What Retail Options Traders Are Actually Doing With Their Money

A rare, data-driven look at how retail actually trades options, from the person who tracks the volume. The market runs about 71 million contracts a day, up from barely 20 million five years ago. The surprising part is the sophistication: it's not just outright calls and puts anymore, retail is increasingly using complex orders, vertical spreads, even ratio spreads and poor-man's covered calls. And it fits the moment: with correlation low and the indexes going sideways, this is a stock-picker's market. 📊 tastylive: https://www.tastylive.com/ 📰 Get Tom's pre-market analysis every morning: https://www.tastylive.com/newsletters 📘 FREE Options Strategy Guide: https://tinyurl.com/bp9ms763 📱 Follow tastylive on X: https://x.com/tastyliveshow Chapters 00:00 Busy times across every market 00:40 Digging into the options volume 01:20 Not just calls and puts anymore 02:00 Complex orders and spreads 02:45 The strategies retail is using 03:30 A stock-picker's market 04:15 The state-of-the-industry update 05:00 71 million contracts a day 06:00 Growth leveling off from Q2 07:00 Where the volume goes next #tastylive #optionsvolume #retailtraders #cboe #optionsboom #verticalspreads #stockpickersmarket #optionsdata #optionstrading #stockmarket tastylive is a real financial network, producing hours of live programming every day. Follow along as our experts navigate the markets, provide actionable trading insights, and teach you how to trade. With over 120 original segments, and over 25 personalities, we'll help you take your trading to the next level, whether you are new to trading or a seasoned veteran. tastylive content is created, produced, and provided solely by tastylive, Inc. ("tastylive") and is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not, nor is it intended to be, trading or investment advice or a recommendation that any security, futures contract, digital asset, other product, transaction, or investment strategy is suitable for any person. Trading securities, futures products, and digital assets involve risk and may result in a loss greater than the original amount invested. Investment information provided may not be appropriate for all investors and is provided without respect to individual investor financial sophistication, financial situation, investing time horizon or risk tolerance. Options, futures, and futures options are not suitable for all investors. Prior to trading securities, options, futures, or futures options, please read all applicable risk disclosures, including, but not limited to, the Characteristics and Risks of Standardized Options Disclosure and the Futures and Exchange Traded Options Risk Disclosure Statement found at https://tastytrade.com/disclosures/. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Performance is not presented net of all commissions, fees, and expenses. Multi-leg option strategies incur higher transaction costs than single leg trades as they involve multiple commission charges. Examples provided are for illustrative, informational, and educational purposes only and are not intended to be reflective of results you can expect to achieve. Supporting documentation for any claims, including claims made on behalf of options programs), comparisons, statistics, or other technical data, if applicable, will be supplied upon request. tastylive, through its content, financial programming or otherwise, does not provide investment or financial advice or make investment recommendations. tastylive is not a licensed financial adviser, registered investment adviser, or a registered broker-dealer.