All right, good morning traders and welcome to the pro trader webinar as you know all this week It's been a focus here on options. So Today we have this week. It's been We've done a few webinars with him in the past and maybe you guys remember Doug He's been heavily heavily involved with the Spot gamma guys or in options doing the You know looking at options and the hero indicator that's within book map from spot gamma and then Looking for edges with that That indicator he had a great webinar. I'll put it into the chat like a couple weeks ago, I think Doug and It was excellent on this kickoff strategy. So This this week as the options You know focus on the pro trader webinar We had Brent Kachuba from spot gamma on Monday and he talked about a lot of different interesting things I think what Doug wanted to show here was also regards to Opportunities in the order flow from those Some of the Concepts that Brent was talking about because some big moves happen that Monday right in line with what? Brent was talking about so Let's get involved in here. Doug's well got a kind of a long along Intro here or biography. I've been trading options from around 2008 selling premium He's worked with a lot of different people from mentors and then After being introduced to trading futures in 2019 he went deeper into the futures markets and order flow and then discovered in early 2020 the spot gamma And has been working More in line with the back into the options where he previously came from so He's on Twitter. He writes articles for spot gamma, etc. He's in our discord channel here and We have all sorts of stuff here with Doug and want to do more with Doug so I have his Twitter his spot gamma articles and his Spot gamma article for presentation. I'll put put all of these into the chat for you guys. You can go back and look at these As well as the webinar that he did with us a few weeks ago General disclosure got to go through these disclosures over to Doug All book map limited materials information and presentations are for educational purposes only and should not be considered specific investment advice nor recommendations risk disclosure trading futures equities and digital currencies Involves the substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results Doug take it away. So let me pop out the screen here and Let you Go for it here Okay Are we all set? We are all set Okay, how's my volume? You're great okay What I want to talk about today is my options based approach to day trading futures and stocks and that means I look at how traders and investors are positioned in the options market and how these positions shift from day to day to plan and prepare for the day and also to Make trading decisions during the day and just to be clear. I do trade options I sell Strangles in the S&P 500 These are long-term far out of the money calls and puts and I have a very Specific plan for doing that. That's kind of beyond the scope of of this presentation. Although I do Look at the spot gamma levels and the order flowing bookmap to Place those trades during the day or leg in and leg out of of trades and What I want to talk about today Are first my key tenets and these are my core beliefs that that kind of guide my trading and I'll show plenty of examples of these I've got three core tenets and I'll show Show examples for each and then I want to talk about my approach to trading and This will be a review of a presentation that I did About a year ago where I covered this information And then finally the third thing I want to talk about is the trade example and as Bruce mentioned I want to talk about the ES On Monday and this is a follow-up to the presentation that that Brent did for spot gamma and he laid out the background information and the thesis based on Based on the options and options expiration The main monthly expiration last Friday and then I want to follow up and show how that day played out And how well that thesis worked out for the day So first my key tenets the first one is that options trading and the resulting Market maker hedging activity is a key driver of order flow and equity index futures ES and NQ and many stocks and that doesn't that doesn't work every day all day for every every stock and Index future, but it it it does work consistently And in the second tenant is price seeks liquidity key gamma levels and those are the Gamma levels based on What spike gamma Indicates and then round numbers and finally this is a new one Confirmation leads to trend continuity continuity and to be honest I learned that somewhere else, but it's It I'll show examples of that and show how how it works. So let's take a look at Some examples of the first first key tenant here and Can everybody see the screenshot? Yeah, looks good. Okay This is Let me go back Zoom in just a little bit What we're looking at here is spot gamma hero. This is a web-based version of Spot gamma so there's book map hero and that was the the original version of hero and hero stands for hedging impact of real-time options and this shows How traders are Trading calls and puts during the day and then market makers have to respond With either buying or selling The underlying to hedge their delta exposure as an example Let's say traders are buying calls Market makers sell the calls and that is a negative delta position and they want to maintain Neutral delta so they will buy the underlying buying the stock Or in the case of futures, they will buy ES for trades and SPX and spy to hedge their delta exposure the One nice thing about this Spot gamma hero is that allows you to separate Puts and calls so you can see how traders are Trading puts and calls and we'll we'll see that in a minute and then this and this first example here this is showing a Combined signal of calls and puts and As you can see there's a very close correspondence between the the market maker Or the options trades and the market maker hedging activity and price and You know and here it's actually somewhat of a leading indicator in the first few minutes as price rises and The options trading are neutral to starting to be bearish and Here's another one for AMD AMD is a stock that I follow that responds very well to Options trading so I have a number of examples of AMD Here this is showing the separation of call and put transactions and you can clearly see that the call transactions traders are buying calls and this is Driving the stock price and this is a very powerful Driver of a price action You know again going back to my example traders are buying calls Market makers are selling the calls. They have to buy by stock to hedge their delta exposure and this this can turn into a a Kind of a feedback loop that continues and continues and the thing about Traders buying calls or buying puts is there's no limit to the upside so it just keeps going and going and again a very close correspondence between the call buying and and The price action and you can see when that when the calls drop off here for example the price Price stalls until the Options trading gets going again Here's an example for meta one for Microsoft Microsoft is kind of on and off it it sometimes responds to Options trading sometimes not so much but here, you know, it's clearly responding to traders buying calls Nvidia is another stock that responds very well to Options trading activity and you can see here as soon as the the call buying gets started price Price jumps pretty sharply Another one for Nvidia again a close correspondence between price action and In options trading What what I've showed so far is is one way that I Use hero and that is for a confirmation Kind of a corresponding Something that corresponds directly to price activity What often occurs in QQQ and spy the the index ETFs is Hero can act as a leading indicator and that's a another way that I use hero and here's an example in QQQ showing a very clear lead between the options trading and And a drop in price So you can see here that traders are Selling calls and buying puts from the open and price rises up to Well, it looks like about 1015 or so and then starts to respond to the options trading activity And it also looks like the options trading here is leading a reversal Around noon So this is clearly an advantage when You know if you're trading yes or in queue or or spy in QQQ So Doug Yeah So some of those other examples, I mean they were trending very nicely together right here. It's not And this is where you're looking for your edge. Is this your back to your kickoff strategy? Yes, this is You know part of the kickoff strategy again for stocks almost always Hero acts as a a corresponding confirmation You know almost a one-to-one maybe a little bit of a lead Driving price action a confirmation And it can do that in QQQ and spy but it Well often or it can act as a leading indicator You just have to be patient and wait for your wait for the signals that you see in book map to Take the trade so you know looking here You know you would And I don't have the a screenshot of of QQQ or in queue for the day but you know seeing this here you would just wait for Wait for a signal and you'd have to wait pretty patiently you know almost an hour before this played out and You know again, I'm sure there were you know pretty you know pretty good signals and and Book map showing that this was a top and you know you can you know Even if you wait to hear and see a lower high, you know, this would be a good good entry point And here's an example in spy showing hero to be a confirmation here and then You can see that it It slows down levels off and then starts to fall lower Before price drops and then starts to rise again before price reverses at this 410 Key gamma level it's the put wall Which often acts as a support level also the key gamma strike in the hedge wall So this is you know just a clear clear signal of a of a turnaround so once you see this see hero rising and then price heading down to this key gamma level the Key is to just wait until you see the reversal at this level and then then enter long and again, this is spy and This this is the more This is the behavior that I'm looking for From hero and the options market in and spy and ES as a leading indicator What what I mean, I just love I loved your previous presentation On that kickoff strategy. I mean the simplicity and clarity of it is is brilliant I'm just I'm wondering like when you're looking at book map in the order flow What kind of time frame are you looking at? You know, like are you kind of zoomed out a bunch? or I Mean that kind of clarity in the order flow has to be there I I I prefer to stay zoomed out a bit. I I Really don't scout that much. So I I look at a larger time frame. I may trade spy. You know, I trade spy quite a bit my my core position like I said is is Selling strangles and spy and then I may scalp around that during the day or you know trade around that during the day, but You know, so I I prefer to stay zoomed out a bit and and see the bigger picture and This is another example and spy showing Trader selling calls So pretty much from the open from 935 On on through almost noon traders were selling calls and eventually spy rolls over in Correspondence to that. I think you know, there are a lot of other I mentioned in the webinar that I did a few weeks ago that that ES spy and SPX You know, that's a complicated product made up of of those three products the S&P 500 and You know, there's a lot going on and sometimes it seems to take a while for Price action to respond to the options options trading But you know, again, here's another example showing this options trading activity as a leading indicator for a move down and then here's Tesla and Tesla is a stock that responds almost one-to-one tick for tick with with options trading activity and I I think that is because market makers must respond instantly to With their hedges to options trades. All right, so that is different from others though Yeah, so that Well, I I think it's most prevalent and the stocks that