Down the long path of history cramping across centuries and continents in the graves of kings and the necks of dictators Seeking always a way of life where the people have their freedom believing praying fighting dying We came this way Tonight the national broadcasting company presents the third in the new series. We came this way a dramatic account of man's struggle down through the ages taught a democratic way of life NBC has prepared a booklet to aid in your understanding and enjoyment of this series Listen at the close of this evening's program for more information about it Tonight we are concerned with France and the way in which he was helped toward freedom by one of her greatest citizens NBC presents Victor Hugo on We came this way Ladies and gentlemen somehow into the framework of time bounded by now and the next ringing of the time and Measured by the ticking of your living room clock Somehow into that scant space of time We must fit a picture a picture of a man in the shadow that man cast across the century in which he lived Well, then the picture No man exists in a vacuum He is born into a family lives among people and has his being under a society or a government If he's a little man these things shape his destiny if he's great he may shape them What we need now is the backdrop for our drama a sketching in a people in events that we've the tapestry of France in 1841 and That's a job for you historians, but do it quickly minutes are escaping the history of France in ten sentences, please Young man, you can't hurry history. Maybe not, but you can historians now. What are the fact? Well, let's see 1841 King Louis Philippe was on the throne of France Started out being a pretty decent sort they even called him the citizen king What do you mean now started out? Well, you know how kings are Sometime they start out all right and then begin to get notions of grandeur By 1841 the liberals had deserted him and the left-wingers were sniping at him openly What about science flourishing and business booming and culture? What are that lots of it a brilliant literature the theater was active under well What about the feel of the people? Well now there's something it wasn't so good They began to sense that the government wasn't quite as liberal as it started out The people of Paris particularly who are always sensitive to such things were restless There's no open revolt or anything like that, but restless. That's important. Remember that well young man anything else No, thank you, mr. Historian that does it nicely next Comes now the question of Hugo's heredity the juggling of the genes and the chromosomes the kind of people his parents were The conditions of his childhood home These things start a man on the way. He must go these therefore are facts. We've got to know Mr. Biographer. Yes, what is it? We need to know about Hugo's mother. Tell us briefly what facts you can Why easy his mother was long descended on both sides from good peasant stock Her home was in not and she had a good education. I see you what kind of a person was she? She was a brilliant woman who later in life had kings and generals for her devoted friend He was smarter and better educated than her husband. Yes. So what about him? What a few goes father. He was a captain in Napoleon's army. Hmm. What about their home life? There's a marine in the south Pacific have a home life. Oh like that was it? Yes, of course captain Hugo was a professional soldier made a career of it Hugo was his mother's boy That'll explain a couple of things later on remember that. Well, are you finished with me? I think so. Yes Then if you'll excuse me, I'll get back to the library Go ahead mr. Biographer and thanks for the information not at all not at all now Thus Hugo's parents and his heritage Our interest is in Hugo as a leader of the people and a champion of the basic rights of men But before he entered politics or even thought of public life. He'd earned himself a fortune with his pen The order of events goes something like this He started writing poetry at the age of 12 three years later this entry appeared in his copy book. I am 15 I have done poorly. I will learn how to do better in 1818 He was awarded both the first and second prize for poetry by the literary Academy of Toulouse at 25 He was the acknowledged literary leader of young France and not content with successes apart Hugo turned to the theater he wrote in on a which created a riot in French literary and theater circles and is still read by More American college students and perhaps almost any other French play Hugo went on to triumph after triumph more plays more points more novels more money more fame and more friends as A matter of fact he was thrown out of his apartment by an irate landlady Because so many people were tramping in and out at all hours of the day and night in short then gentlemen Here was a man standing on the threshold of his prime full of life full with ideas bursting with energy And like Alexander finding no more literary worlds to conquer at 39. He had won them all The same happened sooner or later. It had to happen it happened now Victor Hugo simply burst out of literature and into public life It didn't happen all in a moment But the idea had been growing on him growing and he couldn't shake it in his apartment one evening He said to some friends But I tell you the poet must be more than a maker of verses He must be a teacher and a leader of public opinion a priest and a seer for the people a man of utopia His feet upon the earth and his eyes turned skyward looking all was for better days Hugo was off again at a wild gallop happy now in the possession of a new goal to reach for a new battle meant to storm His first campaign was successful and in 1841. He was admitted to the sacred inner circle of the 40 old men of the National Academy By now he was a friend and confident of King Louis Philippe and many an evening He spent with that carpet slippery old gentleman in his study at Versailles and the King saw his wish and his power and on April 13th 1845 the old man wrote a proclamation in Consideration of services rendered to the state by Viscount Hugo We have decreed and do decree as follows That the said by Count Hugo member of the Institute be raised to the dignity of Pirra France Hugo didn't know it then but that day sealed his fate It marked the end of a free career what a man could say casually I stand here on a current topic Now he was a peer and responsible for the state Hugo spent three years finding his political seal eggs early in his career in the chamber appears he said I Prefer not to belong to any political party. I Intend to judge and support each in the degree Which it seems to be working for the interest of the country in my opinion One must be with all parties on their generous side and with none of them on their bad side Noble sentiments if not practical politics Still he felt his way along working always toward a philosophy of government which was somewhere down inside him waiting only for events to Crystallize them and the events were working working as the quiet yeast works in the baker's dough and the signs of the times Themselves on the faces of the people of Paris There were crop failures and no bread There were more taxes that no one had to pay them there was need for goods and unemployment There was need for strong government and no action and finally one day Hugo could stand at no longer on that day He arose in the chamber appears and spoke Ministers Ministers For seven years nearly eight years now. What have you done? Have you regulated finances? No, there are failures everywhere. There are floods. Have you regulated the food problem? No The July government suddenly becomes feeble Apologizing for doing nothing without control over emotion and rumors and a public square You are more fearsome of a riot than Napoleon a plenty back As you go faces the assembly he senses a mixture of response to his demands then on prepared without notes He sounds the formula of all freedom-loving men everywhere without quite knowing it at the time his politics crystallized then and there as he said ministers gentlemen We must turn ourselves to the people the people grave calm courageous and patient who work and suffer and Gradually by a series of urgent reforms and improvements create wealth out of their work and Well-being out of their suffering Frank is only the people of France Hugo had found his way had stated his creed But the ministers didn't listen and the Paris workmen grumbled in the streets and the grumblings grew to demonstrations And the demonstrations led to white-out anger and suddenly on the morning of February 24th 1848. There were barricades in the streets Hugo's people had rebelled The government taught it and fell and the king advocated In the confused four months that followed while a provisional government was feeling its way toward what the people of France wanted Hugo roamed the streets of Paris looking at faces talking to workmen Trying to discover what was best for his people and in that time He said something very like the late president Roosevelt famous statement in 1933 Hugo said I Do not understand why the people have feared the sovereign people are all of us To fear them is to fear oneself In this moment of panic. I fear only those who are afraid Let's forget now about parades and the people and see what went on behind the closed doors where the new government really didn't want the democracy And so they hedged But even so popular pressure made them provide for the election of a president and at this point a new figure injected itself into the picture Hugo had decided to move into less turbulent and more spacious quarters in the Rue de la Tour de la Verne in the west end of Paris and One day he was unpacking a trunk in a bare room in the new place when a short dark man walked in unannounced and said You are Victor Hugo. I believe I am and you I am Prince Bonaparte at your service. Oh, how do you do sir? Do sit down There is only this trunk here as you see. We are just moving in quite all right Shall we share the trunk? Thank you. I Have heard of you of course my father served your uncle Napoleon Bonaparte for many years and you sir could serve me Now that at least is to the point What do you think I can do? You are perhaps the most influential single man in France. I Intend to stand for election to the new presidency. I Need your support. I see and just what Prince Bonaparte do you think recommends you to my support? You know where I stand I do and that is why I'm here They say I want to be Napoleon over again That is man. I am no genius But I do want a chance to demonstrate my good will to my people of France. I Don't want to be a guilty hero like my uncle. I would rather be known as a good citizen like Washington Forgive me Prince, but talk is cheap You say thus and so Now what guarantees do I have at once president? You would keep your word my dear Hugo? I believe in democracy with all my heart In Italy did I not fight beside the men of the rebellion? That is true You have seen perhaps some of my pamphlets on the elimination of populism With your support we could return France to her old glory under the banner of freedom God knows France needs someone who loves her at the head of her government. Well, Mr Let me consider it and if I am convinced of your sincerity, you shall have my support for the presidency of France Hugo did give Bonaparte his support and he was elected as first president of the second Republic This was in 1848 remember the next three years were a nightmare for Hugo Almost at once he realized his hopes of the Republic could not materialize Their leaders spoke of the people as the vile masses For a time Hugo placed some hope in the president Bonaparte But it finally became evident that Bonaparte too had a private axe to grind All Hugo could do was to speak out bravely and bitingly against the government's usurping of the people's power Then on the night of December 1st 1851 Bonaparte gave a great reception in the Elysee palates It was a brilliant affair and lasted until late Then when the last guest was gone Bonaparte went to his study and got out a special dossier Labeled with a single word He looked at it long and then broke the seal What in heaven's name is the man go come at once there are public has been made prisoners That is right Hugo Bonaparte has taken over the government, but I don't understand how the army Hugo It is everywhere. The Palais were born surrounded the chamber of deputies is barricaded They say that 70 of the representatives are already been made prisoners. Why this means dictatorship final trade Some of the leftists have not yet been captured and they're meeting in an hour at number 16 Rue Blanche Will you join us there Hugo to what end to stop this awful thing if we can will you come? Of course, I'll come excuse me a