The "daily Call" From Option Alpha: Options Trading | Stock Options | Stock Trading | Trading Online

Hey everyone. This is Kirk here again from Option Alpha and welcome back to the daily call. Today, we're going to answer the question, “Can I buy the VIX?” And the short answer to this question is no. We cannot buy VIX itself. We have to trade either VIX futures or VIX options. The VIX in and of itself is just an index. It just tracks rolling 30-day implied volatility for S&P 500 option contracts and so, it's just one metric of measuring volatility in the market. And most people use it and gauge it as the fear index of the market because as people get more aggressive and buy put protection, the VIX option prices go up. And so, as a result, you can't actually trade VIX itself. There's no bid or ask spread. It's just an index. But you can trade VIX futures which is /VX if you’re in most broker platforms or you can trade options on the VIX itself. Now, we also like trading options on other volatility products like VXX and UVXY which we’ve talked about before on the podcast. But again, you can’t actually go o