I follow in Tesla the one-to-one tick-for-tick correspondence with with market maker With options trades and market maker hedging activity Hmm, so then I'm just kind of curious like then do you feel like with the indexes that They just kind of let it they don't I mean, maybe they'll just kind of hedge it a little bit later or I Don't you know, maybe Immediately, but it goes against them and they don't care. I mean, I Guess that's the thing and maybe it takes Make it takes longer to to turn around a big ship. I I that That behavior that leading indicator Occurs most often and spy and ES and then after that Maybe a little bit less prevalent in QQQ But it is a it's something to watch for in and spy and ES Okay, so those were my examples for the first tenet Again Options trading and is a key driver of order flow the second tenet price seeks liquidity key gamma levels and round numbers and I have some examples there and this The liquidity is very apparent in stocks, that's one of the advantages of trading stocks with book map you can see the the resting liquidity in the order book and and You can see here an apple that this liquidity comes in right at the cash open and price keeps going up to each level until finally it's absorbed at 158 so the the targets in and stocks are often very clear and this is Another AMD example and this is from Wednesday the right after the FOMC announcement and press conference and What's interesting here is that immediate? AMD drops down to the put wall, which is Typically considered a sport support level and also the liquidity at that level Shoots up to the call wall and the liquidity at that level the call wall is a resistance level and Then goes back down to the put wall You know just a great great setup there knowing those levels and So again, that is from from Wednesday the FOMC announcement and press conference this is for ES and And these I'm showing Two levels of notes and lines here These are the spot gamma levels that are provided in the cloud nodes by To spot gamma subscribers And then I have my own notes here That I that I add so this shows price reversing at the Quiddity and this gamma level is combo combo l3 level. It's also SPX 41 50 and Also ES 41 50 so this kind of cluster of levels and the quiddity and then price moves up to This cluster of levels 4300 Then the SPX volatility trigger and the spy volatility trigger so You know all those levels were in play Here's another example for ES In these spot gamma spot gamma provides Notes for their subscribers one in the morning and that's what I use for my planning Along with some other things that we'll take a look at with that example Some other information One of those pieces of information is support and resistance levels Based on the the gamma levels so here this this example shows price reversing lower at this call wall resistance level That is SPX 4,000 it's also close to This is the you contract close to ES 4,000 Reversing down to the support level at 3950 that's SPX 3950 Also noted as a support level As well as the liquidity at the round number level 39 ES 3950 One more example for ES and this shows This is also from Wednesday post FOMC announcement showing price Rocketing up to the Resistance level here again a level noted as resistance in the AM note and then going down past the support level to this next level this Combo level close to SPX 3800 and here this is the Z contract and now there's more of a difference between the price and ES and SPX currently spot gamma is showing that difference at about 16 points and Here's an example with meta showing Price reversing at the liquidity at the 171 level heading down to the liquidity at 168 and An example for Microsoft showing price heading up to this High liquidity the highest liquidity shown here at 265 and being Absorbed and reversing lower so a very very clear easy to define price target for running long entries and Also these some of the many of these as examples illustrate more than one key tenant and here this is showing that Hero rising at the same time indicating that this Price action is being partially driven by options trading and market maker hedging activity Nvidia also from From Wednesday Kind of the same sequence Price rockets up to the call wall resistance level also this high liquidity at that level and then that drops right back down an example for spy Spy responds generally responds very well to round numbers and also You know it trades one for one with with ES and XP SPX so here I have the SPX resistance level marked on this chart showing a clear reversal there and then down to the 380 key gamma strike Doug can you zoom in just a little bit more yeah on these just one more maybe yeah, that's good Okay, yeah A question on on some of these like I'm just really curious. I mean you've looked at and traded this for Quite a while now So the in the Tesla example saw kind of one for one right and movement of hero real-time options impact and Then and price action so Some of these other stocks you you kind of you don't really see that the index is a whole nother thing right so does that mean that then I guess suppose that The conclusion would be or deduction would be that a lot of people are trading options in Tesla. I Yes, I think that price action and Order flow in Tesla is largely driven by options trading and market maker hedging activity That would be my conclusion Yeah, of the stocks that I follow that are mainly the big cap tech stocks Tesla is the seems to be the most Most driven by options activity other stocks that are reliably driven by options activity our AMD Nvidia I Would say I would put those on the next level then Apple and Meta So I you know, I think all of those stocks are generally pretty reliably driven by options trading interesting Okay, thank you Okay, and this example It all show it also shows my first and third tenants This is showing Confirmation leads to trend continuity. So in this case hero is acting as a confirmation At least until about right here When it starts to kick up and then price levels off and I don't have the rest of this but I wouldn't be surprised if price Started to rise after this and it so You know all all three tenants are in play here and this in this setup and Another one for Tesla Again all three tenants and play here First is options trading Driving price action you can see with the hero dropping The second is the Liquidity level Acting as a target and this is You know clearly the most liquidity on the board here at 280 and then finally confirmation both CVD and hero dropping and the you know the Only thing you have to do is figure out where to get sure here and that's You know, you know, there's some pretty clear pullback entries often to To these round number price levels and that is the last example for my second tenant and then again the third tenant is confirmation leads to trend continuity and I've got more examples Again AMD and Here I'm watching hero, that's the green line and cumulative volume Delta CVD and both both rising as Prices rising you can also see all the green dots showing that Here that shows that options traders are are buying calls and selling puts and Then aggressive traders Are buying and then market makers are buying stock also to hedge their Delta exposure So I you know, I want to get in get in on the uptrend Looking for pullbacks to get in on the uptrend when when all those are in place So I'm you know looking at these not as indicators, but as Something that confirms what what traders are doing Again options traders are bullish Trader aggressive traders are buying and market makers are buying to hedge their Delta exposure You know, I want to get in get in on that Another example with AMD. Sorry about all the AMD. It just it corresponds very well to To these tenants and one more with AMD and here's one with Amazon again showing bearish activity bearish options trades aggressive sellers and Market makers selling stock and a you know, clear clear downtrend And actually this is from this morning showing the clear downtrend in ES toward these two gamma levels the put wall which Has acted as support today Though it hasn't price has gone down lower. Sorry about that It was acting as support here But you know showing hero going down CVD going down and this is You know ended up about 7 20 a.m. Before there was much stop and iceberg activity, but you can see them coming in As price price reaches these support levels, here's an example for Metta Again showing the clear rise in hero and CVD and price corresponding Doug on these examples that you're showing I'm Just to just to clarify on it like I mean you you see this all the time Is that correct? Yeah You know not not every day and every stock and But it's something that I look for when I'm trading stocks Yeah, okay, because like what I'm I guess the point I want to get across is that these aren't like cherry Pick type of things that you're you're looking at you you you see this all the time Basically, I mean well they they are picked to to illustrate This example, so I you know again I Not not every stock every day will look like this and there there could be a divergence between CVD and hero and If I have two stocks that I'm considering trading and I see one like this and One stock chopping around or You know with price action not necessarily Corresponding to hero and or CVD. I'm going to pick the first stock with where there's correspondence. So You know you've heard traders talking about a plus setups well in my You know my opinion. This is a plus setup where Again options traders are Entering bullish options trades Aggressive buyers are buying and market makers are buying. Yeah, I just want to look for a pullback to to get in on this uptrend Okay, I see So, I mean I know that you've covered it many times and and that you I mean I see the images all the time I just wanted to get the point across or Ask about like how often? You know you see this and it seems to me quite often by the number of images that you're posting Well, these images I were all Occurred within the last I I'd say from beginning of August, you know I I look back that far to pick out these examples So, you know, I found 30 examples of these tenets in the last Last month and a half or so Okay. Thank you another one for meta again Rising CVD and hero rising price action price targeted the high liquidity at 170 QQQ reversing at NQ the round number 13300 and the downtrend following CVD and hero We've already I've already looked at this example of up Tesla Again, I think I mentioned that it was showing all three tenets here and Bruce you'd ask about zooming out and and this This behavior becomes more apparent when you when you zoom out to this level You know, you can see the trends and price and also the CVD and hero more clearly When you when you zoom out a bit. Yeah I think you went over it last time Doug I know you're going through your tenants and showing this and proving the point I'm wondering though like You did it before Like kind of going over where you how you manage your trade where you're looking to get in and I know where you're looking to get Out at the at these key levels right, so I You know, I'm looking for a Trending stock if I'm trading stocks looking for a trending stock Stock and then looking for a pullback to enter. Now. Let's go back Just test for example here, so I'm waiting for Here's a good one right here, so a sweep up into this key level to 85 and You can see the you know the buy sweep and the passive sellers absorbing that sweep then all of the All of the pink dots Coming in and that's a you know clear entry cycle and I can see that Hero is starting to drop CVD continues to drop and I've got a price target below That's what I'm looking for to enter. Here's another pretty clean entry here this pullback into 284 and then the The pink dots coming in in this example here would would you be Scaling in maybe I know I don't scale in I I enter All shares at once and I scale out That's how I trade So those were all of