moment. I must tell my wife Adele Adele Adele, what is it Hugo something wrong? I'm afraid so my dear Bonaparte sees the government the representatives are all being arrested I must leave at once before they come here, but Victor you will be now now. Don't you worry about me? I'll be all right Here is some money darling. There's not much mine hundred francs, but it's all I have in the house at the moment Now don't worry and I'll get in touch with you just the minute I can but if the soldiers come here What shall I do nothing? They will not molest you It's me. They're interested in and you Hugo What are you going to do? I am going to do my duty Do it darling and God bless you Everything is in the hands of the army. What can we do can't we go to the chamber of deputies and invoke the Constitution? We can't get in the chamber even the streets leading to it or jam with soldiers and any one of us will be recognized and seized But let's hear from Hugo. Yes, let's you go to be All right, Hugo. What do you think we ought to do? Oh, I do everything. Yes, we must resist the seizure of power We must arouse the people they are the ones whose liberties been stolen They are the ones who will fight for its return right and we'll march on the palace if the troops yield We'll seize Bonaparte good if the troops fire scattered at once all over Paris and call the people to arms sound the talk American There was a word cut out for us The soldiers are coming Someone must have told of our meeting place men To your work. We will meet at midnight tonight. Where in the back room of the cafe TV go now and Speak out for France. How can a baker argue with a mercenary a loaf of bread is no answer to a naked bayonet an Honest carpenter lugging his toolbox to work in the freshness of the morning stands dumb and unbelieving at the sight of a musket mussel It was always so The good people mind their own business and bake their bread and saw their planks and stare at first in shock Surprise in the face of naked grasping force The people are slow to anger and in that interval of unbelief Dictators move in the trap snapshot So it was in Poland if you will remember when the nation was raped while the world watched stunned And so it was in Paris on this 2nd of December on a biting lead morning in 1851 The next 70 hours for Hugo merged into a nightmare of friends and speeches Calling the people to arms secret meetings in back rooms running always from the soldiers of price on his head At first it was heartbreaking the people seemed stunned Slowly the people of Paris began to rally behind Hugo in his committee Barricades began to appear in the squares and on the boulevards the people grew bolder and then the incredible happened It was on the 4th day of December when the dictator ordered 80,000 troops into the city They came in three columns converging on the center of Paris after a sleepless night during which it attended meetings and written Manifestos Hugo was standing on the curb hidden in the crowd at the old Fandeneau gate where a handful of workmen Manned a barricade facing the oncoming column of troops the curbs were lined with people watching to see what would happen Suddenly a shot was fired and the soldiers went mad For it I can't I can't believe my eyes. It's horrible. I can't stand it They're bringing cannon development People's back was broken and another dictator was in power Hugo was a hunted man with a price on his head Nine days later a workman with a tin lunch bucket walked into the gardener and bought a ticket for Brussels And that it was that Victor Hugo began an exile that was to last for 19 years But Hugo was no placid soul contempt to accept the inevitable Within him burned the divine fire that would not let him stop or rest until his beloved France was free To a group of exiles in Brussels he said I tell you there can be no peace while Bonaparte rules France It is water the death between him and me. I shall not rest until Frenchman can once more be free How long who knows one year or ten it doesn't matter But be very sure his doom will come and until that time I have no task but to hasten the day And I vow to you here. I shall never step foot inside France until France again is free and Beyond that I can see a large piece someday under a United States of Europe So for the next ten years burning indictment streamed from Hugo's pen First from Brussels and later from the origins of Jersey and Guernsey came boat after boat hurled at the head of the trader Bonaparte First came the burning story of a crime written in the white heat of hate Next came the contemptuous Napoleon the little more telling because the writer was less angry Then came a cold blood attack 6,000 epic lines of hate in a book called the chastisement that rocked Bonaparte on his throne Next came the legend of the centuries a more temperate work, but still leveled at his old enemies and Finally his most magnificent work of all lay miserable This tremendous study of Jean Valjean the released convict deals with what Hugo called the three-fold problem of the century The degradation of man into proletarian the decline and fall of women to hunger and the destruction of children into a social Outer darkness this impressive social document is nearly always listed among the hundred best novels of all time and sold over 7 million copies in the first 40 years During this period to Hugo was a nerve center for every liberal movement in the world Mazzini calls for help and he bashes off an appeal to the Italian Poland is in trouble and Hugo intercede John Brown is sentenced for the affair at Harper's Ferry and Hugo writes to Lincoln everywhere It seems his great spirit was at work in the world, and then his long prediction came to pass Bonaparte was tottering before the onslaught of the Germans on September 4th 1870 Bonaparte yielded his sword at Seydant and Hugo was called to Paris only now with the dictator gone would he consent to return to his beloved France As the train pulled into the station from which he had fought in disguise 19 years earlier Paris torn by seed as it was stopped everything to give its hero a welcome such as few men ever received Over 10,000 people jammed the station and as he stepped off the train there was a deafening cheer for their hero What happened next is a matter of history so supposedly call on our historian friend to tell us about it Well, I wondered if you're gonna forget me Well, let's see now 1871 you go call that the terrible year They called him to the government. Of course. He accepted tried his best to hold out for a decent piece with Germany But the businessmen couldn't wait and they voted him down and made what he called a shameful piece So he resigned his post in protest and incidentally took himself off to Brussels again in voluntary exile And how long did his exile last this time two years approximately most of which time he spent in Luxembourg All right And that brings him back to Paris and another election into the Chamber of Deputies in the Third Republic the Republic nobody wanted And almost single-handed over a period of six years He fought heckled champion voted back nearly all of the civil rights Frenchmen have been without since 1850 Hugo lived on vigorous to the last and finally as all men must died quietly on May 22 1885 at the age of 83 This then is the portrait of a man Not of a poet. We haven't time for that Not of a father husband or a lover and That too is a tale to tell Not the novelist or the playwright or the great humanitarian, but only of the statesman And now our portraits finished How shall we sum it up? His contemporaries called him a dreamer an amateur politician a poet in the Senate a soft-hearted visionary Strange it's hard to recall the name of a single one of those contemporaries But Hugo loved his people Had faith in the common man and looked at the time when there should be peace among all free men He preached that impractical doctrine a hundred years ago and Men from 50 countries sat together in San Francisco last month to make of that doctrine a reality Because Victor Hugo believed that a poet must be a prophet for his people. We came this way Would you like to know more of the life and times of Victor Hugo portrayed in the program you've just heard a Handbook containing life stories of 13 great leaders in the struggle for human liberty has been prepared as an interesting supplement to the broadcast series To obtain your copy right for we came this way Address your request to Columbia University Press station J New York 27 New York and enclosed 25 cents in coin to cover costs of printing and mailings My trip was written and produced by Albert Cruz Original music was composed by Amel Fuddersen and conducted by Joseph Calichio Members of the cast included mr. Clifton Utley as narrator mr. Wilms Herbert as Hugo Miss Geraldine K as Adele Hugo and mr. William Everett mr. Tom post mr. John Holtman mr. Fred Sullivan and mr. Gilbert Ferguson This series is presented each week as a public service of the National Broadcasting Company and its affiliated independent station This is the National Broadcasting Company


I'm nearly a two to one print. I mean that that's incredible and after two three hours it should be really way better. Way better. I got I gotcha. Yeah she's holding in there on the bottom side. So you have to pick within strikes of five increments so honestly I think right now the puts would probably should stay with the 40-40 break even. 55, 50, 30, same here. Yes. Yeah that's that's that's screwing with me. Cause it's still opposite. You still gotta do the opposite and that doesn't change. On the but yeah you should be getting into the call. The call is already healed. Yep. Why why doesn't mine doesn't have the ear all of a sudden what the why why is that the ears on the on the put side yeah I got it that's so weird it's not showing the ear why not.  Yes top of the ear we're looking at four grand roughly. Oh see we're about to move the the uh puts. I guess we're not too concerned because we're going to be trading the calls from here but still yeah yeah and it and you said that it's going to stick more true it's going to be yeah okay yeah yeah I mean right here we're looking at 1,400 loss for 1,800 gain. Looks like a 55-40 so that's a 15 point range is pretty standard. Yeah and there's range oh Jesus. Just relax.  Right it's going to be another two minutes until we get a trade. We can wait so you want to try to wait and that would be 55 because yeah we're looking at a $2,000 loss for $700 gain roughly. I don't like those odds there's the trade yeah let it let it come back in let it come back it's coming in man it's one to one okay let's see create duplicates order that's 2,000 oh geez but how many contracts do you have oh that's why so let me take a look at it now oh yeah you're you're right 13 so you're gonna go ahead and do it at three dollars I got I got three bucks oh I got seven oh I got it I got it I got it I'm barely one to one but I'm not far from it I'm not too far from it but holy shit I didn't realize this is my mistake I didn't realize that I signed up for $2,000 loss I'm 1862 gain. Yeah same here oh so you did 13 yeah go Baker go home $60,000 account yeah yeah so maybe we need cents so let's create closing order sell yeah for 30 cents yeah no reverse trades and just just hang in there man hang in there and if it's a losing trade it's a losing trade like it is what it is right but it's keeping us yeah I got you within a normal vertical okay okay and if you pull this dude up and it's actually gonna lose we get closer into the day yeah let me tell you how much I paid in in commissions I paid $133.64 in pure commissions and now times times two uh that's $270 in just commissions yeah yeah so what you paid is should be my my round trip yeah yeah we round trip this thing so so analyze monitor and okay yeah calling yeah absolutely man I'll I'll be around all right pacing and I'm going you know for the next it's only been 20 minutes yeah no I'm I'm there with you dude I am I am trying to put clothes away I'm getting my laundry prepared to do to wash it I mean I'm trying not to watch watch it I did set an alarm uh an alerts uh 40 50 that's that's so funny it's exactly what mine said great much big like yeah I need a hobby yeah you know I told you about those rocket building things and I was like man I need that on the side wow yeah yeah see we here's here's the thing right here's the beauty is it's a one and done thing we set it up we get into the trade and we let this thing ride I mean we're riding this thing to 4055 that's that's that's done you know what I mean um yeah the let the let the numbers work themselves out uh yes I am nervous yes I am you know fidgety it's just the it's the nature right it's the nature of gambling so to speak but uh yeah we're riding this man oh yes oh that's oh look at that it's going down