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"McMillan is the top name in options education, bar none."
—Paul Stevens, President, Options Clearing Corp. and The Options Industry Council

"Larry wrote the book we built an industry on," notes Ned W. Bennett, CEO of OptionsXpress, referring to McMillan’s thick volume, Options as a Strategic Investment. A decade later, McMillan on Options focused on McMillan’s own personal strategies and favored techniques. Now comes Profit with Options, a treasure that complements his previous works and continues his legacy of educating investors on the benefits and strategies for incorporating options into a winning investment program.

Profit with Options is a unique course book that covers every phase of the options trading process step-by-step, and then reinforces individual concepts through end-of-chapter quizzes, thereby allowing readers to refine their skills. Each chapter covers a specific concept and closes with a set of review questions and answers that will assist the reader in implementing the material covered. Focused on practical ways to profit from stock, index, and futures options, this guide covers basic to advanced concepts and includes everything you need to consistently "profit with options." Learn how to determine whether to buy options or the underlying stock, use price and volume as technical indicators, apply index options as portfolio protection, and implement powerful volatility strategies.

When it comes to options trading education, no one is more respected than "Trader’s Hall of Fame" award-winner Larry McMillan. Through his bestselling books, popular newsletters, and packed trading workshops, he has become a true industry icon. In Profit with Options, McMillan’s newest offering, you’ll learn powerful, proven, and profitable options trading techniques with the expert guidance of one of the world’s foremost authorities.

User Reviews about Profit with Options: Essential Methods for Investing Success

The book is for a reader with some degree of investment and trading experience. Unlike the previous books by the author (Options as a Strategic Investment and McMillan on Options), this one covers each phase of the options trading process step-by-step, reinforces individual concepts, and thus allows you to hone and refine skills--in essence, a workbook or study guide. In other words, the aim of this book is study in repetition. You will revive in memory what you already new, and will probably pay attention to some minor new tips.

The unique characteristic of this book is that each chapter ends with a set of review questions and answers that will assist you in absorbing and implementing the material covered.

Chapter 1 moves right into the components of option price, using historical and implied volatility
to formulate your option trading strategy, and understanding the advantages an option model can provide. Plus, LEAPS, futures, and trading technology are each treated in detail.
Chapters 2 and 3 explain how to use options as both direct and contrary indicators, with examples showing how each can predict market direction and help you decide which options to buy under both scenarios.
Chapter 4 teaches you how to incorporate system trading into an overall options game plan and illustrates the value of taking the system approach. A variety of systems types are outlined that are applicable for both short-term and long-term investors.
Chapter 5 presents powerful methods for using options as "insurance" and portfolio protection, which is one of their key strengths.
Chapters 6 and 7 conclude with various strategies for profiting from trading volatility. I start by viewing volatility as a strategic indicator, and then move into both forward and reverse "skew" and spreading strategies. I then provide a more in-depth look at volatility analysis, the reasons behind volatility changes, and highlight the author's favorite strategy plus personal criteria for buying straddles, "follow-up" action, and selling naked options.
Each chapter of the workbook can stand on its own, but taken together, they form the basis of a well-rounded options trading program. With the end-of-chapter questions provided, you can test your knowledge of the concepts, techniques, and systems featured in Profit with Options before you need to put them into action in the real trading world. And this learn-by-example workbook should prepare you for making the right moves at the right time, while reacting swiftly to opportunities that arise in the fast-paced options arena.

As a conclusion, this hands-on guide will complement the previous two works by the author. If you didn't complete these two works, I don't recommend to start with this one.
-- An Addition to The Previous Two Works by The Author

This book could probably be considered the Chevy in McMillan's fleet, with McMillan on Options and Options as a Strategic Investment standing as the Cadillac and Corvette, respectively. It's a worthwhile addition, but if you're new to McMillan, you'd probably be better-served by one of his more well-known works.

This is a relatively short book that provides some tools for using options as direct or contrary indicators, and actual strategies for employing options to profit off expected movement in price or volatility. The book also provides some good guidelines for evaluating indicators like the put/call ratio (index and equity-only), VIX (old VIX, now VXO), and how to interpret volume in an options chain for possible signs of predictive insider trading. Later chapters get a little more complicated, covering some strategies for volatility buying and selling, etc.

The "workbook" end of this volume is rather thin, basically comprised of 12-20 questions at the end of every chapter covering what you've learned, with an answer index in back.

If you're a McMillan fan or new to options, you'll probably like this book. Otherwise, check into his better-known volumes first. -- Pricey, some good stuff