my examples for The three key tenants Bruce I'm not looking at discord. Are there any any questions? Let me take a quick look No, I think we're good in discord and in YouTube Yep, some questions in here Do you typically use weekly or? You know the zero zero day options expiration For your a plus setups Well, I Mentioned before when I trade options. I trade far out in time far out of the money. I trade 90 day I sell 90 day plus options far out of the money and in spy and I at the end I can I can take a look and think or swim and show you what I'm doing in In the in spy. So I I really don't pay any attention to Short-term options. I think that that is not a I well first of all, I don't buy options the only The only time that I buy options are Spreads to shorter term spreads to hedge my longer term shorts and And I'll show an example of that. So I you know again I when I at the examples that I looked at for stocks, I prefer to just trade shares I There are disadvantages in my mind. I I was trained as a premium seller and I in my mind there are Disadvantages to buying short-term options and this very very Strong disadvantages to shell selling short-term options. I think it's very dangerous right now That's why I sell long-term far out of the money options but I I Would consider buying a put under certain circumstances. I would never buy a call They're just too many factors working against buying a call number one is time decay number two is volatility typically when You know as Brent talked about on Monday options are Option prices are affected by the price of the underlying and time and volatility so as typically as price rises Volatility decreases and that takes away from the that reduces the price of options and There's also time decay. That's why I sell options rather than buy options that time decay is working for me not against me So, right understood. So, I mean your approach here is very and not to Or your trading style here is very different in the sense that you're really not trading options, but you're using the options information here To base your trading decisions of the underlying right that that may be a little bit difficult for some people to or get used to or understand but I you know going back to my key tenet that that The options market is the key driver of price action in in many stocks like Tesla and also futures You know traders are positioning themselves in SPX and spy options and this is driving a lot of the order flow and ES Okay, great Is that it for the questions that that's it so far. Yes, okay. All right, so let's take out I just want to do a quick review and then I really want to get to the example from Monday So let's just take a couple minutes quickly. So my approach I develop a thesis and that is You know, I do that every day and that's based on the information That I see in spot gamma basically I read the the morning report I look at the equity hub that the shifts and the key levels and Also the Vana model and we'll take a look at all that in the example and Then I look for Trending stocks we talked about that targets talked about that and we've also talked about the trigger the pullbacks often to key levels. So first of all the thesis for the day. I I Anticipate you'll come up with the anticipated volatility for the day the and then a trading range and then directional bias based on the information that I see in at spot gamma and Here's the again the basis for my thesis spot gamma Founders note in the morning and the key gamma levels for SPX and spy for Trading ES and NDX and QQQ for trading NQ Also look at the high liquidity levels I take a screenshot every morning before the market opens and look look at where the liquidity is Is set up and then for spy and QQQ that really doesn't come in Until after the market opens And also the Vana models and finally the equity hub. I look at SPX spy and QQQ I'm kind of curious how how do you Like in the examples that the these really great examples you showed these are all big pretty big trending days Uh-huh not all of them But many of them How do you stay away from like? Oh, you know, it looks like it's starting to trend and You know, you've got Many of your key tenants kind of aligned, but it just chops instead You know, I guess that's why I have More than one stock open in bookmap and I keep the same stocks open Here's let's take a look at Bookmap so I you know, I have all these stocks available and I can You know quickly scan through stocks and see see what's what's working. What's not so for example here and and You know, I'm Definitely bearish today. So I would I would quickly scan through these and and look for stocks that are Down-trending and and you know, I With corresponding CVD and hero matching Yeah, so so that would be kind of like a pullback there in your Amazon. I think Current at current market Yeah, this would be You know, here's first pullback to pullback to VWAP I see, you know, it looks like things if Price is kind of leveled off and in a lot of these stocks So may not be an all-day trend and Microsoft even rising a bit and video looks good there Yeah, so QQQ here. I probably would have stayed away from this Seeing how hero is rising take a look at Tesla If you're training stocks, this is Looks like I need to update my price lines here so this is the stock you wanted to be in this morning and What let's just take a look at So how you could have potentially prepared for that see if there are any shifts so here is one one bearish signal is the put wall shifting down to 280 and Let's see This this is something that and I won't go through this now, but this is something that I'm Spot gam is put together to show these option wall put wall and call wall shifts and showing how You know, that can be an indication of of price action. So I would You know in my morning preparation I would see this and I I Didn't have time to do all that this morning but typically I would note this on the chart and see this and You'll put that down as a You know stock of interest for a short based on this Put wall dropping from 290 to 280 and Plus Tesla is very volatile. It moves around quite a bit. So that's it for the thesis trend You know again, I'm looking for a trending trending stock target really talked about that that liquidity Mainly in stocks and also es Liquidity is not very apparent and in spy and qqq key gamma levels are apparent in all Indices and You know futures and stocks and then round numbers as well and one thing to keep in mind is that es Response to spx and spy Round number levels and that's why I put those levels in my charts and Then finally trigger reversals pullbacks trend breaks You know also in spotgam, I'm looking for looking at the shift in volume dots For es and nq looking for stop in iceberg orders absorption liquidity imbalances and Shifts in the order flow and hedging flow Okay, were there any any more questions about that? Okay, I guess not No, they Bruce East not regarding it. I'm asking you for also trade crude oil, but yeah, no, no, I don't I have no edge in crude oil that I You know, I don't even know I don't well hero does not work for for crude oil I just I have much more of an edge and stocks and Es so that's what I what I stick to so let's now let's get to the third item in the agenda the trade example for last Monday and Again, this is a follow-up to Brent's presentation on Monday Where Brent presented the background information and laid out a thesis and then in this example I will show how that thesis played out and then a couple of trade setups based on that thesis and Order flow and book map and also the real-time hedging flow So just as a reminder I Brent's thesis and this is all based on information in spot gamma that SPX and spy options are dominated by puts and that means that traders and investors are long puts and what What money managers often do Is they will they have a basket of long stocks and they will buy a certain number of SPX puts to hedge their portfolio and Then market makers sell the puts so the market makers are short puts and they have to short ES to hedge. There's no other way to hedge SPX and The monthly expiration was on last Friday 916 so a lot of those puts expired on Friday and that means on Monday that That a lot of those puts were gone both in SPX and spy and the market makers can buy back their short futures After expiration, they're no longer needed So let's take a look at At the morning report This is for Monday morning and there's some key Can key information here again, this is for Monday morning in this example One one negative thing here one bearish thing is the SPX put wall shifted down to 38 But on the other hand the spy put wall held at at 390 So the first thing of interest here to remember is that The note also shows resistance at 3900 and that will come into play later on and Also, another note of interest is Britain is anticipating that traders would sell short dated Pre-foot pre-fed before Wednesday, you know either Monday or Wednesday expiration Sell these puts and that should help support the market. So again trader sell puts market makers have to They buy the puts and they have to buy Buy ES to hedge their delta exposure Then Brent also prevented presented the stats for The average weekly return Before expiration and then after expiration now I And I also use this information to hedge in and out of Some strangles and spy But you know the key thing to note here is the one week after expiration Friday for 2002 the typical weekly return is 2.3 percent 2.37 percent now that hasn't worked out this week past Monday Because of the FOMC, you know the big macro event You know kind of kind of played into that So That is the information that was presented in the in the AM note and I was You know bullish looking for long opportunities so just to verify that This shows this is from the spot gamma equity hub and this shows that the options in SPX were dominated by put gamma by puts Showing the difference in the put gamma and the call gamma and the same for spy and one thing to notice here is the gamma levels are Larger in spy than SPX That's one reason that I often look at at spy to guide trades and ES and This is also From the equity hub showing the five-day history of the key gamma levels and in SPX and I actually took this yesterday But this still shows from Friday that almost 31 percent of the gamma Was expiring on Friday, this is the Friday expiration and SPY Typically corresponds to the big monthly expirations. So this was the September monthly expiration and then the next expiration after that starting on Monday is The October monthly expiration. So again noting that Almost 31 percent of the gamma in Spy was a part expiring on Friday and again, that was put gamma since the Spy and SPX were dominated by puts and this is the Vana Vana model for SPX and this shows the The shift in Delta notion Delta notional based on changes in in implied volatility and What this is showing is that As price price decreases The Delta notional Exposure market maker Exposure increases and that means they need to or becomes more positive and that means they have to as price falls That means they have to sell Futures and as price rises, they would have to buy futures to hedge their Delta exposure So they would be trading with price and and enhancing price action and here's the same thing for the spy Vana model and Finally, this is SPX Spot gamma hero again from the web-based version of spot gamma. It's Not as clear as spy, but it is showing that Just as expected The blue line shows activity trades and puts and the orange line shows trading and calls and The lines are shown in terms of Delta So a rising blue line Means that traders are selling puts and a rising orange line means that traders are buying calls So you can see with the rising blue line here that traders were selling puts as expected and it's a little bit more clear in spy that traders were selling puts pretty much from the open and Not do it not doing much with with calls And this is for the