REVISION: Powell testimony on Tuesday is 10am ET…. same as Wednesday.
The big CPI on Thursday
Recent Updates Page 47
TLT
I’ve got some 94 strike covered calls so rolling up short puts in case we keep going.
Rolled TLT Jul 19 2024 91.0 Puts to Jul 19 2024 92.5 Puts @ .50 credit (1.80 total now)
Happy 4th a day late!
Back from France and reloading inventory (trades). Should be at my normal level today.
So if people are interested, the butterfly and broken wing butterfly are some of the best tactics for income trading. I have taken others ideas and tweaked them for shorter term income generation. Typically 14-21 DTE but occasionally longer. Works on just about any ticker but SPX is probably the most efficient. The market determines the initial levels, delta zero on a 1 lot. Below is a screen shot of today’s trade.
I then manage with calendars, diagonals, verticals, or additional butterflies. Take profits around 5-10% which is usually over the weekend or within a week. Rinse and repeat. A significant move in either direction and I re-adjust the legs by moving either the leg or some of the center strikes. Since Oct 2022 it has made $128,153 on max risk of 100k (10-20k risk per account x 6 accounts).
Have to go out 28 DTE today due to low VIX to not have to pay too much for it.
TQQQ,
STO August 2, $70 puts at 1.01
SPX
Getting kinda scary up here. Crazy.
Bought to Close SPX Jul 05 2024 5485.0 Puts @ .50 (Sold for 22.90)
Sold SPX Jul 08 2024 5520.0 Puts @ 7.00
SPX 0-dte trades 7/5/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX July 5th 5505/5535-5540/5570 condors for 13.60, IV 15.76%
June Jobs Report
#Jobs — Gains beat expectations again, but drop in prior months
Gain of +206,000 non-farm payroll jobs, vs. expected gain of 190K
Unemployment up 0.1% to 4.1%, vs expectation of unchanged
U6 unemployment 7.4%, unchanged
Labor force participation up 0.1 to 62.6%
Average hourly earnings up by 0.3%; +3.9% Y/Y
May jobs revised down by -54K to +218K
April jobs revised down by -57K to +108K
Happy Fourth of July
SPX
This should make Friday a little more exciting.
Rolled SPX Jul 05 2024 5460.0 Puts to Jul 05 2024 5485.0 Puts @ 2.50 credit (22.90 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades for 7/3
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX July 3rd 5475/5505-5510/5540 condors for 10.05, IV 11.16%
Low premium due to a short day. Overnight action was in a pretty small range. May or may not close before 9:45/10:00 data release. Market closes at 1pm ET.
TQQQ,
STO August 16, 70 puts at 2.14
SPX
Early roll since it feels a little weak. Going out to Friday and down a couple strikes for nice credit. (cue up the rally! LOL)
Rolled SPX Jul 02 2024 5470.0 Puts to Jul 05 2024 5460.0 Puts @ 4.75 credit (20.40 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades 7/2
#SPX0dte I placed a trade last night around my usual time when I shouldn’t have. The move from the close to 9pm PT was downward, and I want to place this trade only if that move is mostly flat. But I had been encouraged by the resilience of the premium lately so I placed it anyway.
At 12:28am ET, sold to open $SPX July 2nd 5435/5465-5470/5500 condors for 15.478
The downward move continued and premium maxed at 18.75 at around 7:53am. We bounced enough and I just closed for 15.30, so breakeven after commissions. The resilience saved me but my condor is too off-center to risk going into Powell’s speech and JOLT release. I will consider possibilities after 10am.
TQQQ,
BTC July 5, 55 puts at .01, It would have expired at zero but for .01 cent, I covered early.
TQQQ,
STO August 9, 60 puts at .91cents
TLT
Adding a little.
Sold TLT Jul 19 2024 91.0 Puts @ 1.30
SPX
Early roll today. Be out most of the afternoon.
Rolled SPX Jul 01 2024 5475.0 Puts to Jul 02 2024 5470.0 Puts @ 1.75 credit (15.65 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades 7/1
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX July 1st 5445/5475-5480/5510 condors for 16.05, IV 13.25%, at 12:26am
Earnings 7/1 – 7/5
Barely worth posting, but for the sake of consistency…
Economic Calemdar 7/1 – 7/5
Actually a fair amount of data coming in the Holiday week.
