Human vs Machine

I'm not that active in trading options because I have limited capital. After 2 months of staring at the option quotes, I realize that I'm trading against machines! Yes, the buy/sell queues can change tremendously fast based on the price of the underlying shares. At first I was puzzle. I thought that the Americans can be really quick in pushing buttons. But then I saw the change correlates with the price, from there I remember something that 20-30% of the trading in US are done using computers (something like that, can't remember the actual figure).

Are machines going to replace humans? No wonder the advertisement for analyst includes building complex models/algorithm.

Anyhow, I think that human is still superior as compared to machine even though the hand cannot be as fast as CPU. This is still a research area and when the time arrives where the machine will be as good as the human, I think that, that will be the day trading will end as no fools will dare to go against the machine anymore.

Verizon

Made a 2 day trade with Verizon Jul 42.50 Put. I think that I'm going to change my strategy to buying low time value put options. Going down is much faster than going up. So, if I get it right the direction of the stock, can get a quick profit without risking my money in the market.

Halliburton (HAL)

Okay, I am bad in managing my option position. The swing for the option is so large. The correction from 5.90 to 3.80 is greater than I though. Thus, I decided to close out my October Call with a little bit of profit. I'm still having my PFE though and looking to close this position with a loss.

Lesson learned: Will not sit out any correction for options. Just buy/sell at swing ends.