OptionBot

A few days ago, I started to receive e-mails from the one and only Keith Jones (author of the “60 Seconds Profit Strategy”), promoting some new trading software. Oh, joy! I will be rich again in no time. I don’t know if the Option Bot software is produced by him or what is his exact part in all this, but he was recommending it to me, telling me that he makes up to $2K per hour… Ok, when the e-mails became really annoying, I decided to click on the link provided and the whole adventure started.

What’s OptionBot All About?

The guys that are trying to sell it to me make it look like it’s the best thing since sliced bread…but we weren’t born yesterday and we don’t believe everything we read on the internet. I started to watch the presentation video and my eyes almost popped out of my orbits when the guy talking told me that “…3 pips is quite a large jump in currency terms…” That is an idiotic statement. To be honest, I didn’t really know how to react: laugh or cry? I am originally a Forex trader so I know currencies and let me tell you, three pips is an extremely small movement…extremely small movement. That’s not a typo; I just needed to repeat it. Anyway, the software announces me through a chime when one of the 15 pairs analysed moves the “tremendous” distance of 3 pips over a period of 15 minutes and I have to act quickly by placing a trade in the opposite direction. So if a pair moves 3 pips up, I have to place a Put and if the pair moves 3 pips down, I have to place a Call.

The direction of the move will be displayed in the left panel of the software in the form of a red or green arrow and I have to place the exact opposite trade (if I see a green arrow I place a Put and a Call if a red arrow appears). To be honest I find this confusing. I am not a programmer, but I think it would be a simple task to switch the colors for their software so it tells me exactly what to do. After all, they claim that you don’t need any kind of experience and that the software is extremely easy to use. Ok, it’s not very hard to remember to place the trade in the opposite direction, but why do I need to think about that?

Ok, so let’s recap what the Option Bot does for us: it alerts us when a move of 3 pips occurs in one of the 15 analyzed pairs and then we have to place a trade in the opposite direction…for this they charge $97. Guys, that is wrong on so many levels that I don’t know where to start.

The Revamping Of OptionBot… Or Should I Say Recycling?

Four years after my first visit, I had to return to see if this software has turned into a fossil or if it’s still kicking. Guess what: it is now at version 3.0, they offer a 25,000 Euro Demo Account and apparently the software is free. They don’t speak about the “3 pip” move anymore and instead they talk about Support and Resistance but to be honest, their knowledge about the concept of S/R is at beginner levels (and I’m being polite). Then they say the software will show you the market trend and that you can adjust Pip and Time Frame parameters. However, when I tried to sign up, I got a message saying that there aren’t any available brokers in my country (and I tried signing up from different countries, using a VPN), so, maybe the Bot has become a fossil by now.

Really, I don’t see the point of using this software (assuming you will manage to sign up), because there are literally tens of technical indicators that can show you S/R levels, trend, pip movement… and switching time frames can be done on any decent platform. On top of that, if you use OptionBot 3.0, you will have to sign up with one of their “recommended” brokers and we all know how that usually turns out (hint: not good). In my opinion, OptionBot should have remained in the Power Rangers era. We don’t need it here in 2017, just how we didn’t need that new Power Rangers movie… but we got it anyway.

Why does OptionBot SUCK?

The principle behind the trade is plain stupid and totally wrong from the very beginning: a 3 pip move is insignificant, it’s a drop in the ocean and I see absolutely no reason why I would want to trade in the opposite direction or even in the same direction. No trade should be based on a 3 pip move.

The money management seems to be designed to terminate accounts quickly and easily: they recommend that I open 5 accounts with 5 different brokers and then I can switch between brokers directly from the Option Bot software. This is a nice addition, I agree to that, but then the bomb comes: they recommend that I use “…no more than 25%” of my trading balance. Oh, my God! You know what that means? That if I lose 4 consecutive trades, I will blow my entire account… and if they are referring to my 25% of my entire balance, then I’ll blow 5 accounts after 4 consecutive losing trades. I am speechless and I cannot imagine how somebody can sell something like this…. “account terminator” comes to mind.

To go even more into “SUCK” territory, the Option Bot website offers a free 7 days trial, and although this sounds like a good thing: when I tried to unpack it, my antivirus program announced me that Option Bot Installer.exe is a Win32: Malware-Gen. For me that’s a virus and my cue to stop any installation of the software. I know it can be a false alert, but I am not willing to risk it. It’s like someone offering me a King Cobra as a gift and saying: “It might bite you, but maybe you’ll be lucky enough and still live after that” Ok, sorry but I’m not Chuck Norris, so I’ll pass on that. No 7 days free trial and no snake for me.

Why OptionBot Doesn’t Suck?

Now this is where I am having a hard time, because I cannot find any good reasons why it doesn’t suck, but I am going to try. Somewhere throughout the presentation, they tell me that I can customize the 3 pip amount so the software alerts me only if my desired move occurs. Ok, this is good and maybe the user can find other settings that can actually make some money, but a lot of testing and paper trading is needed to find those settings.

If the installation file of the software would not contain the virus I was talking about, having a free trial would be great. Maybe your antivirus will not detect it or maybe you are courageous enough to allow the installation, but I really hope you don’t take any unnecessary risks.

The Easy Conclusion

I suspected from the start that a product advertised by Keith Jones will either make me angry or make me laugh. Well, this one made me laugh and then made me angry, which is a first for any trading product that I have come across. To categorize a 3 pip move as “massive jump” is almost epic and I’m sure my trader friends will get a good laugh out of it. The sad and angering part is that the software costs 97 bucks…and my computer detects it as a virus. Why should I pay for a virus when they are easily found for free…? I find no logic behind the strategy used by the software and probably I wouldn’t use it even if it was free. If you still want to try it, I would highly recommend that you just paper trade when you get a signal from the software.