man it's going down I'm up 700 bucks yeah you can five minute put a trade so that you know that just means our odds have gone up yeah absolutely gone up greatly now oh it's awesome I'm up a thousand bucks dude geez it's just it's it's looking pretty dude it's crazy to think this is a daily thing this is a day that we can do this daily man every day this is incredible but you know one of these days obviously you know it's going to come back and we don't know what the day holds the the rest of the day but we're going to get into some losers if we're going to have some therapy sessions yeah no yeah I know we are I just want to come in here really quick um and just say it's anything anything can happen um from here it can come back up and knock us out uh and get us into a losing trade for the day but this is incredible guys we got a cool little system here uh if you're interested in learning about what we're doing here just uh stick around guys I've been absent for a long time and it's a reoccurring theme for me here but there's a particular reason why and I'll share with you why that is on a later uh video so just just bear with me guys trade those yeah um anyway you know how bad I just want to pull the trade and just be done was that $1,400 I'm like yeah dude and just no time dude we're 10 cents we're getting out yeah dude it almost got got us out it's at 35 cents did it really it's at 35 cents 40 cents I was like man we gotta close this thing because it's right there on the predicted deal and then boom there it goes oh almost come on where are we at it's 45 cents no it's 35 cents now yeah it's 35 cents man jeez 45 cents it's just jumping up and down well it's gonna decay into it if we hang down here so yeah nice dude dude almost monitor 40 cents 35 cents I know you're busy man I don't want to keep you on the front just excited come on folks you're seeing here right here the mark where it says negative 45 right now we're trying to get out at 30 cents and let's see what happens here 30 cents almost almost it hit it didn't get me out oh my partner got out flash 20 there for a little bit I don't know what's going on the flash 20 there for a second which is lower oh I got out that's it I had to move my order to 35 and I'm out guys I made $1,722 in 50 cents big win guys big win big huge huge win oh my gosh I'm glad that you guys witnessed this of course in recording not live but amazing amazing amazing amazing wow wow wow wow guys and there it goes there it goes and if I was patient enough I'm sure it would have gotten me out but I didn't want to take that chance it was not that big of a difference I just wanted to get out and I'm out holy crap guys amazing thank you everybody so much for watching today's trade today's video this is the first in a couple of years I apologize comment down below what you want to know what you want to say what you thought about this trade what you thought about what we're doing here do you want to know leave a comment hit that like button subscribe also hit that subscribe button I would greatly appreciate it'll help me out tremendously and see you guys here on the very next trading video hoping it's a green trade this is Giovanni from the options trading channel see you guys later


Okay, we're back here live inside the Cube at IBM's Information on Demand in Las Vegas. This is SiliconANGLE, the Cube, our flagship program. We're out to the events. Check to see if they're from the noise. Let's get right back into the action. I'm John Furrier with my co-host. I'm Dave Vellante at wikibond.org and we're here with Stacey Leidwinger who is a senior director of product management at Vivissimo, which is a company that IBM bought recently. A lot of people are excited about this acquisition, Stacey. So welcome to the Cube. Yeah, thank you. It's great to be here. Yeah, so when was the acquisition? When did it go down? So it was closed beginning of June this year. So have you been blue-washed? So actually we're getting ready to launch our first blue-washed product. We'll be announcing tomorrow. Oh, Jonas says the antibodies. Yeah. He's the guy who ran a Skunkworks project called G2 for like four years.  Doesn't play with the heavy machinery at IBM. So what's been like there? It's been really positive and good. So I think we're excited because we've come under the big data portfolio. And so, really, yeah, right? And so it's been great working with the teams, getting the product ready to go ahead and launch, working with all the different sales mechanisms. As a product manager, the wealth of technology, we can now integrate with our product. It's like Christmas. So it's all about prioritization and focus. And the market's growing like crazy. There's a lot of demand for solutions. Yeah. Man, it's exciting. So give us a quick, yeah, I know you got a deadline, so we'll try your writers. Give us a quick overview of what's going on with the product with you guys inside IBM. Yep. So our product is going to be announced as Data Explorer. And it's really one of the entry points for clients who are looking to understand and navigate and explore all of their big data assets. Whether it is stored in a system like Big Insights where you're going ahead in a Hadoop infrastructure, or you want to go ahead and bring in more enterprise content coming from content management, ERP, CRM, external information like social media, web, Wikis, et cetera. And so we really allow organizations to explore and navigate all that information to use at point of impact. So talking about applications, it's really big data applications that customer service agents can use. Marketing executives can use. Sales executives within R&D. So I was always talking to my friends in the big data world. We need a search engine for data. Data sets, not so much data per se. Is that something that you guys are looking at? Yeah, so fundamentally we've come from a search background. So what we're doing is we're able to go ahead and index all of these rich assets to allow users to navigate through it. We also have a user interface that pushes content out, providing a 360 degree view of information. So customers, products, again, all of your information sits where it resides. We're not asking you to move or change your data. We build that rich index and then we allow for exploration. Does that include real time information, anything that's streaming in? You indexing that too? Yeah, so that's where we're integrating with InfoSphere Stream. So we can actually show how real live data is being streamed in within our interface. And then you can push that information so you can index it later on. So you're not sucking it into a God box? Is that right? No, it's all in our index. Okay, so it lives where it lives. Stays, yep. It's distributed by its very nature. You talked to it off camera about federated discovery of data, right? So talk about why that's important. So I think one of the biggest challenges organizations face is how do I get started with big data? I don't even know what I have. I don't know what I don't know. I don't even know necessarily what information's valuable for my users. And so we're that initial step to start allowing users to navigate and just find what information do they have about a topic? What information is used heavily by their users? Once you start to identify those characteristics sets, now you can start to decide, all right, this information is valuable. I should probably put it in a system like Hadoop or Big Insights to run analytics. This information actually would be better off in a different archival system. It's not heavily used. I need to keep it for governance reasons, but I could find cheaper systems to store it in. And so we're really that entry point to start exploring and understanding what information you have. So is there a classification capability as well, or is that sort of a different technology? No, so we actually, we can leverage anything that exists, any type of metadata or structured information. But we also have what we call our clustering engine which dynamically categorizes themes without any pre-processing with your unstructured information. So that's where some of this exploration comes. So people can actually find things they otherwise would have missed. So obviously unstructured data is a big theme here. How do you guys deal with all the unstructured data? That's really our sweet spot. Because there as we start to build these indexes, we can start to find related terms and themes as I've pointed out. We can also allow users to hunt for that information. We can combine structured and unstructured so we can go into your CRM system and understand here's our list of customers. Now in all of your unstructured information, your file shares, your content management, your email, find everything that relates to that customer name. And so that's where we see this merge of structured, semi-structured and unstructured content. So share with the folks out there. I mean, I don't want to get too, you know, you give away too much of each side of it, but explain to them how hard that really is to do. So I think that's what everyone says. That's not, you know, it doesn't sound hard, but when you think about enterprise applications, it's very complex. You've got to think about security. So how can I ensure that only the right information is being delivered to the user, that they're not seeing anything that's unsecure? You've also got to consider about updates. So as content changes, how can I ensure that it's updated almost instantaneous? We live in a world of instant gratification. People want to know that if they change a document and SharePoint file in that, they're going to immediately see that change when they hunt for it. And people test that all the time. Also the nuances, when you think about all the fields and metadata that might be associated with a piece of content, you need to ensure you're accessing all of that. So when I talk about connectivity, I always talk about ensuring you get all the content in a secure fashion, and you support real-time updates. And that becomes quite complex when you think about systems that have been out there for a number of years.  Yep. They bought in Deca. It was in Deca, they bought, it was in Deca. Yeah, and they're inventing big data, as we heard from Larry Ellison. They're just a note on the grid we heard earlier. And they say they do a lot of things, really weren't built for what's going on in the workload side of things. How do you look at Oracle relative to what IBM's doing? So I mean, I think I'll look at it first, kind of where you pointed out, like in Deca and in Search. I think where Oracle invested was more around product cataloging, e-commerce. That's really where in Deca's strength has been over the year. They have a number of retailer sites that they would allow to go ahead and search against the product catalogs. Probably less of the sweet spot was the unstructured wealth of information that's coming in, the content management, the ERP, PLM, all that I mentioned before. And so I think the way that we're attacking big data is really how do you bring big data to the masses? How do you ensure that the business user is getting real tangible benefits? And I think that's how we start to differentiate. Also having this UI, which I could show our screen now, because I think really that 360 degree view of how the information's being pushed together, we're not seeing that from a product perspective with any of the competition to date. We're seeing organizations try to build it, but we all know what happens when you try to build something. How do you sustain it? How do you maintain it? And that integration point becomes the challenge over time. So talk about what you mean by that 360 degree view, because a lot of firms in the BI business used to say that. And I want to probe a little bit and tell us what you mean by that. So I'll use a scenario. If I'm a marketing executive and I'm looking to do a marketing campaign on one of our new product lines, how do I go ahead and today, without using Data Explorer, how do I find my information? Well, I probably go into my content management. What's the latest marketing data sheets that I've had on this? What has been the recent case studies that we've done? What's the recent stats around it? Then I probably go into our CRM system. Who's actually bought the product? Who can we use as customer references? I might go in our PLM system. I might check our data warehouses around inventory. I might go out and look at the social media. So I'm going to all these different silos to understand just how my product operates, the health of my product, the business of my product. Now, in a single interface, we can bring all of that data together. So you're seeing information from CRM, PLM, our marketing automation tools. And that's what we're talking about 360. Where