AutoTrade

Auto-trading is probably one of the great innovations of online trading in recent years. It allows your options advisor to effectively trade your brokerage account for you (even though they never have access to it). As you'll see on our SearchRank facility, you can search our database according to those services that offer auto-trading. If you're not familiar with it, here's how it works:

:: Step 1

Choose the advisory service that you want to use. Doing this first is important because different services have auto-trade arrangements with different brokers. You may not want to open a new brokerage account for each advisory service.

:: Step 3

Once you have completed Steps 1 & 2, you can define how much of your account is traded each time a recommendation is sent from your advisor to your broker. While the available parameters will vary from broker to broker, in general you will be able to choose from:

a specific dollar amount
a specific number of contracts
a percentage of the cash available
a percentage of your buying power
a percentage of your total account value
or the specific service recommendation

You will also be able to decide whether to allow the advisor to close out the trade or if you want to do this yourself.

:: Step 2

Open an account with one of your service's designated brokers. When you do this, you will be able to nominate not only your advisory service but also which particular trading system of theirs you want to use (if they have several).

:: In Summary

If you have never traded before or are unfamiliar with online trading, then auto-trading is a great first step to familiarize yourself with the market. You really do have full control over the process at all times and, as you can see, you can tailor the settings as you choose.