OptionsExpiration
EXPIRED:
BMY 43.5 Covered Call
BMY 44 Covered Calls
BMY 44.5 Covered Call
BMY 45 Covered Call
CVS 64 Covered Call
GILD 69 Covered Call
WBA 20.5 Covered Calls
SQQQ 9 Covered Call
PARA 11.5 Covered Call
VFC 15 Covered Call
VXX 13 Covered Calls
NVDA 102 Put
WBA 11.5 Put
GME 18 Put
UPS 128 Put
AAP 60 Put
SQQQ 8 Put
BOIL 15.5 Put
NUE 146/149 Bull Put Spread
UPS 129/132 Bull Put Spread
CMG 61.9 Diagonal Put
GME 19/21/31/40 Short Iron Condor
GME 23 Diagonal Put
GILD 74/70 Bear Call Spread
TSLA 177.5/187.5/210/220 Short Iron Condor
SBUX 70/77 Bull Put Spread
SPY 533/541/549/550 Short Iron Condor
ASSIGNMENTS:
None
VIX
Lottery ticket for a possible sh*t show between election day and inauguration day.
Bought VIX Dec 18 2024 20/30 Bull Call Spreads @ 1.06
TQQQ,
STO August 9, 60 puts at .71 and August 16, 60 puts at .95
SPX
Roll to Monday and up to just inside the expected move.
Rolled SPX Jun 28 2024 5465.0 Puts to Jul 01 2024 5475.0 Puts @ 5.25 credit (13.90 total now)
VXX long term puts
Bought VXX Jan 17 2025 5.0 Puts at $0.04.
#VXXContango
Picked the right day
What a day to skip for a neutral trader. Overnight was UP, and after a brief pullback before the open, we’re now at all-time highs again. This week’s $9+ profit made up for my past 5 losing and breakeven weeks, so I was comfortable skipping today. Fridays have been bad to me this year so happy to skip this one. Hoping for a few days of opportunities on the holiday week before next Friday’s job report.
TQQQ,
My $46 puts will expire at zero today.
USOY
#dividends
announced div today
Ex day is 7.1.2024 /$1.23 per share
BOT USOY @19.81989
NVDA
One add.
Sold NVDA Aug 16 2024 105.0 Put @ 2.00
SPX
I may regret this this but with weak premium next week staying aggressive tomorrow with the extra juice available.
Bought to Close SPX Jun 27 2024 5455.0 Puts @ .65 (sold for 34.10)
Sold SPX Jun 28 2024 5465.0 Puts @ 8.65
MMM Stock
Sold part of my tiny position in MMM at 104.01.
#FormerFakkingKnife
SPX 0-dte trades 6/27/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX Jun 27th 5445/5475-5480/5510 condors for 13.559, IV 15.23%, at 8:53 ET.
SPY Expiration
1 SPY 06/26/2024 542.00 Diagonal Put. Sold at $0.26
TSLA Calls
Sold 1 TSLA 06/28/2024 220.0/210.00 Bear Call Spread at $0.27 Credit
COIN META MSFT TTD Calls
$COIN STO 6/28 235 calls at 1.57
$META STO 6/28 520 calls at 1.82
$MSFT STO 6/28 457.5 calls at .68
$TTD STO 6/28 101 calls at .23
SPX
Not much happening today. Straight roll to tomorrow.
Rolled SPX Jun 26 2024 5455.0 Puts to Jun 27 2024 5455.0 Puts @ 6.00 credit (34.10 total now)
SBUX CMG Puts – GILD Calls
Sold 1 SBUX 06/28/2024 70.0/77.0 Bull Put Spread at $0.12 Credit
Sold 1 CMG 06/28/2024 64.0/64.4 Bull Put Spread at $0.17 Credit (first day of post split strikes)
Sold 1 GILD 06/28/2024 75.0/70.0 Bear Call Spread at $0.34 Credit
SPX 0-dte trades 6/26/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX Jun 26th 5440/5470-5475/5505 condors for 14.55, IV 15.28%, at 8:12am ET
UPS Puts
Sold 1 UPS 06/28/2024 129/132 Bull Put Spread at $0.36 Credit
Just prior to FEDEX earnings
SPX
Feels like it wants to drift lower. Rolling early on the little bounce. Out a day and down another strike.