I think 360 has gone in different areas, like MDM, for example, is they find that 360-degree view of an identity. So they know that Stacey Lydwinger in the CRM is S. Lydwinger in email, is S. Lydwinger on the intranet. So we can actually leverage all of that work and now pull in all the unstructured in the context of all of that information. Similar to BI, I think BI has done a lot of work around quantitative analysis. So looking at a lot of transactional information. We can pull that information in. We work together. But we then go after the qualitative and the unstructured. And that's really where the magic of our solution is, is being able to find that golden nugget maybe in an email or a sales briefing notes that otherwise is overlooked. You got to know what a gold nugget looks for before you can actually find a gold nugget, as we always say. That's great stuff. My question, I know you got your tight on time, but I want to dig into the go-to market for you guys, obviously. So talk about how you're getting the word out. What are you guys doing as you go take us to market with market development? Is it selling through IBM channels? What kind of marketing do you do? What's some of the playbook there? So, I mean, we're really all just ramping up, I'd say, leveraging the IBM machine to get our name out there. But I'd say where we look at kind of the playbook, really in three areas, all around big data. The first is really how do you navigate and explore your big data assets? I'd say that looks a little more traditional like a federated discovery or search solution where you see a list of results that you can drill into. The second area then is this 360 degree view. So much more of a dashboard like view, pushing information out to the user. And then the third area is taking that 360 and extending it with analytics. So really starting to merge the quantitative analysis that might come out of a big insights, a Cognos and SPSS with the qualitative of the unstructured. So based on those three areas, we're going ahead in training a lot of the IBM sales team. We're going with our channel partners. We're getting people ramped up to go ahead and deploy in the field. I think every week I'm doing probably five to 10 different enablements in training sessions. That's the plus word for IBM. Is there any marketing behind it? Like yeah, so you can, you know, I mean print advertising, web advertising. So what you're going to see come out is all around data explorer. And I think we're spending a lot of time talking about the big data platform because we really want customers to understand how all these products come together. They're not really just piece mail. There's a plan and how they can get started. We have our big product announcement that's going to be coming out this quarter. So you're going to see a lot of marketing. Yep, this year you're going to see a lot of marketing information come out around that announcement. And we're coinciding that announcement with Streams 3.0, Big Insights 2.0. Now a big data group. We're interviewing Rob Thomas. He's coming to see you. Is he your group? He really leads our group. He's, you know, our champion. He's the head top dog. Yep. So we brought Vavisimo in during the acquisition phases. Yep, he's in the NMA. Grilled me with lots and lots of questions. Who does the marketing for the group? Tracy Moustachio? So she runs Big Data Marketing. So she does Big Insights, Streams, and Data Explorer. Yeah, we like your Big Data. You know, I used to be friends with Anad Jhingran until he turned and left the company. I had not, he's been at IBM for years. He went to a startup, but yeah, we've talked about structured data for a long time. You guys have done a lot of work in the area.  One, the IBM acquisition. And I know you can say, oh, it's great all the effort. But two, product wise in the marketplace, what's really getting you excited? Well, I think those two go hand in hand. So I had been at Vavisimo for eight and a half years. So the fact that IBM saw the business value that we were bringing to our clients and said, I think we can do a lot more. We can take this product that's been your baby and show it to a broader audience. So to me, that's the most exciting. The fact that tomorrow I'll be talking at the IM keynote showing the demo of our product to maybe two, 3,000 people. It might have taken me a whole year to demo to 3,000 people. And I did a lot of talking, but there wasn't that many. Well, you're just talking about 2,000 people. Yeah, there you go. Right? You can reach that right here. Several help. We should have got the demo going. So from the product perspective, I think that's it. And I think that what we bring is we've really focused on what are the business problems that our customers are looking to solve. And I think I'm seeing this evolution where probably the last year or two years there's been a lot of lack of a better term of science projects around big data. We're hearing at the conference where there are now a handful of 50 different organizations or more that have really taken these products and started to expand and use. And so I think that's going to evolve over the next year. And the fact that we get to be a piece of that, I think is exciting. Okay, Stacey Ledwinger. Thank you for coming on. I know you're busy. Senior Director of Product Management at Vivismo. Now an IBM company and M&A into the big data group. You've got a good car you pulled off the deck there. Getting in the right group. Big data's big, it's hot, we love it. This is theCUBE. We'll be right back with our next interview after this short break.


I want you to consider an important question. Actually, a question that has more than one part. The question is, what is important to John Smith? I spend September doing regions and geography. Once we get through all that, we start in with the charters and the exploration and why would anybody want to get on a ship to almost sure death. I also want to put in some other words here. And some other words for the word important. What's the first word under important? Great. Valuable. Valuable. You know what valuable means? Remember what valuable means? Or who can tell me from what we talked about in math? Value. Valuable. John. Something precious to somebody. Okay. Something that is precious. Okay. Anyone else? Zach, did you hand up? No, I was going to say something like, John. What were you going to say? Something that is not as important to you. That is important, but is important in a way that maybe we're talking about precious. Something like money. Something that has worth. Right? Okay. And necessary. Very different to say something is valuable than it is to say something is necessary. Michelle. Something. Important in what way? Alicia. Something that I need. Needed. Okay. Different to say something that you need than something that has value. Okay. Those are different things. You need what? What do you? Fourth graders. What do you need? See now. You need shelter. Place the list. Kumar. You need food. Uji. Water. You need water. Okay. What is valuable to you? What is valuable to you? Toy. A pet. Okay. A game boy. Michelle. A picture of your family. A picture of your family. Okay. Are we seeing clearly you don't need a game boy. You don't need a pet, but they are valuable to you. Okay. We understand the difference? Yes. Okay. John Smith. I'd also like to put the word yet, but the Virginia Company is the group of men in England who paid all the money to send John Smith and the colonists to Virginia. Okay. The settlers to Virginia. The Virginia Company were not settlers. They were not colonists. They were men who stayed across the ocean in England. The colonists and John Smith are the ones that sailed across the, what ocean did they sail across? Atlantic Ocean and came to Virginia. Okay. So your question, which has more than one part to it, is what is important to John Smith and the colonists and John Smith. Okay. Okay. All right. All right. Let's go.


The long-time editor of prestigious medical journal started his editorial on physician conflicts of interest, describing a fantasy that doctors treat patients using simply the best evidence and experience rather than being influenced by money or self-interest. This is, of course, nonsense. There's a reason pharmaceutical companies spend billions of dollars on the influencing, education, and entertainment of doctors around the world. The vast majority of physicians in the United States take gifts from the pharmaceutical industry, and ironically cardiologists whose practice centers around diseases that can be largely prevented and treated with lifestyle changes receive the most payments of all. A previous compilation of surveys from the 80s and 90s found that on average doctors met with drug industry representatives face-to-face about once a week. Today, your family doctor may meet with drug company employees on average 16 times a month. Basically, there's only 20 workdays a month, so that's nearly every day. What does the public think about this? Only about half even appear to know what's going on. So if 83% of doctors receive gifts, it's likely that significant percentage of patients are not aware that their personal physician receives industry gifts. And we're not just talking like a Viagra paperweight or soap dispenser. For marketing, pharmaceutical companies spend $15,000 per physician every year, making conflicts of interest one of the most pressing problems in American healthcare. How do doctors feel about it? Most generally approve of the gifts. However, tellingly, physicians do not want gift relationships made public. Physicians disagree that it's inappropriate to accept gifts, but their reluctance to disclose this gift relationship to the public suggests that they must recognize that the public would not appreciate the practice. To analyze how physicians resolve this contradiction, researchers conducted a series of physician-focused groups. It turns out physicians use a variety of denials and rationalizations. They avoided thinking about it, denied responsibility. Doctors readily acknowledged the inherent conflict of interest, but this didn't stop them. In fact, some complained that the gifts were getting more modest. Us doctors tend to deny that we personally have any conflict of interest if a pharmaceutical company buys us a nice dinner, for example. We tend to insist that it won't affect our judgments in any way, as if drug companies just like wasting money on purpose. Most physicians contend that their colleagues are susceptible to industry's influence, but not them. Though physicians don't want these gift relationships to be public, that's just too bad, because thanks to Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, the Sunshine Act was inserted into Obamacare. And so for the first time, patients will now be able to see what, if any, financial ties their own doctor has. Doctors can't hide anymore. This will give patients some insights when choosing a provider, and once the database goes live, law enforcement agencies can also see who's getting money from industry to investigate illegal kickback cases. Right now, it might just be embarrassing, but this could allow Attorney Generals to go after doctors to see the kinds of incentives they may be getting for writing lots of prescriptions. And the database is live right now. If you go to openpaymentsdata.cms.gov slash search, or for a more user-friendly version, pro-publica's dollars-for-docs page, the industry, the drug industry spends billions trying to influence doctors, and for the first time, you can see if your physician, or any physician, has their hand out. Senator Grassley hoped that this would help save our nation money. It could reduce healthcare costs, if patients view such doctors less trustworthy, or choose doctors less in bed with industry, or could change physician behavior, who may want to avoid financial relationships with companies to guard against this patient distrust, or becoming the target of an expose or investigation. Or they could just try to cover it up. This is from the American Academy of Family Physicians, advising physicians how to avoid getting burned by the Sunshine Act. For example, drug companies now have to report when they give doctors free meals valued at over $10. So should family physicians just stop accepting free food from drug companies? No way! You just have to give the drug sales reps the right headcount, so the per-person meal cost dips below $10. The former longtime editor of the New England Journal of Medicine said it best. Although the spotlight has been on disclosing doctors' financial relationships with industry, the problem with conflicts of interest is not the lack of disclosure, but the existence of the conflict itself. Rather than just disclosing them, the best approach to financial conflicts is to have none.


