Fred Thomson

Using Covered Calls to Replace USB Dividend (Barron's)

This is a great article. But a well disciplined covered call trading strategy can be very profitable and will beat stocks in all BUT the strongest bull markets.

Trading costs are another possible disadvantage, but again this can be gotten around by not paying ridiculous amount for trades - try Zecco for goodness sake. I've used them over a year now and they don't have great customer service - but it's is way cheaper.

Also, any covered call trader will need some sort of tool to help him make decisions on when to manipulate his positions. A great tool can be downloaded at coveredcallcalculator.net