Doubled my money on DD using Option Call Spread

Doubled my money in 3 weeks using a Dupont (DD) April Call Spread. Bought the April 38 Call and sold the April 40 Call on 3/18/10 based on a recommendation from the good folks on Fast Money (http://www.cnbc.com/id/15838499) that DD was going to 40 in 2 weeks. Option spread cost was $0.50. Sold today for $1.00.

Original target was $2.00 to quadruple the investment, but DD didn't go up fast enough and the options are going to expire on 4/17/10, so I lowered the target to capture the positive move before they expire.

Options are always for a block of 100 shares. So if you buy an option for $0.50 per share, you pay $50.00 because the option controls 100 shares. If you have more than $50 to risk you can buy multiple options.

You sell an option further away from the current market price of the stock in addition to buying the option you want, which is closer to the current market price of the stock, in order to reduce the net cost of your investment. The downside is that your profits are limited to the difference between the strike prices of the options. In my example above, the profit was limited to $40-$38=$2.

A Call option is a contract that gives you the right to buy a specific stock at a specific price for a specific period of time.

It seems like when you make money, you risked too little. And when you lose money, you risked too much.