Good morning everybody, traders, friends, investors. This is Lee Lowell from smartoptionseller.com. Today is Saturday, May 22nd, 2021.  We go over options trading strategies and then later on we look at the charts as part of our Saturday synopsis. We look at the indexes, we look at individual stocks, see what they've been doing, see where they may be going. But the first part of our video is always about an options trading strategy and what I can help teach you about how to become a better trader. Now I always have this cheat sheet up on my screen which is today, how to sell put options. Here's my process. At the smartoptionseller, selling put options is our bread and butter. That's what we do. That is what we do most more than anything else as part of options trading. We sell put options. So I continue and I always get emails from people saying, Lee, I understand selling put options. I know what the strategy is, I know how to do it. But I wanna know what your process is. How do you, what's your step from A to Z? How do you go about picking a stock and then deciding, okay, it's time to sell a put option on this particular stock? How do you do it? I wanna know what your process is. Well, I made a lot of videos like this and I've always included my process, my five step plan, what I look for, but it's always good to renew because people come on at different times and they see these videos at different times. So once again, I will walk through my process of how to sell put options and how do I do it and why do I do it and why, and how and why do I pick the stocks that I choose to sell put options on? So it's all about helping you become a better trader and how to help you become a smarter and more profitable put option seller. So that's what we're doing. That's what we're going to discuss today. So let's jump right in. How to sell put options, here's my process. Well, number one, let's just make sure everyone's on the same page so we understand what selling put options is all about. In the options trading world, there's always, there's only two kinds of options, call options and put options. We only, I'd say not only, but most of the time we settle on selling put options and why is that? Because selling put options is a neutral to bullish strategy for the stock's direction. Or even if you're trading or selling put options on the indexes as well. The stock market continues to go up over time. In the long run, the stock market always goes up. So you might as well stick to a strategy that plays that long-term direction, which is neutral to bullish. Selling put options takes advantage of that long-term strategy or that long-term direction in the market. Now I understand people can trade very short-term options, you know, one day, one week, one month, whatever. And in that very short time, the market can be very erratic. So it's hard to take advantage of a long-term direction of the market if you're trading very short-term. So I try to use options that trade or expire within a couple months. You know, sometimes one month, but I need to make sure we can get, we need to allow the stock to move in our direction that we think it's going to move. And sometimes you need a little bit more time. So I don't sell put options usually on a very short-term basis because the market is just too erratic in that short-term. You know, unless I'm really sure of something, you know, then I'll sell, you know, a one-week put option, but that's pretty rare for me because I like to give the stock time to move in the direction that I think it's going to move. Okay, so number one, you have to know selling put options is a neutral to bullish strategy. You don't wanna sell put options on stocks that are going downwards. And how do you tell if a stock's moving downwards? Well, you just look at a stock chart and if you see the stock trending lower, it would be very hard to sell put options on a stock that's moving lower because it could keep moving lower. And you don't want the stock to move lower when you sell put options. So make sure you check the chart. Make sure you look at the charts to see the stock is moving in the right direction, which is either flat to rising. Okay, that's number one. You wanna make sure the stock's moving in the right direction. So what I do is that, you know, when I'm ready to sell a put option either for myself or for our newsletter, I'm always going to stick with one of my favorite stocks. And how do I, where do I come up with the stocks? How do I pick my favorite stocks? Well, over the 30 years that I've been in this business, I've cultivated a stock watch list that includes almost all of the stocks that I like to look at on a regular basis. These are leaders in their sectors, leaders in their field, stalwarts in the business, stalwarts in their industries, stocks that have been around for a long time and just generally large, popular, good, solid companies. And what do I mean by that? Well, companies that make quality products and companies that have good earnings quarter after quarter, you know, their sales are increasing over time. You don't wanna pick stocks that are unprofitable quarter after quarter, because eventually the stock price will follow those earnings lower, okay? There's a lot of companies, you know, a lot of new companies, tech stocks that don't have earnings yet, but they're trading on hype, they're trading on forward-looking, you know, projections. But eventually those companies have to create products that are profitable for the company. Otherwise, the stock will eventually move lower. So I've cultivated this list of stocks and you can do the same. And what I'll do is I've talked about how to build your own watch list and I'll put a video link at the end of this video. It'll come up on the screen. It'll be one of my past videos of how to build your watch list, how to pick stocks to put in your watch list, okay? So you have to choose a stock that you're interested in buying one of your favorite stocks. And this is all my process of selling put options. So once I've decided on a stock, then I look at the chart. And I wanna make sure the chart is showing that the stock is somewhat in and up trend, okay? So, you know, here we're on step three here. So we know it's a neutral to bullish strategy when you sell put options. You wanna find your favorite stock and then you wanna check the charts to see what kind of trend that stock is currently in. Because before I decide, hey, I wanna buy X or potentially buy a certain stock, I have to check the charts. I wanna make sure the stock is moving up because there's no reason for me to buy a stock while it's currently in a downtrend. That's just, you're gonna be swimming upstream, which is much harder to do. And you're gonna be frustrated if the stock keeps going lower and you've bought it, it's going to frustrate you. So you always want to stick with stocks that are moving in the right direction and that is higher. That's if you're bullish, of course, okay? So once again, when you sell a put option, you're obligating yourself to potentially buy this particular stock sometime in the future at a price of your choosing. So you have to decide, okay, I like this stock. Where am I, where would I be willing to buy this stock somewhere down the road? A lot cheaper or cheaper than where it currently trades. I'm not looking to buy the stock right at its current trading price. I wanna get a good deal on the stock. I wanna buy this stock cheaper than where it currently is right now. And by doing so, I mean, obviously you can't do that. If the stock's here and you wanna buy it down here, there's no way you're going to buy it down here because it's trading up here currently. So how could you buy a stock cheaper than where it's currently trading? Well, you can sell a put option at a strike price down here, okay? So the stock's here, you sell your strike price down here and in the off chance that the stock actually drops that far over the term of the expiration, well, then you'll get to buy that stock. So you have to decide on what price would I be willing to step up and buy this stock in the future? Now, what you're doing is you're basically saying, in today's date, I'm making a decision that sometime in the future, I will buy the stock lower or down here. And obviously you don't know what's gonna happen in the future. So you have to be comfortable with that potential purchase price happening in the future, okay? So things can happen between now and the future that could affect that stock's price, either higher or lower. So you're sort of making a decision today, hey, I'm willing to step up and buy this stock in the future. So you have to make sure it's at a price that you would be comfortable buying that stock. Now, how do you do that? Well, number four here, you decide on a potential buy level. So if the stock falls somewhere in the future, you say, okay, I'm okay buying this stock at X price. For me, that's at least a 20% downside from where it currently trades. So if the stock's at 100, 20% below that would be $80. At a minimum, that would be my potential buy area for the stock because I've decided, okay, $80 is 20% discount to where it currently trades. Yeah, I'd be okay buying that stock. Whatever the stock is, wherever it trades, you have to decide where your comfort level would be to potentially buy it. And we'll look at some charts and we'll see how I actually do that. Now, the next step is once you've decided where you potentially wanna buy it, that is the strike price level. Then you check the options chains. You check the chains to see how much you can get when you sell that put option. Remember, you're the option seller. So you're selling it and you're getting money for it. To me, at a minimum, I like to try to get at least a 25 cent premium when I sell that put option. That's just, premium is just what is another word for the options price, the option value is premium. So I'm hoping to get at least a 25 cent premium for that option that's at least 20% below the current price of the stock, the strike price. And I'd like to try to stay within a three month expiration period. Doesn't always happen, sometimes have to go out to four months, depending on the stock, depending on what's happening in the market, depending on where volatility is. So you go through the expiration months, and this is a little bit of a manual labor. You gotta check a couple different expiration dates and see how much the options are paying for your chosen strike price. Okay, then you can, the next step, you can also check the probability of what are the chances of the stock falling from its current price all the way down to your potential buy price within the expiration period. And the probability calculator, and I'll show you how you do that as well, will give you an idea of the chances of you actually being able to buy that stock. The way that I do it, and the way we do it in the newsletter, we really don't want to buy the stock. We just wanna collect the cash, we wanna collect the premium that the put option buyers pay us. We'll have that option either expire worthless or we buy it back eventually for a very cheap price. And then we move on to the next trade, because buying stock entails shelling out thousands of dollars of cash. Okay. And sometimes a lot of our readers of our newsletter, they don't really have all that money to buy all the shares of stocks. So we're, what we really wanna do is sell the put option well out of the money. And that's what these strike prices are called out of the money strike prices. We want the stock to stay above those strike prices so that the option can expire worthless. And we move on and do the trade again on many different stocks. So we collect all this income and that's how we build our, yeah, build up our portfolio. Portfolio's worth goes up over time.  