entire day All right. Now here are the examples in ES. This is the first one from the open So again, I'm looking for longs and this this setup shows bullish market maker hedging activity from the open with a rising green hero hero line also rising CVD You know, there are aggressive buyers in here all along So once this gets going and this is pretty typical activity That the stops buy stops start to come in Here you can see that the buy stops once Once price starts to rise and they continue to full fuel the the rise higher and the the entries The pullback entries Are really shown with the Three items here that they're where the aggressive briars Start to step in after a pullback So the first entry would be a a pullback at this combo l3 level as You know the flag and then price starts to rise another pullback here Another pullback another pullback And then the price target here was the es round number 3900 And this is the the warning setup And it's just corresponds beautifully with the With the thesis and with the information and the In the am note from spy camma Yeah, he really teed it up beautifully. Yeah Everything he he was like a crystal ball Yeah, you know, you don't see that every day, but when it You know when it does you have to take advantage of it That's right, you know just I'm sorry go ahead dog But you know again, you don't see this every day such a such a close correspondence between Between your thesis and and what actually happens But it you know it's it's great when it happens Yeah, yeah, that was another thing that I I remembered from your kickoff strategy too when you start to see the The alignment also of the stops going up. Uh-huh to to with the CBD and and the hero The the second example that I have shows that more clearly Um We can go ahead and take a look at that This is uh afternoon setup And I just take a quick look. Here's here's a look at the entire day. So This was the the morning setup That we just looked at and then Pull back a lot of chop a lot more chop and Then it takes off again in the afternoon to the to the final target And remember from the AM uh AM note showing the resistance level at 3,900 and that is spx 3,900 shown here at this level. So let's let's go back to the second setup and This is really a uh hero and iceberg kickoff So the first indication of a Uh of a potential move up is the uh the large block options trade here and Then hero I guess rises slightly kind of more going sideways And uh, you know, it's kind of amazing how long it chops around between spy 385 and 386 especially when When all of these by icebergs were firing off And I I added all these up The the second indication here All of these by icebergs. That's over 14,000 which is I think a pretty incredible number and the The blue line here shows that steady increase in by iceberg activity Until finally The aggressive buyers start to step in and then Once price gets going then the stops by stops start to fire and fuel to move higher up to 3,900 that's where um at the cash closed so price closed at The spx 3,900 target At at four o'clock and then futures continued to rise higher after that Yeah, that's a kind of beautiful correlation of data there, right? Yeah, I I think that's a kind of an incredible setup um You know a combination of the thesis laid out in spot gamma and then looking at book map Seeing all of this and just waiting patiently for the setup to play out So, you know again looking first you have the thesis then you have the bullish options activity Then these icebergs firing off and then just looking for a For a long entry here And then seeing the starting to see cvd and the stops rise Um, and you have your price target up at at 3,900 Yeah, that's a that's a beautiful one And yeah, I mean it also I mean shows how You the patience required like you mentioned Exactly, uh patience is Um You know a big part it definitely required for trading es to wait To wait for the setup and that's where book map comes in and helps so much um you know just seeing the the signals and book map and and and You know knowing or you know having a very good idea that that price has got to rise some at some point with Um 14 000 by icebergs firing off Yeah, yeah, I mean there's You know it and then it's very very clear once it breaks your um, uh, three or your um Your your level there that's marked 386 But yeah, that's spy spy 386 So, you know the key was just you know seeing all this chop between Uh spy 385 and 386 and then just waiting for a breakout You know a clear breakout above that level Yeah, that's beautiful that this this is why um, you you're always looking at the spy Uh one of the right I Yeah every day I Well, I use an add-on called price lines It's a available in the in the book map marketplace And I just marked these levels In a in a spreadsheet and then they're displayed in book map and and price lines also draws the Uh the lines Yeah, that that that helps me I that's the way I trade from I trade from level to level Do you happen to have the same image you're also in spy? The uh say that again, do you happen to have also the spy? Chart for that for monday Yeah, yeah, here we go So let's So this is the overall The the entire day for es and then this is the same Same for spy So what I have to do is figure out the the ratio between es and spy and it changes a little bit every day and then I mark that Add those levels to my Spreadsheet for es And and then those are displayed Yeah, the the the the spy really doesn't give you quite as much I mean, you don't have the stops and icebergs for sure, right So even if I was trading spy I would I would look at the es chart, you know, there's just more information here And that you know, that can be a good thing and a bad thing, but uh You know, again here, it's a good thing You're just not going to see the the stops and icebergs on spy like you do On es. Yeah, wow really interesting stuff, Doug Thanks And bird is asking how do I calculate that ratio? I bird I look at a look at one minute charts for es and spy and find corresponding points highs and lows and and Just calculate the ratio at three or four the high and low points So I just divide the es number by the spy number and it's you it's 10 Right now it's about 10.8. Oh, oh wait 10.08 And I just calculate that every day or two and then change my levels in the In the my spreadsheet. So bruce, that's all I had Yeah, yeah, no, I'm still still looking at these charts here and uh, yeah, really, really, uh I'm really interesting stuff here and um Yeah, this is just a you know, beautiful combination of uh book map and and spot gamma.  Um very very common common sensical and and uh The market understanding Let's see. Uh, no questions over in Uh youtube and then you just answered bird's question here So, um Let's see, um Did I have any questions for you? I think you answered all of my questions. Uh the um Yeah, I mean one thing that I really liked about the um, the kickoff strategy Uh was that kind of build up over time and then uh, and then finally the break and release um so I would just imagine that When you're looking at at these and you get your your setup dug. It's I mean, it's just It's got to be really high probability. Um That you're probably going to get a pretty nice move At least to dump off some risk Um for a for-profit uh at minimum right, um You know, I you know, I guess all you can do is prepare and uh You know anticipate and it may or may not play out, but you know in this case the um The preparation was right And then the price action and what I saw during the day, uh Confirm that thesis Yeah, and it it, you know, it worked out well And it it often does I I I look at the shifts in the gamma levels every day And uh, you know, like we looked at at teslas this morning that that played out well the shifts in the uh The shift in the put wall Was it, you know, you know a good indication, you know, of course along with the the big gap down and In the uh futures was a you know, a big indication to look for a short Do you um like in some of these um moves? Uh, I know you said you're scaling out. Um But like for example the the target here to 3900 in the in this example here, um is is very clear Like, uh, you know, I you're looking for that. Um, right and um But it it gave so much more And uh, how do you handle that because like, uh, uh, you know, you have these these setups, um, and they are You know very high probability um Do you find yourself kind of Uh trying to uh manage these for a longer term to to work out for hours or, you know, um Longer period for the day I I I tend to I tend to do that more in stocks where I can, um Have more control over the shares, you know, es Is a pretty big contract 500 shares a spy if I trade spy I can Can adjust the number of shares to whatever I want I don't have to have as tight a stop and I can can hold for a longer term Especially knowing I've got that that longer term core position And this is the you know, whatever day trading I'm doing is, uh, you know can often be in that context of that longer term core position So I uh, you know, if I'm going to hold something longer, uh, I I'm going to do that in spy Where I can You know more where I'm more comfortable And and holding for a longer Period of time and and keeping a wider stop. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, I see I see, um So and do you do both maybe uh, so you're you're you're scalping also, uh the s and p e many as well as spy Yeah, I uh, I I tend to get in and out more quickly and In es but if I'm trading spy, I'm definitely looking at the es chart And uh, you know, again, I may be scalping es and You know here I would you know, if I got in I I would have a hard time holding and Harding uh holding an es contract Uh up until 3,900 whereas with spy, I would have no problem at all holding for You know holding for just two or three points and in spy Yeah, yeah, with you know with with a few hundred shares of spy Yeah, yeah Yeah, it's uh, so it's basically just the leverage, uh that uh, kind of um Um Yeah, that and that that's especially right now like I've mentioned before. I'm I'm super busy. I'm I'm moving in a couple of weeks um and I'm Looking for Trading that doesn't require Uh, you know sitting in front of the screen just uh, you know watching every tick in es Yeah, you know, that's why why I'm more comfortable trading spy and again tighter stop Can control the number of shares hold for a longer target and uh, not have to Uh You know pay attention to every tick. