Newb - options trading

[Pacmanpth]

I've just started to read about options trading. Very very interesting and potentially profitable section of the market. Do I trade them just like I would stocks? What I'm asking is....say I had $5000 that I wanted to put down on an August 150 call for Apple (this would have been genious to do a day or two ago). If it was at say $2 per contract, would I buy 2500 contracts? It dosen't seem that way at all as volume on options is very low, (10-60k for different contracts for apple, which itself has an avg volume of about 34 million/day). I've read through a few articles and haven't really been able to find a definitive answer, although I saw a brief mention of something about listed prices actually accounting for 100 shares and therefor actually being 100x cost of what is listed.

[aiki14]

Originally Posted by Pacmanpth

I've just started to read about options trading. Very very interesting and potentially profitable section of the market. Do I trade them just like I would stocks? What I'm asking is....say I had $5000 that I wanted to put down on an August 150 call for Apple (this would have been genious to do a day or two ago). If it was at say $2 per contract, would I buy 2500 contracts? It dosen't seem that way at all as volume on options is very low, (10-60k for different contracts for apple, which itself has an avg volume of about 34 million/day). I've read through a few articles and haven't really been able to find a definitive answer, although I saw a brief mention of something about listed prices actually accounting for 100 shares and therefor actually being 100x cost of what is listed.

Contracts are 100 share blocks so a $2 contract is $200
Here's a helpful link
http://www.cboe.com/
Take a look at their online tutorials
Good luck