And in the meanwhile, you don't have to buy shares of stock. But in the off chance that you do end up having to buy the stock, you know what, it's at a pretty cheap price from where it was trading prior. Okay, so you check the probability to see what would be the chances of you actually having to step up and buy those shares of stock. Now, if you have a very high probability of that not happening, of you not having to buy the stock, well, that's a good thing. We look for over 90% chance of us not having to buy the stock, okay? That means the stock has a 90% chance of not dropping to our strike price. That's the way that we do it.  You sell the put option and you collect the cash from the put option buyer. And at that point, you're just waiting. You're waiting to see what happens. And step eight is you can manage the trade. So let's just say you sold the put option, the stock was here, all of a sudden the stock starts to drop on you. Are you still willing to step up and buy that stock at your chosen price? Maybe you're thinking, well, you know what? They had a really bad earnings announcement and the CEO was caught doing some bad stuff. The stock prices started to drop. Maybe I don't really wanna buy the stock anymore. Bad things are happening. Well, that's fine. Stuff like that happens. What you have to do at that point is manage the trade. Just like if you had just bought stock, how do you manage your trade? Do you have a stop loss set? Do you have a bailout point? It's up to you to decide how to manage the trade. Some things you can do is you can set a stop loss or you can roll the put option if necessary. We talked about rolling in one of our previous videos where if you've sold the put option, you could always buy that put option back at any time. You're not obligated to hold it until expiration. You could buy that put option back and then you can sell a new put option for a much lower strike price in a further out expiration date. That's what's called rolling the put option. Or you just set yourself a stop loss. If the stock drops say 20% and you're like, you know what, I'm out. The stock is not doing well. I'm out 20% drop. I have to get out of this trade.  And it might be for a profit or a loss at that point, depending on where it is in the expiration cycle. So you're never married to the trade. You can always get out of the option trade at any time you want, okay? So here's the eight steps. And number nine is once again, these are just my rules. These are the things that I follow. All the rules that I'm showing you here or all the guidance I'm showing you here can be tweaked based on your outlook for the stock and how long you wanna be in the trade. Nothing is set in stone. These are not black and white rules. Everything could be moved around or tweaked to fit your risk profile and your outlook for the stock. So these are just guidelines of things that I use, how we use them and why they work so well. So let's just take a quick look at how I actually go through these steps and what I do. Number one always to me is you have to check the charts, okay, so let's pull up. Let's pull up, I have Merck up here. Okay, this is a daily chart of Merck and we want to see a stock that is, as I said, in an uptrend, moving higher because you want to go with what the market is showing you. You want to move into a stock that's trending higher when you sell put options. Now here is a daily chart of Merck going back to, you know, a year and a half ago. Here's where it currently trades, okay? It traded $79.18, that's where it closed on. Yesterday, Friday, May 21st, 2021. Now, you know, this stock doesn't really look like it's going anywhere. And Merck's just kind of been trading around this, you know, 75 to 85 level for a long period of time since the pandemic last March. It's been trading in this pretty wide range. So, you know, if I wanted to sell put options on Merck, the stock's moving sideways, which is fine. I want to see it go up more than sideways. But, you know, that's just something that you have to look at the charts. Now, if I was saying, you know what, I like healthcare, I like healthcare stocks, I like Merck, I know the company puts out great products. You know what, I want to try to buy some shares of Merck but I don't want to buy it at its current $79 price. Where should I buy some shares of Merck down the road if that's possible? Now, you can also see in the chart, and what I can do is you can see that, you know, it's kind of in a little bit of an uptrend here. And it looks like it has some resistance right around here. So, it could be in this, what's called an ascending triangle pattern. Okay, Merck's moving upwards, it's kind of going up. And if it can get through this resistance around $80, I think that the stock's going to keep going. Now, mind you, this is not a recommendation, this is not personal investment advice, this is just me showing you an example here of how to play it on a stock called Merck. And I'm not selling put options on Merck, I'm just showing you it as an example. So, if I think Merck can get through $80, it's going to keep going higher. And it's sort of been moving up. So, I'm a little bullish on Merck right now. So, I want to sell a put option. Well, what do I do? Well, we look for a put option strike at least 20% below where it currently trades, where the current stock price is. So, it's around $79, 20% below, that's roughly a little under $16 per share. Subtracts $16 from $79. So, that's about $63, okay? $63, actually, let me pull this down a little bit. So, $63 is somewhere down here. Okay, here's $65. The 63 strike is somewhere down here. Here's where Merck currently trades, $63 is all the way down here. That's a nice buffer. What do we mean by that? Well, we want to give ourselves some wiggle room for the stock to move around. Stocks move higher, they move lower. So, you need to give yourself some room for the stock to make its normal gyrations without getting knocked out of the trade prematurely. That's the reason why we have a big buffer. We don't want to get knocked out of the trade prematurely. So, we choose one of these out-of-the-money strikes all the way down here. Would you be comfortable potentially buying Merck at at least $63 per share? It's currently trading at $79. So, that's a nice $16 discount. And you think, okay, yeah, I'd be willing to step up and buy Merck at $63. So, now the next step is we have to look at the option chain. See what people are paying for these Merck out-of-the-money strike prices. So, what you do is you go to your option chain. I have this already pulled up. Now, this is an option chain for Merck. We've got put options on the right-hand side. The bid-ask-com is all we need to look at.  So, Merck's at $79 roughly. We're looking for at least the strike price at $63 or lower that will pay us at a minimum 25-cent credit, okay? So, you scan down. Now, here's how many days left until expiration. I said in the guidelines, we want something minimum three months or not more than three months if we can. So, we start at August expiration, 90 days out till expiration, and we scan down the strike price-com till we get to at least a 63 strike or lower. 62 and a half is our strike price, at least 20% buffer. Now, it went out 10-cent bid at 25-cent offer. It's probably more like a 15-cent bid at 25-cent offer. We probably could not get 25 cents since it's already offered at 25 cents. We wanna see something with at least maybe a 25-cent bid because if we sell it, we know we'll get 25 cents. Now, you can move up to the 65 strike, which is a 25-cent bid, 39-cent offer. You can do something in the middle maybe at 30 cents, but $65 is not the full 20% buffer. So, you have to decide, is $65, am I still okay potentially buying Merck at 65 bucks? That's up to you. We can go out to the next expiration date, which is September, so that's 118 days out. That's just under four months.  That's up to you. Scan down the strike prices. We look at the 62 and a half, which is a little bit more than 20% cushion, and that is a 26-cent bid, 36-cent offer. We could still probably sell that somewhere in the middle around 30 cents a contract, which would meet our criteria of getting at least 25-cent credit. If you sell it for 30 cents, that's better than selling it for 25 cents. 30 cents is better than 25 cents when you're selling it. When you're buying it, you don't wanna buy it for 30, because it's more expensive than 25 cents. So, we can sell it for roughly 30 cents. That meets our criteria. It's a little longer than we'd like to go out in the expiration scale, but $62.5 is a good buffer, a good distance below $79. So, it's all about figuring out, okay, how far out in the expiration scale do I wanna go? Which strike price is offering me at least 25-cent credit? Now, if 25 cents is not enough for you, because some people will tell me, Lee, that 25 cents, what am I gonna do with 25 cents? That's not a lot of money. Well, over time, when you're selling these things over and over again, and you're having such a high probability of profit, the money adds up. But if you're thinking, you know what? 25 cents is not enough for me, well, then you have to choose a different strike price. A higher put option strike price, that pays more. The 70 puts pay out about 90 something cents per contract. And you have to multiply that by 100 to tell you actually the amount of money you get. So, let's just say 95 cents, multiply that by 100. That's 95 bucks that you'll get for selling each put option contract. The 62.5, you get $30 for selling each one contract. One contract equals 100 shares of stock. So, if you were to have to buy these in the future, that's $62.5 times 100, okay? That's $6,250 that you would have to pay out at expiration if you were forced to buy the shares of stock. Now, that would mean Merck would fall from $79 all the way down to 62.5. That's the only way that you'd actually have to buy the shares of stock, okay? So, you have to decide, are you willing to step up and buy the shares of stock at 62.5 or 70? That's $7,000 if you have to buy your 100 shares. So, you have to decide ahead of time. So, you pick the stock first, you check the charts, you check the expiration, you check the strike prices, see it if it all meets your criteria. Now, how do we check the probability? Now, what we can do is we can go to our, let me pull up the probability calculator here. So, here's the probability calculator. This is on our website at smartopsinseller.com and you can check the probability of what are the chances of Merck falling from its current price of $79 all the way down to $62.5 within the expiration period. And that'll tell you the chance of you have to step up and buy the stock. So, here, we've got at the top of the inputs and the bottom will tell us our probabilities. So, we've got $79 for the current stock. We have 118 days in the future. The future volatility is 20%. I'll show you where to get that number. You don't have to worry about dividends or interest rates. You can leave those zero because they play such a small role. And you put in your target $62.5 for both boxes, 62.5. And when you click on Go, the calculator will tell you what are the chances of Merck falling from $79 down to $62 in 118 days from now. And here is what this box and this box is all that we care about. This is telling us we have less than a 2% chance. There's less than a 2% chance that Merck will fall that far in the expiration period. Conversely, on this side, there's a 98% chance that Merck will not fall down to $62.5. So, that means you have a 98% chance that you won't have to step up and buy the stock. That's a pretty high probability. So, that means you're pretty protected from Merck falling that far and you having to step up and pay $6,250. Now, you may wanna buy Merck at $62.5 and you think, well, I only have a 2% chance of that happening. I want a better chance to buy shares of