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, it makes makes good sense. Um Uh once you move though, Doug, I want to see you'll hold it for uh, uh Uh, yeah, I'll I'll I'll work on that later Um, you know once I have time to uh, give this my full concentration Yeah, I mean because they get boy, would it be great to to you know, hold that up until like, uh Not just get 10 points out of it get like 40 points out of it You know or whatever it gave you here, um Well, you know that 30 that yeah, that will come but You know, uh, uh, you know spy is just a Um You know a Another substitute for es. Yeah. Yeah, exactly exactly and steven. It's asking about my longer term strangle approach Let's take a look at that and this is um This is an example. It's just kind of boiled down to um one Or kind of unit contracts that you know, the smallest number that i'm trading right now so, uh, what this is is three short longer term puts in um In december in the december quarterlies And also the december monthly expiration and then one One short call and the december quarterlies and that is the uh, that's the 30 deas expiration and the The december monthly is the six uh, uh, 16 december expiration and then two shorter term Put spreads and the seven oct and the 14 october Yeah, I think you know again kind of boiled down to the basic one one unit Uh One unit each so three short puts one short call and two uh, two hedging spreads and that you know that ratio that coming up with the uh the number of calls the number of puts and and the number of uh hedging spreads is kind of the key to um You know kind of the key to doing this And it's it's going to vary um Very over time and and how the market is moving Yeah, and you're and you're going to be constantly managing it uh as well, right? Well, no, the thing is this doesn't require much management You know, I've got a uh, you know nice big range of profitability from um You know, this is spy 340 all the way to 400 And I'm you know kind of in the close spot. I still have negative deltas. So it looks like about 360 um is the sweet spot and that actually corresponds to um Let's take a look at the vana model for today And this is the spy gamma mod gamma model, I meant and this shows that the um Price action and the hedging activity should slow down around this area And I Brent has talked about this Uh before and this has to do with the way that market makers are hedging Um tail risk, you know, they've got some They've got some puts way down here to hedge their tail risk So they uh, you know as price approaches this level They um, you know, they're hedging activity can slow down and this and that should slow down price So I you know, I'm pretty comfortable with that with this right now And I can get out anytime Right the thing it you know the thing about spy is it it's the one of most one of the most uh liquid instruments in the world and Um You know, it's easy easy to get in and out Yeah, yeah, excellent excellent. Um, yeah, and actually here here's another position in es This is uh similar with a little bit different ratio um One hedging spread two short puts and one short call So here this this requires a little bit more attention that uh, delta is almost flat Well, uh Thanks, Doug You know that uh, was uh, was really clear you went through your tenants, uh, what you're looking for You showed examples of each uh, and uh Then you went into uh the um Price action from uh from monday as well and the trade uh set up here on monday Did I miss anything was that yeah that everything or uh Yeah, that's that's it. That's all I had. Yeah. Yeah No, really really really clear examples. Uh, and then here it all culminates into this beautiful trade right here um that right is just like it's got everything in it And uh It took a while uh for those uh, you know all that iceberg buying and then uh boy once once it once it released though It just moved Well, yeah, and when when I have time these uh Setups for monday will probably be the subject of my next article for spot gamma Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. Well, uh, let's see. Um Uh, do you get more transaction costs using spy versus spx? uh, peter h is uh asking Well, I um I would not sell options Naked and spx. That's too big too much for me But the the uh transaction cost Is the is the same for one contract of ease. So if I was uh, you know, if I were trading 10 spy contracts to one spx contract the Yeah, the transaction costs would be 10 times higher, but I would not Uh, you know, I would not make that jump the the jump that I would make is from spy to es options and I um that And I well with es there's also the advantage of different margin So, uh, you know once uh, you know once I exceed what I Um, you know once I get up to a certain level and spy I'm going to shift more and more Of my capital to trading in es where the You know, you get a span margin um and can trade you know much You know much bigger size with um with es with um and now the for you know, the the commissions are higher and uh Commissions and exchange fees are higher for es but you you know, you're trading uh, you know five contracts of uh You know one contract of es is equal to five contracts of of spy Right, right So that's you know, that that is the the progress the steps You know, you might even start with mes although that I just don't like the liquidity of the options In the uh in the micros and the the limited number of strikes the uh number of strikes in spy Uh is almost unlimited Number of expirations and strikes and it's very it's limited and and mes but it and it's also good in es So the progression is from spy to es and I would never go to spx. I would I would just continue to trade uh es and not not trade Naked options and spx now I trade butterflies and and things like that to find risk trades and spx, but but not naked Right, right understood. Okay. Um Okay, well, uh everybody Well, thank you dug and uh, if uh, if you like this video, please subscribe to the channel and give us a like there for dug Uh, and uh, dug. Good luck with your move. Uh, and and looking forward to doing more stuff with you here in uh Maybe uh later in october Yeah, I should be uh up and up and going uh Probably second second week in october Excellent excellent. Yeah back back to normal. We'll reach out to you. Uh, uh later in october then Okay Okay, thank you everybody. Okay, and thanks. Thanks everyone for uh attending on such a busy trading day Yeah, yeah, we do have one more. Um, uh, well tom b is starting Uh, right now or you just started uh his stream and we have another Webinar this afternoon with a new new trader Uh with patrick, uh, weland, uh, so if you guys are interested in attending that Uh, you'll see it in our discord channel as well as on youtube but Uh, yeah, now we got three for you dug Nice little collection of um, really really good options information Great. Yeah. All right. Thanks dug and uh, we'll right let's talk to you later All right. Thanks everyone. Okay. Bye. All right. Bye


Rydw i'n gweithio sgwpeth y maen nhw er fyddai mwy o'u pwynt hon arbennwyd. Bywch chi'n cynhiddu i hynny i'r lluniau mwy o'r hyn, dwi'n gallu gwneud bryhau i'ch munawr o'u pwyntau a chysylltu i wneud bryhau. Y cwysylltu nr 1 yn Kenneth Gibson. Diolch i'r dwyll Refne am y cwestiynau oes Unedig Gwydiannol, ysgrifffryd ei wneud muwr i'r wilflygiad i wneud hynny i grinig desgwysreithio. Hwnnw, Arly, Eileen MacLeod. As long as it is well managed, the use of sewage sludge allows us to recycle valuable materials in a way that is safe and environmentally beneficial. It should cause no nuisance or inconvenience to the general public, but I am aware that, in spite of the existing regulatory arrangements, problems with unacceptable order relating to the storage and spreading of sewage sludge do still occur. That is why the cabinet secretary, Richard Lochhead, commissioned a review of the storage and spreading of sewage sludge on land in Scotland. Following the recent conclusion of the review, the cabinet secretary is considering a wide range of recommendations that he intends to announce shortly. It is likely that some of the recommendations will require changes to legislation and we will undertake a public consultation on any draft legislative proposals. Those actions will address the issues raised by communities and MSPs in relation to the spreading of sewage sludge and lessen the impact on communities, particularly in respect of offensive orders. She will be aware from the recent member's debate that the vile practice of spreading human waste has caused a sickening smell to provide not just the Garnag Valley in my constituency but many other communities across Scotland. Is it not time to end this revolting practice? I am aware of the order problems in the Garnag Valley area. It is those types of issues that I expect the review's outcome to tackle. Spreading to land as a fertiliser is a long-established route for sewage sludge, recognised as the best practical environmental option due to its ability to improve soil quality, organic content and water holding capacity, as well as to provide nutrients for crops. The important thing is ensuring that that is all done properly to avoid risks to public health and the wider environment. That is exactly what I expect the review to achieve. Claudia Beamish I welcome the minister's remarks. I am very keen, as I am supporting communities in the Glentaggar ex-mining area in my region, to hear the results of the review. There have been inconsistencies in the level of treatment of sewage sludge before spreading on land when there have been outages. Will the new risk categorisation facilitate more rigorous checks by SEPA and is there enough treatment capacity to ensure that all sewage sludge is not just dried but heat treated to kill pathogens and protect human health if, indeed, we continue with this practice? As the member will be aware, this was a Scottish Government-led review, which involved SEPA and Scottish Water officials. Over the past few months, over the group has held discussions with communities, sewage sludge industry, local authorities and other stakeholders. As a member may appreciate, there has been a complex task, particularly in relation to existing legislation guidance and practice. It took a little longer than expected, but the fact that the members of the sludge review group wanted to ensure that an effective market of measures would emerge from the process in order that some of the issues that led to the commission in this review can be fully addressed. One of the key recommendations is that SEPA should have the power to have an exempt activity. Such a storage of sewage sludge stopped immediately and the sludge removed. Can the minister be more specific about when the review findings will be published given the word due in August? Does she agree that a holistic approach is required to address this issue and that there should be a lead organisation to properly monitor and coordinate activities relating to sewage sludge? I can say to the member that, at the moment, the review has been concluded and it is sitting with the cabinet secretary at the moment. Advice has been provided to the cabinet secretary around that. I cannot give any more details about when that consultation will be formally announced, but I am more than happy if the member wishes to write to the cabinet secretary to get some clarity around the publication date. To ask the Scottish Government what its position is on the impact on the environment of fracking. The impacts of unconventional oil and gas in our environment, communities and economy needs to be fully understood. The Scottish Government's moratorium will allow time for careful examination of the issues and proper engagement with the public in considering them. The comprehensive programme of research that we announced on 8 October will include projects to investigate the possible climate change impacts, as well as the effects of additional traffic movements, site decommissioning and aftercare. A freedom of information response that I have received shows that Government ministers and officials met 13 times with Ineos prior to the moratorium in fracking, and Nicola Sturgeon met with him on the very day that the moratorium was announced. Since then, John Swinney has met him twice. Given the construction of the large holding tank that is being built, is it not clear that, as soon as the election is over, the moratorium will be over and that fracking will begin in Scotland, or have any of us just blown a big pile of cash on licences that we will never use? As I said, ministers have held meetings with representatives of environmental non-governmental organisations, community groups, industry bodies and local government, and those meetings have helped us to prepare for the research and public consultation processes. As a result, we have planned a robust and thorough research process, and a wide-ranging and participative consultation process. To ask the Scottish Government for what reason there was a £13 million underspend by the Rural Affairs Food and Environment portfolio in 2014-15. The Scottish Government consolidated accounts for the year ending 31 March 2015 contain an explanation of major resource variances greater than £3 million for each programme within portfolios. For the Rural Affairs Food and Environment portfolio, the statement highlights that £7 million of the £13 million resource underspend was planned underspend on uncommitted budgets such as research. £3 million was, as a result of demand-led budgets such as private water funding, and of the minor variances totalling £3 million, £2 million was a non-cash underspend representing differences in accounting estimates in areas such as depreciation of assets. In total, the underspend represented less than 3 per cent of the resource del budgets available to the portfolio and was used to help to meet capital pressures. Obviously, the climate change budget sits within that portfolio. Why was there a £2 million or 12.5 per cent that underspend on the climate change budget?  