There are lots of ways that options can bite you, so I will list a few and suggest a very conservative way to get your options feet wet. Hopefully, others will offer their own strategies so that you hear from several voices.
Things that can bite you with options:
*Your option expiring soon but TSLA hasn't gone to the moon yet. As you know, Tesla is often delayed in implementing things. Buy options with an expiration date that is well beyond your expected sales date because of delays and because you can profit from selling an option with some of its time value still remaining.
* Buying options with too expensive a time value. Take a look at Jan17 100 strike, Jan17 160 strike calls, and Jan17 190 strike calls. If you add the strike price to the approximate price of the call $100+$90=$190, $160+$46=$206, and $190+$32=$222, you get a number that can be compared to the current price of the stock ($188). The difference between the current stock price and the numbers we just computed is the time value you're paying for that option. By the time the option expires, the time value will be $0. The time value drops as time goes on but there's another reason for it to drop. The farther in the money the option is, the less time value as well. Thus, we see the time value for the $100 call as $190-188=$2, for the $160 call as $206-188=$18, and for the $190 call as $222-188=$34. You can see that the higher the strike price, the more leverage you have (you can buy 1 $100 strike call for <$10,000, 2 $160 calls for < $10,000, or 3 $190 calls for <$10,000). You increase your leverage as you raise the strike price, but you also increase the time value you're paying for the call, so in reality you will not make 3 times as much money with the $190 strike price as with the $100 strike price, even though you own three times as many calls. Which solution works better? It depends upon how high the stock price goes before you sell. If you go for out of the money calls (calls with a strike price greater than the current stock price), the time value is high but the leverage is of course higher, too. The negative is that you can lose all your money if the stock never climbs close to your strike price.
Personally, I see the time value for $190 Jan17s as being very steep, and I see the time value of $100 strike Jan17s as being very cheap. What you need to decide is whether you are investing or gambling or going somewhere in between. May I suggest a conservative doubling of your leverage with a $100 strike Jan17 call? Instead of making about $2500 as 50 TSLA shares gain 50 points, you make about $5000-$200 lost time value=$4800 as TSLA gains 50 points. You double your reward with minimal risk unless the bottom really falls out of the stock. Let's say you go for the $190 call and it gains 50 points, too. You gain 300 x $50=$15,000, but you lose your 300 x $34 time value if you hold the call until right before expiration, and so you really make $300 x16 =$4800 and are exposed to a lot more risk. Naturally, you would make more with the 190 strike call if you sell earlier or if the stock climbs more than 50 points, but you need to weigh the chances of something negative happening (like a recession and its pull on stock prices) with the chances of TSLA going to the moon in 2016. Sometimes people go for super-high strike prices and make a lot of money, but most of the time these people lose their investment, rather than making money. I see this as gambling.
.
