down. Safe yields compete with dividends, higher discount rates lower the present value of future payouts, and…

CPI, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, tracks prices urban consumers pay out of pocket. The PCE price index, from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, covers spending…

The FOMC publishes minutes three weeks after each decision. The statement and press conference give the decision; the minutes show the debate, including how many…