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In this blog, you'll read about Scottrade's educational tools and resources. I'll keep you posted when new features are available and highlight popular articles. If you have ideas or suggestions for enhancing our educational offering, reply to a blog post or bring it up in the Education Resources discussion group.
Get Ready for New Option Symbols!
At Scottrade, we're doing a lot to get ready for the industry-wide option symbol changes, and you can too! Even if you're not an avid options trader, this is a big change impacting the entire industry, so it's a good idea to stay informed. What change am I talking about? Options symbols are transitioning to a new system that's designed to better accommodate current and future options products. Scottrade will be transitioning all systems to the new options symbols beginning after market close this Friday, Jan. 22.
Here's what you can do to get ready:
1. Educate yourself. Understanding what's happening and how it impacts you is the first step. This may not impact you at all, but until you read more about it, you won't know for sure. Here are two resources I recommend:
2. Know the important dates. Following the symbol conversion on Jan. 22, there is another process called consolidation that will continue for another few months. The Options Clearing Corporation will be streamlining option symbols so that the option contracts are always represented by the same symbol as the underlying. When groups of symbols are consolidated by the OCC, any open orders for these symbols will be cancelled. The printable Guide to Options Symbols is a good reference explaining the difference between conversion and consolidation and the dates to remember for both.
3. Be aware of how accounts may be impacted. If you've placed an options order in the past few months, you likely saw the reminder that open options orders will be cancelled during the symbol conversion on Jan. 22. But, to make the transition as smooth as possible, there are a few other things to keep in mind:
If you have questions about how to do any of these things, visit the Knowledge Center or ask the group here in the Community. We're always happy to help!
The conversion to new options symbols and subsequent symbol consolidation process are important changes in the trading and investing world, but you can take steps toward a seamless transition if you're well prepared. Education is everything!
Here's what you can do to get ready:
1. Educate yourself. Understanding what's happening and how it impacts you is the first step. This may not impact you at all, but until you read more about it, you won't know for sure. Here are two resources I recommend:
- Options Symbols in the Knowledge Center. This article explains the current symbols, the new symbols, and why this change is happening. Check back with this article periodically -- this will be one of the primary places that Scottrade posts information about the transition, so if anything changes with the transition date, it will be highlighted here.
- Printable Guide to Options Symbols. This is a great resource to help you understand the symbol conversion process and how you may be impacted. Plus, it's a handy, printable PDF that you can keep by your computer for easy reference.
2. Know the important dates. Following the symbol conversion on Jan. 22, there is another process called consolidation that will continue for another few months. The Options Clearing Corporation will be streamlining option symbols so that the option contracts are always represented by the same symbol as the underlying. When groups of symbols are consolidated by the OCC, any open orders for these symbols will be cancelled. The printable Guide to Options Symbols is a good reference explaining the difference between conversion and consolidation and the dates to remember for both.
3. Be aware of how accounts may be impacted. If you've placed an options order in the past few months, you likely saw the reminder that open options orders will be cancelled during the symbol conversion on Jan. 22. But, to make the transition as smooth as possible, there are a few other things to keep in mind:
- If you have watch lists containing option symbols, you will need to convert to the new symbols following the symbol consolidation.
- If you have alerts set for particular option symbols, the same is true. To keep your alerts up-to-date, make sure you're using the new symbols after the transition.
- Scottrader and ScottradeELITE layouts containing option symbols will also need to be updated following the symbol conversion. Load the affected layout(s), modify your symbols, and then save.
If you have questions about how to do any of these things, visit the Knowledge Center or ask the group here in the Community. We're always happy to help!
The conversion to new options symbols and subsequent symbol consolidation process are important changes in the trading and investing world, but you can take steps toward a seamless transition if you're well prepared. Education is everything!