Merck. So, then you have to pick a higher strike price. So, let's just say we chose the 70 strike price for Merck and let's see what the chances are of that happening. Okay, click go. So, now there's a 14% chance that you may have to buy the stock. Conversely, there's an 85% chance that you won't have to buy shares of Merck. Okay, so the higher the strike price you choose, which will be closer to the current price of the stock, the higher the probability it is that you may have to step up and buy shares of that stock. Okay, so you check the probability, calculators is on our website, you can find it. Now, where do we get the 20%? This default, this means 20%. You only have to put in the number 20. Where do you get the future volatility number? Well, that, you can go to ivolatility.com and let me just see, yep, ivolatility.com right here. You type in Merck in the basic options tab Merck and it'll bring up this volatility chart right here. This is a volatility chart, not a price chart. And there's two lines, the blue line and the orange line. And that signifies the historical volatility and the implied volatility. Here's the colors right here. And they kind of move in tandem. This is the volatility. This shows you how erratic the price of Merck stock is over a period of time. And right now, both of the numbers are right around 20%. That means the price of Merck stock is fluctuating higher or lower of 20% around its current price based on its past movements. So 20%, you look at the current number for both of these and if they're at different levels, then you probably take an average of the two of them. Now you can see that the Merck volatility got above 30% over the last year, all the way down to a low of about 13, 14% over the last year. But right now it's right around 20%. So you take that 20% number and you pump it back into the probability calculator and there you can get your results. Okay, so that's how you do it. That's how you find a put option to sell on a stock that you've decided ahead of time. So let's go back to our cheat sheet here. And it's all about picking a stock from your watch list and I'll put the video up on later to show you how to create, help create your own watch list if you don't already have stocks that you look at. Okay, so you find your stock that you like, you decide where could I potentially buy that stock, you sell the put out or you check the expiration dates, try to get at least 25 cent premium. That's just the way I do it, okay?  Just remember here, all the rules can be tweaked. If you don't like 25 cent premium, you want something higher, then you have to choose a different, a higher strike price. Or you go further out in time. The more time you give, the more money you will get. So like I said, manual labor, you have to check the expiration dates. And it's all based on my outlook for the stock. I like healthcare, I like Merck. Looks like it's moving into an uptrend. Okay, I'm willing to step up and sell a put option at this time. If Merck was in a downtrend, I wouldn't choose Merck. So make sure you check the stock charts, okay? So that's how you do it. All right, so there's your lesson on selling put options the way that I do it, my process, you can watch the video and take a screenshot of this picture, keep it on your desk, whatever, okay? These are all guidelines. This is not real individual investment advice. So please take that to heart. Okay, so let's move into our Saturday synopsis where we take a look at the charts, we look at the indexes, and we see what's been happening in the market over the last week, couple weeks and see what may be moving forward. And here is part of my watch list that I've cultivated over the years, but we always want to look at the S&P 500 as the broadest measure of the overall market as represented by the SPY, which is the Exchange Traded Fund for the S&P 500. I like to look at this chart first so we can see what's been happening. Obviously, here's the pandemic from last year. Hit the lows. So the general market's just been going up since last March, and it has been going up, but it has the pullbacks along the way. That's normal gyrations of the market. And if you've been watching my videos, we talk about when stocks and or indexes are in an uptrend, they will typically bounce when they pull back off of one of their moving average lines. Which moving average lines? Well, I use a blue 20-day, a red 50-day, and a green or orange, I don't know what color this is, 200-day. These are all simple moving averages, not exponential, simple moving averages, 20, 50, 200. And I have the RSI, 14-day RSI indicator down here. This is an overbought, oversold indicator. Okay, so most stocks, when they pull back, when they're in an uptrend, will typically bounce off either the 20-day or 50-day moving average. We really don't want to see it move all the way down to the 200-day. Cause that entails something, you know, pretty big news item that is knocking the stock down all the way to the 200-day moving average. And you want to see the moving averages moving upwards, trending upwards. You don't want to see moving averages sloping downwards. That means a stock's in a downtrend. We don't want that, okay? So as you can see here, the S&P 500 has bounced two times recently off the 50-day moving average. So if there's a stock that's bullish that you're thinking, okay, I want to buy some shares of this stock, you wait for a pullback, wait for a pullback. And you can see, even though it's gone through the 20-day, it's pulled back through the 20-day moving average a number of times, it usually catches its breath on the 50-day, okay? So if you were missing the bullish move here, you can wait to a pullback. And what do you do is you wait to see if it bounces. Before you jump in, wait to see if it bounces off the 50-day. Once it bounces, then you can feel more confident about getting into a bullish trade. So the S&P 500 looks strong over the last two weeks. There has been some selling in the market, mostly in the NASDAQ, the tech stock. So we'll look at that as well. But right now, the S&P 500 looks pretty good. Yeah, we had this little pullback two times it bounced right off the 50-day moving average. So if you wanted to get long, you wait for these bounces. Will the market continue to go up? I'm bullish in the long run, in the long run. We're talking years and years. In the very short term, on a day-to-day basis, too erratic. I'm not a day trader. It's just too erratic, it's too emotional. I can't handle those swings. So I look for the longer term, longer term, okay? Years out. And over time, in the long run, the market continues to go up. But if you're trading these couple months like we do in our newsletters, we are a shorter-term trading newsletter, not day trading, but months in advance, we wanna see the bounces, okay? We wait for a bounce before we get into a trade. But anyway, the market looks strong. Here in the U.S., vaccines are moving strong. People are getting vaccinated. Businesses are opening up. People have money. They're buying stuff now, going out to restaurants. Businesses are doing better. Earnings are coming out. We've had a lot of earnings come out. Businesses are doing okay. So that just means the stock market is going to go up because companies are doing well. People are buying stuff. Now there's talk of rising interest rates, rising inflation. Yes, that can be the case. That can be the case. But over decades and decades of stock markets of rising interest rates, falling interest rates, rising interest rates, rising inflation, falling inflation, the market continues to go up because there are companies that will always do well and they'll always make products that people buy. So in these indexes, the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq, they're made up of companies that will do well over time. And when you have a laggard, sometimes those companies get dropped out of the indexes and replaced by new ones. So the indexes are always looking at or always replacing bad companies with good companies. So eventually the market as a whole will always go up over time. So you wanna wait for the balances off the moving averages. Let's take a look at the Dow, which has been very strong. Let's pull up the Dow. Obviously you can see same thing. It's a strong uptrend, bounces off the 50-day moving average. Here was the last bounce we had. Looks like Wednesday this week, right here, bounce right off the 50-day moving average, like right on cue. So stocks that are in a strong uptrend will typically bounce either the 20-day, here to bounce off the 20-day, or it'll bounce off the 50-day. Yes, sometimes it goes down below it, but I like to use my three-day rule. If it closes below the 50-day for more than three days, then you have to wait, then you have to watch to see where it's going. So here, let's look at over here, it fell through both the 20-day and 50-day, had more than three days, but was getting close to the 200-day moving average, and then it just rallied, and then it did it again, but it bounced right off the 200-day moving average and rallied again. So nothing is set in stone, nothing is guaranteed, but more often than not, it will bounce off, I like to use the 50-day more than the 20-day. And if it falls through the 50-day, then you have the 200-day waiting for it down here. And then you can also check the RSI indicator, whatever indicators you use. A stock in motion tends to stay in that same motion. So if you're bullish, wait for the bounce, wait for the bounce, and if it doesn't bounce, then you stay out. You can always nibble, you don't have to go full force in a full position. If you think it's going to bounce, take a little position and wait for the confirmation, and then you can get in with the rest of your position. So let's take a look at the NASDAQ, which has been somewhat weaker of late than the Dow and the S&P 500. So here's the NASDAQ. It goes down, up, down, and so it's sort of stuck in this sideways pattern. Let's draw a little bit of a trend line here. So we've got the top part of a channel here. This is more art than science, so you've got probably the bottom of the channel here. Depending on how far back you want to look. So it's bouncing, it's bouncing. What I would really like to see, what was encouraging is that we had this big down move right here, here's this down move, but it bounced pretty good. But it bounced right up through the 20 day and 50 day. It kind of tagged both of them, but finished yesterday on the lows, finished below the 50 day. So I would like to see the NASDAQ pop above here for this week. Get above both the moving averages and start to move back up towards this resistance line up here. Okay, here's sort of the line in the sand right now. The NASDAQ needs to get up and through the resistance line for the real next bull move to occur. But until then, it may keep meandering in here until people realize, okay, these NASDAQ stocks, these stocks that make up the NASDAQ, it's time to buy those stocks. So let's take a look at some of those individual stocks and see what's been keeping the NASDAQ down. Of course, a big player is Tesla in the NASDAQ. Tesla of late has had a down move. Now we have, for those of you that follow Tesla, Elon Musk, he's been talking or he's been tweeting about Bitcoin and all. They have a large stake in Bitcoin, Tesla does. So the moves in Tesla can affect the price of their stock. And because they have a pretty sizable position over a billion dollars worth of Bitcoin, if Bitcoin drops, that means the value of Tesla's company can go down as well. So Tesla's sort of in this ugly, very ugly chart pattern right here, it's been hovering right around the 200 day moving average. This is critical right here. And it's sort of maybe getting a little oversold as well. So what we really wanna see is we want to see Tesla pop off of this 200 day