You can switch accounts by going to the Home tab and tapping on the account button at the top-right of the screen. (The button corresponds to your account name, such as “Default Account,” “Trading,” or any nickname you’ve chosen).
From there you’ll be able to select the account you want to access.
Here’s some great news for all our customers with iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches: OptionsHouse now has an iPhone app! (Compatible with iOS 3.2 or later).
We’ve heard requests for a dedicated app for a long time and we’re excited to finally bring it to you. We spent a lot of time thinking about the best way to bring you the OptionsHouse experience in an app format, and we’re pretty happy with our initial effort.
With the app, you’ll be able to:
- Access streaming quotes
- Trade stock and options
- Trade spreads
- Monitor your orders and positions
- Search for either companies or tickers
- Trade options from the chain
- View quote charts going back as far as five years
- Utilize virtual trading
You can access the OptionsHouse app by searching for it on iTunes. To read more, check out the iTunes listing. (more…)
Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) has seen a significant increase in volume in 2011. While part of this is attributable to an overall market increase in trading activity, the impending availability of the iPhone has also sparked interest among investors.
Since the January 11 announcement that Apple’s smartphone is coming to the VZ network on February 10, VZ shares have been virtually flat after a mid-month pullback. Wall Street’s short-term outlook has been mixed on the stock. While Deutsche Bank recently downgraded the stock from buy to hold, Goldman Sachs added it to its conviction buy list, noting that the carrier’s “appeal to investors should improve over the course of the year.” (more…)
3/08/11 Update: OptionsHouse has an iPhone App!
You can view your OptionsHouse portfolio vitals and trade via a mobile device from pretty much anywhere during market hours (except my living room, which has awful reception). To access the OptionsHouse mobile trading platform, type m.optionshouse.com into your mobile web browser and log in as usual using your username and password.
OptionsHouse Mobile Trading Platform Features:
About a year ago – on September 18, 2009 – I wrote about a company called Universal Display (NASDAQ:PANL), which is at the center of the blossoming OLED technology sector and its derivatives. OLED stands for organic light emitting diode and is a relatively inexpensive, high-efficiency method of producing light and images.
PANL’s focus is more on the development of new technologies within the OLED space and patents as opposed to distributing the actual products to consumers themselves. I bring this up not to gloat about the tremendous year the stock has had, but to remind you about hidden gems that are usually just out of sight when it comes to investing. (more…)
While Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) is not exactly known for a complete lack of volatility around earnings, its movements have not been all that violent (on a percentage basis). Thursday’s earnings report may be a pivotal one for Google, with the smartphone wars continuing to heat up.
The Blackberry, part of the Research in Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) family, still leads the sector with a 41% market share in the U.S. and of course the iPhone craze powers on, but Google’s Android operating system is still growing at an exponential rate. I like to think of it as the 1980s Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)/Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) saga, redux. Back then, MSFT, like Google, offered its “window” operating system to multiple computer makers. In doing so, the company got folks across the world and on different hardware platforms addicted to its products.
Apple, in typical Jobs’ style, only sold its operating system software (and all software, for that matter) for Apple-made PCs. This strategy hurt Apple in the early days. Obviously, things have improved for the company and now the iPhone is like the Rubik’s Cube of the 2000s. Apple has done a good job at getting the public addicted to a cool (albeit flawed) product. Now that Consumer Reports won’t bless the iPhone 4 because of antenna issues, I’m looking forward to seeing how Apple spins it. (more…)
Early Tuesday, brokerage firm Caris lifted its 12-month price target on Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) to $130 from $120 (roughly a 20% advance from current levels). Monday, at Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) much-anticipated Worldwide Developer Conference, NFLX officially announced what has been speculated for months – a free app that will allow streaming video across various Apple devices for NFLX customers. Caris points out that the 20 million iPhone users in the U.S. may help grow the Netflix customer base.
NFLX shares have been in uptrending mode since the last quarter of 2008, more than quintupling in value over the last 18 months or so. While the broader market has given back more than 11% since late April, NFLX has continued to chug higher, up more than 5% during the past six weeks. The stock’s uptrend has slowed down, but the overall outperformance continues.
Investors who think the “trend is their friend” and who want to follow Caris’ bullish thesis might wish to take advantage of the leverage that option strategies can prove. Those who feel the uptrend is petering out and who wish to take a contrarian approach may also want to explore an option strategy. Two hypothetical option strategies on NFLX – one bullish, one bearish – are described below. Remember these serve as examples, not recommendations. Consider your own risk/reward parameters and personal trading goals before executing any new trades.
Want to learn more about different options strategies or the OptionsHouse platform? Stop by our events page to review our schedule of free weekly webinars and sign up for one that interests you. Next week’s Tuesday strategy webinar is a look at the short-call strategy. (more…)
Expectations are always high for new Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) products and with Steve Jobs being the showman and master of spin that he is, he can generally deliver. Blogs are lit up with anticipation ahead of today’s Worldwide Developers Conference and Jobs’ keynote speech is expected to contain news of a new product (Note: I am writing this at 7:30 am CT).
There have been many sites that have leaked photos and specifics of the closely-guarded product. Of course there was the notorious beer-garden incident in California, which offered a “free look” into the phone, thanks to Gray Powell, an engineer from Apple who left the phone at Gourmet Haus Staudt (which I hear has a great selection of German beers, by the way). That fourth-generation phone ended up in the hands of the website Gizmodo for the sum of $5,000 but was later returned to Apple.
According to Gizmodo, the new iPhone is thinner than the 3GS and previous iPhones, containing smaller internal components and a 16% larger battery inside the new metal frame; this could mean that poor battery life will be improved. There is now a front-facing camera, which should help with many apps and with video chat, and there is also a larger and better-quality camera with an LED flash on the back, a higher-resolution display, and a second microphone for noise cancellation.
There is also reportedly a new back cover, which is speculated to be glass or ceramic, possibly to address the scratching issues that iPhone owners face every time they sit their naked iPhone on just about any surface other than one coated with cosmoline. It is also reported that there will also now be a MicroSIM slot in the phone, which is the same device used in the iPad. (more…)
No question … Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is an innovator and has always had a very unique way of doing business. In the early days of the Apple-versus-PC/Windows debate, Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) founder Bill Gates had very different ideas and ways of growing their respective businesses.
While Bill Gates went on to license his software to many different computer makers, creating the PC and Windows association, Apple opted to produce their own hardware and keep their software in house (and only on their computers). While this made Apple unique, it may also have hurt them in the early days.
Microsoft obviously flourished early on. Apple, meanwhile, had a strong start as well; its IPO generated more capital than any IPO since Ford Motor (NYSE: F) in 1956 and created more instant millionaires than any company in history. But AAPL endured some very tough periods in the 1980s and 1990s. Steve Jobs left the company from 1985 to 1997 but returned to help create a new line of computers that brought Apple back to the forefront of innovation. (more…)