The figures in the council demonstrate the firm grip that the Government has on Scotland's public finances. Our approach means that we are managing our budgets across more than one year. We carry forward some spending into the next year when we need it, so such underspends do not reflect a missed opportunity to spend more on our public services. As I said, the underspend of £13 million includes £2 million non-cash that simply cannot be spent on services, and it represents differences in accounting estimates in areas such as depreciation of assets. The Government's approach represents sensible budgeting, reflecting fluctuations in costs and demand across the spending review period and ensures that there is no loss of spending power in Scotland. As part of the budget, can the minister tell Parliament when the cap payments due next month will be paid? Can she also clarify whether the reclassification of land affecting hundreds of crofters in Scotland will be affected by those budget changes? I do not have that detail in front of me at the moment. I know that officials are working extremely hard to make sure that we can get the cap payments as soon as possible. I am happy for the member if he wishes to write to the cabinet secretary for further clarification. Just to follow on that point, when will we know whether all the cap payments will be made in December or not? Is there a time that the Scottish Government is committed to with farmers who are already going to banks just to make sure that they do not have problems? As I have said, the Scottish Government officials are working extremely hard to make sure that we can get the payments made as soon as possible. We are more than happy if the member wishes to raise that matter with the cabinet secretary. To ask the Scottish Government what progress it has made in promoting the Scottish dairy brand to international markets. Richard Lochhead officially launched the Scottish dairy brand at the Inuga Food and Drink trade show in Cologne, Germany, on 12 October. The brand and its mark, which were unveiled by the First Minister at the Royal Highland show earlier this year, has been developed by the industry to raise the profile of Scottish dairy produce, to add value to milk and to take advantage of the increasing international demand for products with a strong Scottish provenance. In addition, he is currently engaged in an official visit to North America, where he will be meeting with key buyers to help to promote Scottish products, including First Milk's award-winning mullagantire cheddar. I thank the minister for her reply. Could she please tell me how many producers from across Scotland have now signed up to use the Scottish dairy brand and how many brands and products that this includes? Can she also tell me how best customers can be informed about how to buy Scottish dairy produce and how MSPs might best help to contribute to establishing the brand logo in the eye of the consumer? I am very pleased to confirm that, to date, the Scottish dairy brand has 11 processors signed up with 18 brands, supplying 40 different products over three ranges—heritage, artisan and organic—all of which are made using 100 per cent Scottish milk. Considerable interest was shown from buyers at Inuga with around 20 positive leads. It is expected that some of those will result in firm orders being placed. At the moment, the industry focus is very much on the international market, seeking to tap into Scotland's annual reputation for quality produce and building on our growing reputation as a land of food and drink. However, I am sure that in the future the industry will also wish to raise the profile of the brand, market and domestic markets and would welcome the support of those in this Parliament and elsewhere to promote our wonderful cheeses and butters. The Scottish dairy brand is indeed a laudable effort by the Scottish Government to try to help the dairy sector, but in terms of further help for that sector, I understand that the cabinet secretary has decided to spread the relatively small amount of EU funding support available across all milk producers rather than just those who do not have direct contracts and they are the ones who are in most need. Is the ministry able to tell me why that decision was taken? I am very happy for the member who wishes to write to the cabinet secretary to ask for an explanation. I would like to ask the Scottish Government when and how it will report to Parliament the effectiveness of the dairy action plan. The dairy action plan was launched by Mr Lockhead in March this year. It aims to improve the resilience of the sector and to provide the right platform to ensure that the entire industry can thrive in the context of volatile market prices. The action plan themes include market developing, promoting best practice in dairy farming, but those themes cover short and longer-term actions and a comprehensive update on all the recommendations contained in the plan that was provided by Richard Lockhead to the rule of fares, climate change and environment committee on 28 October and published on the committee's website. To ask the Scottish Government what contact it has had with the UK Government regarding the impact of the disruption at Calais on Scottish food exports. Scottish ministers have written to the UK Government four times about the issue, and the cabinet secretary for food, Mr Lockhead, has also spoken directly to the UK Minister for Transport. In addition, Scottish Government officials have been in regular dialogue with its counterparts within the UK Government, relaying our concerns about the impact of migrant ingress into the channel tunnel on the Scottish fish processing sector. Thank you very much for the answer, minister. The last update that I received from the haulage industry is that Scottish food exports as a channel are facing increasing insurance costs because of delays and spoiled goods. Drivers have been receiving some food parcels as a channel a few weeks ago, and no-office hauliers are telling me that the fence that is elected at Calais is just a gimmick. We show the clear escalation of the crisis at Calais. Can the minister gather his evidence and highlight to the UK and French Government the implications that the crisis in Calais and beyond is having on the Scottish food industry? I sympathise with the drivers who are facing increased costs and insurance premiums. However, insurance cover is a commercial matter for the industry. Our primary focus remains to continue to urge the UK to play its part in a co-ordinated and comprehensive EU plan of action to deal with the humanitarian crisis. The UK Government has commissioned work to quantify the direct and indirect costs of the cross-channel disruption and to provide an initial identification of the implications for supply chains. The Scottish Government has also asked Scottish Food and Drink to work with its industry partners to explore the potential for alternative transport routes from Scotland. That could have the potential to reduce costs and create a range of mid- and long-term options for our businesses looking to export their products. To ask the Scottish Government what the impact on its climate targets are of the UK Government's energy policies. The Scottish Government remains committed to addressing climate change. As we look towards the negotiations in Paris later this month, we are committed to working with the UK, the EU, the UN and France to secure an ambitious, robust and durable climate treaty. However, the UK Government's changes to energy policies since June will make the achievement of Scotland's climate targets more difficult. Since June, we have seen a raft of announcements many of which have created uncertainty across the energy sector and have been resisted strongly by the Scottish Government. Those changes by the UK Government are, to say the least, not helpful as we look towards 2020. That view has been echoed by others, not least Lord Daven, the chair of the Committee on Climate Change, who has specifically written to Amber Rudd, stating that the uncertainty created by changes to existing policies and a lack of replacement policies up to and after 2020 could well lead to stop-start investment, higher costs and a risk that targets to reduce emissions will be missed. Can the minister outline what discussions ministers have had with UK counterparts ahead of the Paris conference of parties towards negotiating a new international treaty aimed at limiting global warming? Well, ahead of my attendance at the UN conference of the parties, I met the Secretary of State Amber Rudd at the Environment Councils in June and September to discuss our shared ambitions. The Scottish Government and other devolved administrations have been consulted on the UK negotiating position. The First Minister and the Prime Minister have also corresponded on our shared objective of an ambitious climate agreement and committed to continue working together on this vital issue. To ask the Scottish Government what progress it is making in considering a tail docking exemption for working dogs. The Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Food and Environment wrote to the Rural Affairs Climate Change and Environment Committee on 26 October to explain the Scottish Government position on tail docking. A case has been made to us for possibly introducing a very tightly defined exemption regime to allow vets in Scotland to exercise their professional judgment and dock spaniel and hunt point retriever pups only if they believe that they are likely to be used for working in future and that the pain of docking is outweid by the possible avoidance of more serious injuries later in life. The committee has applied to say that it would support a full public consultation on this specific proposal. The Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Food and Environment will therefore reply to the committee in the near future about plans for such a consultation. I very much welcome the Scottish Government's commitment to consulting what would rightly be a tightly defined exemption regime for working dogs only. Can I seek from the minister an understanding of when such a consultation might be launched and how long it would run for? We thank the Rural Affairs Climate Change and Environment Committee for the letter on 4 November to support a possible consultation on a tightly defined exemption to the tail docking ban in Scotland. We will reply to the committee by 11 December as requested, and that reply will help us to determine whether to proceed with the consultation on the issue. To ask the Scottish Government what recent discussions it has had with the SRUC on the deployment of veterinary disease surveillance centres. Well, earlier this year, the SRUC consulted on the future of its disease surveillance laboratory network in response to a large number of concerns expressed through the consultation on specific aspects of the proposals. SRUC is now considering alternative proposals and they intend to bring those forward for discussion this Friday at the strategic management board for veterinary surveillance. The Scottish Government has been in close contact with the SRUC. Throughout this process, we will continue to do so to ensure that the provision of veterinary surveillance services continues to meet the standards specified by the strategic management board. I thank the minister for that reply. She will be aware that Auckland crew in my constituency hosts one of the busiest disease surveillance centres in a livestock intensive area. Can she give me any assurances that the centre will be retained within the national network of centres? As I understand, the SRUC has indicated to the Scottish Government that it no longer proposes to move the air disease surveillance centre to Glasgow. The Inverness surveillance centre has been under threat. It would be useful to know if the cabinet secretary is going to listen to the evidence from the SRUC and give it some time before he makes up his mind about what to do. I am sure that the cabinet secretary will do so, although the SRUC has also indicated to the Scottish Government that it is now proposing to open a post-mortem facility in the Inverness area to replace the Drummond hill site. Many thanks. We now turn to questions of justice and law officers. 