Not a blog. Two pages about what a journal could tell you and none of them does, both of which this product computes; and four reference pages on options taxation, every sentence read from the statute, the IRS, an exchange or a broker's own page, linked beside it.
| What implied volatility did your fill actually pay? | Your broker's export does not contain the answer, and it cannot: no export carries the price of the underlying at the moment your order filled. |
| How many trades before a win rate means anything, and why a day is the unit | The usual answer is a hundred. The usual answer is wrong in a way that matters most to the people who trade most: fifty trades on five days is five pieces of evidence, not fifty. |
| Which options are Section 1256 contracts? SPX yes, SPY no, and the source for each | The rule in the statute's own words, and a table of common roots with the exchange, IRS or broker page that decides each verdict. Exchanges say "may qualify", so this page does too. |
| How do wash sales work on options? The rule, quoted, and what your broker will not report | Options are inside section 1091 twice over, cash settlement is no escape, and a broker's 1099-B reports a disallowed loss only in the narrowest case. What the loss becomes, and where it goes. |
| Where does the option premium go on assignment or exercise? Publication 550's table, verbatim | The premium is never its own line: it moves into the basis or the proceeds of the shares, and the shares' holding period decides the character. Eight rows from Table 4-3, and what a cash-settled index option does instead. |
| Where are Section 1256 contracts on your 1099-B? Boxes 8 to 11, broker by broker | Box 11 is box 8 plus box 10 minus box 9, and where that section sits differs by broker: tastytrade splits index options from futures across two documents, IBKR files them under noncovered securities, Robinhood names the section. Dated, with what could not be verified said so. |