#shortputs
$NVDA BTC 9/21 225/230 BUPS at .15 STO at 1.48 on 7/31
#longputs
$WSM STO 9/21 67.50/62.50 BECS at 3.42 Don’t think earnings price spike will last. What do I know?
#longcalls
$ANET BTO 9/21 270/300 BUCS at 11.60 Lucked out. They are being added to S&P 500
#ShortPuts #IRA – I’ll take a shot…
Sold BABA DEC 21 2018 150.0 Put @ 3.45
Update…got really lucky on this one. Re-stated earnings to a miss now. At least that’s the rumor. Jeez is Muskie running the conference call?
SPX BTO Sept 21 2930/2950 @1.70
We did OK on these a while back
Bought to close $CMI Dec 21 105 puts @ .30. Sold for 1.40 on 5/2.
Bought to close $SWKS Sep 21 85 puts @ .40. Sold for 1.20 on 7/23. I normally would let a position like this expire in a few weeks with the stock at 93, but anything can happen with this one (it had a 30% drop in a little over a month earlier this year). Felt better to just take the profits and move on.
GOOGL BTO Sept 7 1200/1202.5 1.85 #supercharger
STC GOOGL Aug 31 1195/1197.5 2.20 Paid 1.85 week ago
… to whoever can identify what the background today represents (Oregon residents are excluded from the contest). Refresh the page if you still are seeing bamboo.
Bought to close $NKTR Nov 16 30 puts @ .45. Sold for 1.85 on 6/5.
An idea from TastyTrade.
Sold $EWZ Oct 19 28/36 strangle @ 1.76 with EWZ right in the middle at 32.00.
Sold at highest strikes:
$DUST Nov 16 64 calls @ 1.00
$DUSH Mar 15 2019 64 call @ 2.10
Interesting one, MamaCash. From the prospectus:
“The Fund expects to primarily take short positions in and obtain short exposure to VIX Futures Contracts with two to six months to expiration, but may take short positions in and obtain short exposure to VIX Futures Contracts with shorter or longer durations. The Fund expects the notional value of its exposure to VIX Futures Contracts to be equal to approximately 100% of Fund assets at the close of each trading day, but the notional value of such exposure may be less, and could be substantially less, at the close of any trading day. Under normal circumstances, the Fund will invest at least 80% of its net assets, plus any borrowings for investment purposes, in financial instruments that in combination provide short exposure to VIX Futures Contracts.”
Here are today’s holdings:
I am considering buying shares as well based on the dividend. Price is only around 3.30 so not a big risk if all is lost (which it could be in these inverse vol products, like SVXY).
#SuperCharger Bought to Open $GOOGL Set 7th 1200/1210 Bull call spread for 7.20. It has a daily squeeze. You can get a better price now, or move down a strike or two. Goal closing price is 9.40.
On vacation this week but home so still doing some trading.
Let’s get the crap out of the way first. Sorry to anyone who followed AMAT. Loss on the last earnings 12 weeks ago. Almost worked it back to even but they beat last week but still punished so break even or near break even is now a loss again. I mostly had these in small accounts so am closing so I can use the money on something more effective. BTC all the 47 call options for pennies, 0.03. Sold the stock at 43.06 and 43.09. Total losses (not per contract) of $588 on lot 1 and $558 on lot 2. Not bad considering it was down over $2000 initially. Rolling helps but the reason I am closing it is this: as it dropped below $50 the premiums dried up. ATM 1 week out is only 0.4-0.5. Not enough for #pietrades. Second reason is after 14 weeks of not being able to break even, time to move on. Like GM this is off the #pietrade list for a while. If you can’t bring in more than 0.5-1% per week, not worth #pietrade.
STC the SPX 2550 calendar hedge for 0.55. So a 1 month hedge only cost 0.65. I will continue playing with these but doubt I will always have a hedge. Maybe easier to just short some /ES futures when needed.
Rest are updates, rolls, new trades.
#fuzzies
MU LEAP 55/50 8 DTE cb at 11.26. At least MU found a base.
WDC LEAP 60/ 65 29 DTE cb at 17.78. Looks like finding new range in the 60-70 area.
EOG LEAP 115/115 29 DTE cb at 11.2.
XBI LEAP 87/95 and 95/95 rolled out to 22 DTE for 0.72 credit. cb now 6.8 and 3.32. Should be free trades soon.