1. Hugh Henry To ask the Scottish Government what steps it has taken to determine whether Police Scotland or its predecessor forces have monitored the activities of political activists, trade unionists and environmental campaigners. Cabinet Secretary Michael Matheson In response to Mr Henry's question on 6 October, I made it clear that the authorisation of police surveillance is a matter for Police Scotland. Scottish ministers have no role in that authorisation process. Surveillance activity is overseen by the independent, judicially led office of surveillance commissioners. The OSC carries out regular inspections of the relevant public authorities and makes annual reports that are laid in both this Parliament and Westminster. Any person who has aggrieved about any conduct authorised under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Scotland act is entitled to make a complaint to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal. Information about the tribunal, including details of how to make a complaint, are included on its website. 1. Hugh Henry Typical double standards. When there were allegations that the communications of MSPs were potentially under surveillance, SNP ministers had plenty to say. Indeed, the First Minister called on the Prime Minister to act over MSP GHCQ snooping. She called on him to declare whether MSP communications have been intercepted. When it comes to political activists, trade unions and environmental campaigners, surely they deserve the same level of care and concern from the Scottish Government? They cannot be bothered to ask. I would ask the cabinet secretary to reverse the shocking complacency and at least ask the question. Cabinet Secretary. I am afraid that the member is confusing a number of different issues here in terms of surveillance and interception of communications. The issue that the member was referring to in relation to elected members is interception of communications. As a former Justice Minister, I would have thought that he would have been aware of that difference and how that differs significantly from surveillance, which he has dealt with under different legislation. In fact, legislation that was taken through and the safeguards that were put in place by his own administration when he was a minister within it. As I have said, if there is a regulatory regime in place for the authorisation mechanism and any complaints that individuals have in relation to surveillance matters, that is also the case for anything to do with the interception of communications. If the member is aware of individuals who have grievance, I am surprised that he has not directed them to the regulatory framework that his Government has put in place in order to deal with anyone who has got concerns about those matters. Patrick Harvie. Individuals can hardly make a complaint about an activity if they do not know that it is happening. Surely we can all acknowledge some information that is in the public domain that Strathclyde police, for example, were caught on tape admitting the infiltration of climate change campaign groups and attempts to disrupt their activity. Do we all have a responsibility, all of us as politicians, to set a clear sphere to set expectations about the appropriate use of police powers, whether it is surveillance or other attempts to undermine and disrupt legitimate peaceful campaigning? As I mentioned to the member, there is a regulatory framework already in place that sets out the thresholds that are the necessity and the proportionality of any type of surveillance that the police choose to undertake. For example, if it is a matter to do with direct surveillance, that is an issue that has to be authorised by a superintendent and above. If it is an issue that has to do with intrusive surveillance, that is an issue that has to go to someone in Police Scotland who is of the rank of assistant chief constable and above, and it also has to be signed off by a surveillance commissioner independent of the police before that can actually be deployed and taken forward. If there are any issues about how they are conducting this, that is reviewed by the judicially led office of the surveillance commissioner. They deal with it and look at the process to make sure that that process has been appropriately adhered to by law enforcement organisations. If they find that there are any actions that are not appropriate, they can investigate that issue further and then go to an investigatory powers tribunal to consider the whole issue in much greater detail. There is a regulatory framework in place at the present moment to deal with it. As a member will be aware, the UK Government intends to change that regulatory framework with the revising of the Regulation of Investigatory Pills act, which will also have an impact on the Regulation of Investigatory Pills Scotland act, given that the office of surveillance commissioner covers Scotland as well. A very brief supplementary answer, Neil Findlay, please. The Home Secretary Theresa May has established the Pitchford inquiry and undercover policing in England and Wales. What correspondence has there been between the UK Government and the Scottish Government to give Scottish people an input into Pitchford, or will there be a similar inquiry in Scotland? There is not, to my knowledge, any reason why someone could not make representations to that particular investigation that has been taken for. Of course, if the member has specific allegations that he wishes to raise with me, he should feel free to do so, and I can ensure that they are passed on to the appropriate body in order to consider those matters. However, I should say to the member that, to date, having said a lot about that matter, he has not contacted me with specific allegations that he wishes to have investigated. To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to encourage and expand the use of CCTV video links for prisoner appearances at court. Modernisation of our justice system remains one of the Government's main priorities. The digital justice for Scotland launched last year, seeks to promote and encourage use of live video links between organisations in the justice system. Scottish Government officials continue to work closely with justice organisations as they develop the use of video links between prisons and courts. Justice organisations are also working with the legal profession to encourage a greater use of the equipment that has been installed in prisons and courts for the benefit of vulnerable witnesses and victims of crimes as well where appropriate for prisoners. In addition to appearances from prison, the criminal justice Scotland bill seeks to change the law and allow more hearings to be conducted via video link. Currently, only a limited number are allowed to be conducted via video, and the legislative provisions brought forward by this Government will allow more hearings to be conducted by video link in future, where it is appropriate and in the interests of justice to do so. I thank the minister for that answer. Given the fact that increased use of CCTV video links for prisoner appearances could save millions of pounds every year, does the minister share my disappointment that the figures for the last few years do not show any significant pick-up in the use of this technology? For example, figures released under freedom of information requests show that, in 2012, CCTV links were used 259 times, and last year it was 260 times. So far this year, they have been used just 228 times. So what more is he going to do to speed up this process? Well, the first thing, of course, to say that the figures to date only cover the first seven months of the year, so the financial year, so we do have a position that is hopefully seeing an improvement in the take-up rates. I take the point seriously that Caryl Hilton makes. We would like to see greater use of video links where that is possible, both to help engagement between solicitors and people who are in prison or are waiting trial, and also to help victims and witnesses, as I say, vulnerable victims. We are seeing a pilot project on solicitors or prison or video links, which is on a limited basis at the moment and it only involves a certain number of criminal defence lawyers at the stage in the region of 177 agents have volunteered, but only 40 agents are currently using it, but we do anticipate now that it's moving out to a national roll-out. We should see a substantial increase in take-up of the use of video link technology, and that will hopefully see the efficiency improvements that the member seeks to achieve. To ask the Scottish Government what the Cabinet Secretary for Justice responses to reported concerns that some retail thefts are directly attributed to hunger. Cabinet Secretary, Michael Matheson. National crime statistics only report on instances of short lifting. We are unable to centrally validate whether retail thefts are directly attributed to hunger. However, it is clear that major welfare changes and benefit cuts imposed by the UK Government are driving more people to food banks. In 2014-15, the Trussell Trust food banks provided emergency food parcels to more than 117,000 beneficiaries in Scotland. We are doing everything that we can with the resources and powers that we have available to tackle inequalities and food poverty. That includes £1 million of emergency food action plan, which helps 26 emergency food projects to provide food aid and funds fair share, a redistribution that redistributes food from retailers to community organisations. Our total investment in broader welfare mitigation members since April 2013 is £296 million. There is growing anecdotal evidence and, obviously, newspaper reporting. In 2014, Durham's Police and Crime Commissioner, Ron Hogg, said that crimes have been committed nationwide by people who are simply trying to live. Is there any possibility of co-operation between the police and charities to identify those who are stealing due to welfare reform and hunger and any help that can be offered to them? I have no doubt that Police Scotland has been more than happy to work with charities to try to identify some individuals who may find themselves at risk of stealing because of the situation that they find themselves in as a result of welfare reforms and hunger. No-one should ever find themselves in that situation. I have said that there is no statistical information around the prevalence in this particular area. I am very much of the view that this is an area where prevention is much better than finding its way into our criminal justice system. The member has a suggestion with regard to Police Scotland engaging with specific charities to try to address some of those issues. I have been more than happy to make sure that Police Scotland looks into those matters. To ask the Scottish Government when it last met the Scottish Police Federation and what was discussed. I meet representatives of the Scottish Police Federation on a regular basis. I was delighted to attend the first Scottish Police Federation bravery awards last week, where officers