moving average. The more time it spends below it, the more chance it could continue down lower. So we really don't wanna see Tesla drop from here. We wanna see it get through the 200 day and start to move back up. But you never know, because Bitcoin, if Bitcoin keeps going down, then Tesla stock might go down, which also affects the overall NASDAQ composite because Tesla makes up a big part of the NASDAQ. So Tesla needs to get off its butt here and start to move higher. Let's take a look at another one of the big NASDAQ stocks is Apple. We always talk about Apple. I'm long Apple. I want Apple to go up. It's also been kind of meandering. Hasn't really been doing much, which is a little frustrating. But here's the 200 day moving average right here. Apple dropped to it two times very recently, but bounced. And right now it's sitting at resistance right on this 50 day moving average. And you've got the 20 day lurking above. We want to see Apple get above here and start to move higher. Our goal is to get up to the 145 level, which is its all time highs. So it's been having trouble really finding a direction. Eventually, eventually I believe all these stocks will continue to move higher because that's what they do. They put out products, they make products that people buy. So eventually people will say, okay, Apple is at a value point here. Let's start to buy it up. But until that happens, we can see meandering, but we really need Apple to get above these moving averages and start to go higher. Let's look at Amazon. Cause these are the big popular tech stocks that a lot of people are focused on. Amazon has been in this wide channel. And I can get rid of these old lines that don't really apply anymore. So you just have this back and forth, back and forth. Does it not really do anything? Kind of hovering around all the moving averages right here. So that just means when the moving averages get very close to each other, that just means the stock's been trading in a sideways pattern, not a lot of direction. So eventually it's going to have to pop. It will explode one way or the other because it can't trade sideways forever. That's just not how it works. I mean, it could trade sideways for a long time, but eventually it's going to move above or below one of these lines here. And I'm hoping that it will be higher. And I think a lot of people hope that as well. Let's take a look at some other stocks, Microsoft. Microsoft has been in this channel that we drew. It's been in the channel bouncing, bounced a couple of times off the lower channel. So when you have a stock in an uptrend and it has these moves, you can draw the channels and here's your more of a high probability setup of getting long. If it bounces off the bottom of the channel, you can take that bullish trader, you can nibble on a bullish trade to see if it's going to move higher. Now, hopefully the next step for Microsoft will start to move back up towards this upper channel. This is called higher probability trading. You draw the patterns, you have the channel here. Most likely it should bounce. Or if you want to wait, wait until it bounces and then get in. Okay, those are, though it's called higher probability setups. What else? We look at, we always look at AMD. AMD has sort of been frustrating as well for us. We've sold put options on AMD, but we still have Cushion. We always choose Cushion out of the money strikes because you never know what a stock is going to do. You want to give it the chance to move around. It had been this downtrend, started going sideways, popped above the resistance line, came back down and it was sitting on this lower resistance line, traded there a couple of times, almost looked like it was going to get through it, but it bounced back. So it's sitting kind of near the 20 day and the 50 day right here, moving averages. Everything, most of the tech stocks are having trouble right now. That's because of this whole inflation narrative and this interest rates, rising interest rates narrative. For these tech stocks, these companies that are more high growth stocks, in order for them to keep growing, they may have to borrow money. And if interest rates goes up, borrowing money costs more. If inflation goes up, it costs them more to get the raw materials for them to create their products. So the dual narrative of rising inflation and rising interest rates will hit tech stocks more because those are more of the growth companies that they need to borrow money and they need to get the materials to build their stock. So that's why these growth stocks are having more trouble right now. The older, more stable, the stalwarts in the Dow and the S&P 500, that's why those indexes aren't getting as hit as hard as the NASDAQ is right now. So the tech stocks are the ones that are being frustrating to everyone that is long right now. So that's AMD. We really wanna see AMD get back up. Let me see what else we have here. Let's look at Disney. Disney is a great stalwart, but it's been selling off of late. I drew this channel probably a couple of weeks ago and we can make a new channel right here or reconnect the lines. So here's the channel for Disney and it's bouncing off this bottom channel right now. Hopefully it'll go back up. Disney's a great long-term company, but you'll have to go through these periods of pullbacks and maybe wanna wait. If you got bullish here, you wait for the bounce and maybe then your next move is to see if it pops through this down-trending line. So it's all about drawing trend lines, looking at moving averages, looking at price patterns to help you gauge when it's time to get in and or get out. Let's scroll through the list. Let's take a look at other things here. Procter & Gamble, another stalwart, another company. Now here's a, I like this pattern right here for Procter & Gamble. You've got this uptrend, okay? Got the uptrend and then you have this resistance right around here, okay? So we draw the resistance line for Procter & Gamble. So this is called a rising ascending wedge. If Procter & Gamble could get up through this resistance line, you know, probably above 139-140, looks like the next stop is trying to tag its all-time highs here. Okay, so you've got a rising stock. You've got the resistance and it's building up all this energy to pop through the resistance. You don't wanna see it drop back down. So you probably wanna wait for a couple days of seeing it pop through the resistance before deciding, yep, I'm ready for the bullish, my bullish trade. All right, so it's all about looking at the charts, looking at the patterns. Let's see, any other thing we wanna look at. Let's look at the two Bitcoin-related stocks. We have Riot and Mara. This is Riot. Obviously, we drew this congestion pattern right here. Congestion pattern, the stock will either go up it, above the resistance, really hard or below it. Obviously we saw Riot came down with a price of Bitcoin and it's sitting right on the 200-day moving average for Riot. Mara, almost the same thing, was in this up channel and it popped down through it, getting close to support at the 200-day moving average. Now this all depends on what Bitcoin's doing. Those stocks are Bitcoin-related. Anything else that's really worth looking at. PayPal, PayPal and Square, the two payment providers. Getting close to support down here. If you wanna draw, you can draw the triangle here, the congestion pattern. It's sort of in this kind of a triangle pattern. So you wanna watch. You wanna see if it drops down below, gets maybe down through the 200-day or you wanna see it pop above. Square, same thing. Square is kind of sitting on support right now. Got some support, maybe right around here. You really don't wanna see Square get too far below this support line because it's already trading right on the 200-day moving average. If it gets through maybe 190, you could see some more downside. So just watch the price patterns, watch the moving averages. That helps you decide when is the optimal time to get in, you want it higher probability trades. What's all about selling put options we talked about earlier, you wanna wait for the higher probability setups. That procter and gamble setup is a little bit more easier to see. If it gets through 139, 140 for a couple of days, that's a higher probability trade for selling put options, okay? The momentum will take it. The momentum in stock trading, momentum is key because once people watch the same patterns, they all get in at the same time and that propels the momentum, okay? So that's what you want to look for. All right, so that's it for your Saturday synopsis. Once again, I'm bullish in the long run. Day-to-day basis, anything could happen, but I think in the longer run, things will continue to move higher. The NASACs having a little trouble, the Dow and S&P are stronger. So take that into consideration when you're looking at certain stocks. All right, so let's quickly go to our website and I want to show you where you can get the put-selling basis. Oh, let's show you where the probability calculator is.  Click on that, it'll open up the probability calculator. You also go to our put-selling basics section right here. This is our free guide. Scroll down, put your name, email address. You get a free copy of our put-selling basics ebook. Lastly, our services tab right here. Click on it or hover your mouse over it. Shows you our two newsletters and our one-on-one coaching. So that's it for me today. I hope this video has been helpful. Give me a thumbs up in this YouTube video. Don't forget to subscribe. Hit that subscribe button in the bottom right-hand corner. Leave me a comment, give me a thumbs up. Send me an email, we're here to help. We want everyone to become better option traders. Okay, we're getting close to our 50 minute mark here. That's all for me today. This is Lee Lowell. I hope everyone has a great weekend and a great week ahead. I will see you all next week. Take care.


Everyone knows that the time you spend studying for a big test or reading a dry text for a class that you're not particularly excited about can seem like forever, but it really only feels that way. Research has shown that people have a tendency to overestimate how much time they spend working, and that applies to students just as much as to adults in the working world. So you may think you're studying 20 hours a week, but it might be significantly less. Researchers discovered this by having people keep a daily log of how they spent their time for a week, and then asked them to report how many hours they worked. Comparing the estimate to the log, they could see that people tended to overstate their work hours by 5 to 10 percent, and some people by as much as 50 percent. Obviously, if you don't have a good sense of how many hours you're actually spending studying and how much work you're already doing, it's hard to know how to plan your schedule. So a great first step in time management is to spend a few days or a week tracking your time. Use a phone-based or paper calendar and set a timer to go off every 15 minutes that you're awake. Whenever it goes off, write down what you've been doing for the last 15 minutes. Be honest with this, if you spend half an hour on Snapchat giving yourself puppy ears and sending silly photos to your friends, write that down. If you cheat on this, you're only cheating yourself. At the end of the tracking period, it's time to do a little data crunching. Figure out what things you really want to know. For example, how much time am I spending outside of class studying or working on homework? Or how much sleep am I getting? Or how much time do I really spend on Facebook? Add up the numbers and see what your patterns are. You might be surprised by where your time is going, and you can use this information to better plan the weeks to come and to make time for the things that are your priorities.