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Strategies & Market Trends : Options -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Duncan J Horn who wrote (3541)	2/24/2000 5:20:00 PM
From: SecularBull	Respond to of 8096

Duncan, as far as I am aware, you may use free margin to buy a stock that's put to you, assuming that you have margin available. I would advise, and I think that edamo would too, that you be very careful in determining your margin needs in a worst case scenario. ed might have a different thought, but I would think that you would have to have free margin available to you to buy the stock, and that you probably would not be able to margin the stock you are buying, before the fact. Afterwards, it would be available to margin. There are probably some technical guidelines about this very point, but those are often written from a one-dimensional perspective. There are ways around certain margin requirements depending on your firm's policies. That's not to say that any rules are broken, but rather just a different take on the SEC guidelines. Ultimately, you should consult your broker. Any option can be exercised at any time up to expiration in the United States. If someone exercises an option it is my understanding that all of the people that have written that particular option are in a lottery. It does not have to be the person to whom you wrote your option. When your number is called, you have to pay the piper. I can't give you any frequency, except to say that I'm sure the DIM options are called much more frequently prior to expiration. Hope this helps. I'm sure that ed will have more to add, and maybe a better example. Regards, LoF