who had gone above and beyond the call of duty were recognised for their bravery. Every day, our officers are presented with difficult, dangerous and challenging situations, and it is so important that we pay tribute to every member of our police service who day in, day out, show continued professionalism and dedication in keeping people safe. The cabinet secretary is aware that, over the past few years, I have been dealing with a particular constituency case in relation to a serving police officer who was accused by his employer of breach of the data protection act in fraud. He was formally acquitted earlier this year, the sheriff stating that he was not sure why it was ever felt necessary to bring criminal charges in this case. Will the cabinet secretary, at his next meeting with the SPF, raise the matter of other serving police officers who have fallen foul of data protection legislation? Whether the SPF views that the whole approach is just wrong is being addressed by the Scottish Police Authority? Of course, I have been more than happy to raise that issue with the Scottish Police Federation the next time I meet them. This is an issue that was raised by the member back in March of this year, in which I set out that I was prepared to ensure that there was further work taken in this area. I can now inform the member that there has been progress made in this particular issue about the information that officers are provided with. Police Scotland now, in conjunction with and in consultation with the Crown, have introduced a new redesigned training package as of July of this year for all officers and staff. The training must be completed by all officers and staff and will reinforce the obligations that the service has under the Data Protection Act 1998. It also sets out when officers and staff can access data and highlights the risks associated with data access. The enhanced package has been introduced to raise officers and staff awareness and to prevent data access that is not in line with the law. I am also aware that Police Scotland's counter-corruption unit is also running a series of divisional workshops looking at the main areas of risk within the service. The workshops will reinforce the new DPA training with the aim to prevent breaches of the act in the first place. To ask the Scottish Government what action it will take to reduce the reported £10 million that is lost in the share of court system by cases repeating stages unnecessarily. Paul Wheelhouse, the Scottish Government welcomes the Auditor General's report on efficiency of prosecuting criminal cases through the share of court. The report acknowledges that, despite overall reductions in crime increases in the prosecution of more cases involving domestic abuse and sexual offences, have caused additional pressures on courts and the wider justice system. By their very nature, those are complex cases that sometimes require more than one hearing. In response to the cross agency justice board in 2014-15, we committed £1.47 million in additional funding to the Crown and Courts for extra-fiscals, judiciary and administrative staff to address delays and speed up access to justice for victims and witnesses. During the current financial year, we have provided a further £2.4 million to ensure the efficient progress of cases involving domestic abuse and sexual offences. The funding will continue in 2016-17 and 2017-18. The Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that criminal cases are managed as efficiently as possible. We will continue to work with justice organisations to speed up access to justice within the share of courts. We are also committed to implementing measures in the Courts Reform Scotland Act 2014, including the new criminal share of appeal court, which opened on 22 September this year and is part of the package of reforms to ensure a more efficient and effective court system. Given that the number of summary cases completed within a timeframe of 26 weeks is the only performance indicator of share of court efficiency, will the minister commit to introducing more detailed performance indicators in order to allow the public a more comprehensive picture of how well our share of courts are actually working? I will certainly agree with the member that performance indicators are important. We are obviously not wishing to be complacent. We know that there is a lot of room for improvement, but SCTS has confirmed that, currently, in over 95 per cent of our share of courts, summary criminal trials are being set within the 16-week target. I know that the member's point was about completion of cases as well. I will certainly keep that under review. The point being that operational matters are obviously a matter for the chief executive of the Scottish Courts and Tribunal of Service. I will raise this myself with Eric McQueen, but the member may wish to also write to the chief executive to raise those points. Minister, Aberdeen, Dundee and Hamilton managed to reduce the cost of term last year. How can other share of courts follow suit? Minister. Improved performance is secured through collaboration with justice partners and local criminal justice boards are key to ensuring that this is achieved. The remit of local justice boards has been recently revised, and all boards now support the chief principal in ensuring optimum performance is achieved across all courts by challenging inefficiency and ensuring that best practice is shared. I hope that answers the member's question. To ask the Scottish Government what support is available through the justice system for the protection of children in families experiencing domestic abuse? The Scottish Government is committed to taking action to tackle the unacceptable level of domestic abuse in our society. That includes enhancing support for all victims of abuse, including children. There are a range of specific measures available that can protect children. For example, there are both criminal and civil non-harassment orders and civil domestic abuse interdicts, with the power of arrest that can be imposed by courts to protect those affected by domestic abuse, including where children are involved. Breaches of such orders by domestic abusers can lead to penalties of up to five years imprisonment. When children are required to give evidence in court, a range of measures are available to help to reduce the trauma of the experience. The Scottish Government has supported a number of initiatives that tackle domestic abuse, such as the Police Scotland decision to roll out across Scotland a national disclosure scheme for domestic abuse, which was announced in the last few weeks. I thank the cabinet secretary for that response. He will be aware of the effect that domestic abuse has on children on their security, resilience and self-esteem. He will also be aware that access to children is often used to continue to perpetrate abuse when our relationship has ended. Does he agree with me that access should not be granted under those circumstances, and can he tell me what steps he will take to protect families in those circumstances? I am very aware of the issue that the member raises and some of the challenges around those particular issues. I am also aware that some of the third sector organisations have raised concerns about information sharing with sheriff courts when they are considering issues of custody. As I am sure that the member will appreciate, those are matters that have to be put before the court. It is important that, as it stands for the court, the welfare of the child is at the centre of that decision making, ensuring that their welfare is appropriately protected. That will continue to be the case in the future. It is also important that we make sure that those who find themselves, where they have been subject to domestic abuse, that they receive and that they are involved in whether they are civil or criminal matters within our court system, that they get the right support and assistance at that particular point and the right advice at that particular point. That is why we have provided further funding to the assist project and programme of work, which specifically provides support and assistance to individuals in those circumstances, where they have experienced domestic abuse so that they can provide advice and information to individuals. That is why we have provided further funding to them in order to continue that important work. My apologies to those members who indicated in advance and during their time in the chamber that they would wish to ask supplementaries. I am afraid that today the questions and the answers were not succinct and that I was unable to call a number of people. We now have to move on to the next item of business, which is a debate on motion number 14768, in the name of Paul Wheelhouse, on the succession Scotland bill.


There's a reason why I've been pushing mathematics for 20 years now. I've been teaching mathematics over 20 years now privately because there's no way I could function inside the institution. I want to become anti-fragile, right?  They would say you need the job to be able to work, right? Not gonna happen, okay? But there's a reason why I've been pushing mathematics on everyone so hard for so long, right? With hundreds of videos online, I started making my first math videos in 2007, putting them online, sharing them because our societies are completely illiterate in the language of mathematics. They have zero concept of how to conduct scientific experiments. They have zero concept of science, what it means, right? They have no idea how to read data. They have no idea about statistics.  Disgusting, okay? And their ignorance, their stupidity, the stupidity of the masses has brought us to this level where frontline workers that were sacrificing their lives, putting their lives and their families lives at risk for two years without proper protection, are now being fired or let go without being, not even fired, let go without even being able to collect unemployment, get benefits or anything without pay, right? Because they don't want to get jabbed.  Talk about the word we can't say on Twitch. Zarya, I wonder how long it is before centralized power cracks down on channels like Chicho for speaking out against them. Gang, just so you know, I'm gonna say what I need to say. We're not loading an auto-sensor tube. If Twitch prevents us from talking freely, we will begin to livestream on Bichu Rumble or Odyssey, and our videos you can catch here, right? You want to be on our Patreon page, and I have a subscribe star page as well. The links will be in the description of this video when it's loaded on, okay? I've already created a sub-stack page. I posted one article on there, okay? There are alternate platforms. I'll take a financial hit. We'll take a hit. We won't get it, but find me online. I will be online sharing information unless they come and throw me in handcuffs and take me to a camp, and I'll fight tooth and nail, make sure I don't go, but you know, it is what it is.  What is it? Half an hour later, we weren't gonna, so you want to be on Bichu Rumble and Odyssey. Join us there. Join us there. Join us there. Join us there. Like literally, there are videos that I upload that I get more hits in the first day of uploading on Bichu than I do on sensor tube, because sensor tube censors as black. I've got 33,000 followers on sensor tube. I've got 600 followers on Bichu, and in the first hour, some of my videos get more views on Bichu than I do on sensor tube. That's shadow banning on sensor tube, right? So I'm not really putting, my main effort is on Bichu Rumble and Odyssey. I want to grow those, right? Support this work on Patreon gang. If you want to support on subscribe star, support on subscribe star. Follow the work there. Follow the work on Patreon. Gang, what can I say? We're in times of fascism. Support your warriors. I'm a gentle warrior. Okay, there are hardcore warriors out there. Support them if that's where your heart belongs.