Scott Nations
AUTHOR

Scott Nations

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Scott Nations is president and chief investment officer of Nations Indexes, Inc., an independent developer of volatility and option strategy indexes. Their indexes include VolDex®, which measures implied volatility on the S&P 500, and TailDex®, which measures what investors are willing to pay to protect their portfolios. The entire suite of Nations volatility indexes is published by Nations Indexes. Before founding Nations Indexes, he spent 25 years as a floor trader at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, running proprietary equity index option trading firms.

His newest book is the fully revised second edition of Options Math for Traders: How To Pick the Best Option Strategies for Your Market Outlook (2026). It explains the math behind option prices, including implied volatility, the volatility risk premium, skew, time decay and volatility slope. It then shows when that math favors covered calls, cash-secured puts, calendar spreads, risk reversals and vertical spreads. The new edition covers today's market, with daily expirations, 0DTE options and current pricing.

Scott is also the author of A History of the United States in Five Crashes, a general-interest history of the five modern stock market crashes from the Panic of 1907 to the 2010 Flash Crash. His other book, The Anxious Investor, examines the behavioral biases that undermine investors during bubbles and bear markets.

He is a longtime CNBC contributor and writes for CNBC's website. He publishes the weekly Volatility Insights newsletter for Nations Indexes.
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