#pietrades
LABU 8 DTE 85 put for 1.9, cb 83.10 if assigned. Good support at 85.
TQQQ lot 1 65 cc rolled to next week 65.5 cc for 0.20 credit. Cb 62.78
TQQQ lot 2 65 CC cb 63.23, new trade, small account only 1-2 contracts
TQQQ lot 3 65 cc rolled to next week 65.5 for 0.25 credit. Cb now 62.98
TQQQ lot 4 66 CC cb 65.02 new trade.
TQQQ lot 5 65 cc cb 63.90
Looks like a lot of TQQQ but each account only 1-2 contracts, I am diversified elsewhere. However I have noticed that my more concentrated accounts are doing much better. Better to be a specialist than a general practitioner like me, at least for trading. Also have noticed the more you get direction right, the better the non directional trades do better. Will keep working on being better at directional bias.
A few other changes. No more #pietrades on earnings. Last 5 out of 8 went bad and basically flattened my equity curve for the last 4 months. Would have done much better without those. If I do them will use spreads in advance. Without those 5 losing earnings trades I could have paid off my wife’s car.
Converting deep ITM #pietrades into #fuzzy is a very effective risk reduction tool. Allows you to limit margin but also keep selling premium weekly and looking at 100% returns over 6 months if I keep them going. Probably best tactic for small accounts.
I will be moving most of the #pietrades over to ETFs and leveraged products to avoid the single ticker risk. The ladder idea works well for this 45 DTE and closing/rolling after 3 weeks.
#Earnings after the close today. I would take a shot but I’m already in a long term LEAPS position that was a repair trade from about 3 quarters ago. Finally sitting at breakeven but I’m gonna hold it through the announcement.
It’s a 3×4 ratio with little to no upside risk and makes money down to 134 which is my short call strike.
Took the last of my SVXY stock today (other than a single Jan 2019 25 strike put). This is pretty typical of where most of my SVXY positions were.
Original trade was Jan 2019 80/80/77.5 Synthetic Stock @ 25.50 so luckily the worse case scenario is a basis about 25 dollars above where the stock is. The short puts were exercised so I sold the long puts. I’ve unloaded all my other stock but I’ll hang on to this one since it’s only a couple hundred shares.
Sold SVXY SEP 21 2018 14.5 Calls @ .38
Back home at last… slept well so keeping jet lag at bay!
#CoveredCallCampaign #SyntheticCoveredCalls Since I’ve been trading lighter I mostly only have long stock and long #LEAPs positions. Looking for new entries… who’s got something?
Wednesday I was over the Pacific without enough WiFi megabytes to trade, so fortunately the market didn’t do much.
Tuesday: BTC $SQ 75 calls for 1.55. Small loss. #StrangleRoll: Sold Aug 31st 73.5/78.5 strangles for 1.95.
Tuesday: BTC SQ Aug 24th 76 call for 1.16 & Aug 31st 76 call for 1.96. Breakeven combining the two.
Today: #Rolling Sold SQ Sep 7th 79 call for 1.55; sold Sept 7th 80 call for 1.50
Today: Sold $BABA Sep 14th 195 Covered Call for 1.50
Tuesday: Rolled $AAPL Aug 24th 202.5 #CoveredCalls to Aug 31st 205 covered calls, breakeven. Still underwater on this one but managing to creep my strike up.
Today: Sold $FB Sep 14th 182.5 covered call for 1.45.
Today: Sold $AMAT Aug 31st 43 covered call for .80. This #PieTrade is a stinker… not much premium to work with.
#LongCalls #LEAPS – Taking advantage of the earnings bounce up to resistance. The overall position is approaching zero deltas again so booking it.
Sold to Close BABA JAN 17 2020 180.0 Calls @ 31.95
Bought to Close BABA AUG 24 2018 180.0 Calls @ 4.60
Ended up with 2.73 profit on a 3 lot…
Now if the China negotiations fall apart I can look to re-enter on the drop. 🙂
Not sure what the hold up was but I finally got assigned the last lot of SVXY from the short puts I had (January 85s). I’ve closed around 20% of the position using basis reduction from UVXY and VXX so I’ll keep plugging away (and maybe start writing some covered calls as SVXY pushes toward 20). I’ll be at this project for at least another year.
STO August 31, 14 calls at .45 cents. I will roll these if SVXY is above 14 on Aug 31
Options Bistro 