Rolled SPX Jun 25 2024 5460.0 Puts to Jun 26 2024 5455.0 Puts @ 3.40 credit (28.10 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades 6/25/24
#SPX0dte Last night at 12:13am ET, sold to open $SPX Jun 25th 5425/5455-5460/5490 condors for 15.723. Didn’t get much decay overnight… price was 15.30 around 8am when structure was very close to centered ATM. But since then, it has dropped to 14.00. Considering when to exit.
This demonstrates how little decay there is overnight and that it really starts in earnest after 8am. Overnight risk may not be worth it, even if probability of stop-out is low.
NVDA
One add.
Sold NVDA Aug 16 2024 105.0 Put @ 3.45
SPX
Held out as long as I could for the theta. Roll out a day and down a strike now. Love a flat day!
Rolled SPX Jun 24 2024 5465.0 Puts to Jun 25 2024 5460.0 Puts @ 5.75 credit (24.70 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades 6/24/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX Jun 24th 5405/5425-5505/5525 condors for 1.05, deltas -.06 +.06, IV 15.65%
Earnings 6/24 – 6/28
Economic Calendar 6/24 – 6/28
Lotsa stuff dropping Friday
OptionsExpiration
EXPIRED:
ALB 90 Put
NVDA 121 Put
PARA 9.5 Put
SQQQ 8 Put
TSLA 165 Put
BMY 43.5 Covered Call
BMY 44.5 Covered Call
BOIL 23 Covered Calls
BOIL 25 Covered Call
SBUX 85 Covered Call
VFC 14.5 Covered Call
GME 10/23 Bull Put Spread
GME 48/40 Bear Call Spread
ASSIGNMENTS:
GILD 69 Covered Call (glad to get my cash back)
SPX
Out to Monday and down a strike.
Rolled SPX Jun 21 2024 5470.0 Puts to Jun 24 2024 5465.0 Puts @ 4.25 credit (18.95 total now)
NVDA
One more a little closer in. Plenty of rolling time before earnings.
Sold NVDA Jul 19 2024 115.0 Put @ 2.59
TLT
Doubling up the divvy again.
Bought to Close TLT Jun 21 2024 94.0 Calls @ .03 (sold for .45)
Sold TLT Jul 19 2024 97.0 Calls @ .42
Sold TLT Jul 19 2024 98.0 Calls @ .29
NVDA
Could’ve done a lot better earlier but missed it. Just a little starter at the expected move the week before earnings.
Sold NVDA Aug 16 2024 110.0 Put @ 2.70
TQQQ,
STO August 2, 60 puts at .95
TQQQ,
My June 21 40 puts and 50 puts will expire at zero today.
SPX 0-dte trades 6/21/24
#SPX0dte As posted below, at last night’s close I sold to open $SPX Jun 21st 5395/5415-5530/5550 condors for 1.15, IV 14.91%, deltas -.07 +.06. This morning, IV is 21.92%, and a similar delta condor is going for the same or more. The night-before entry didn’t help me. It may be the 9:45 PMI data, but traders knew that was coming yesterday too. Overnight moves were minor.
#SPXah Last night at 9:07pm PT sold to Open $SPX 5445/5475-5480/5510 condors for 18.35. At the overnight low (about 1:40am PT) it got up to 19.43. Now as we are currently rising in premarket, it is 17.70. I will close this before PMI. High to low swing overnight was over 20 points, so I’m glad to see it only got a buck in the hole. However, the IV remains high this morning so decay has been minimal.
TQQQ,
STO July 26, 60 puts at .75
GME WBA GILD Calls
Sold 1 GME Jun 21 2024 48/40 Bear Call Spread at $0.07 Credit
Paired with one of the Diagonal Put Spreads I sold yesterday
Sold 1 GILD Jun 28 2024 69.0 Covered Call at $0.23
Sold WBA Jun 28 2024 20.5 Covered Calls at $0.04
Replacing similar Calls that expired last week.
#EveryLittleBitHelps
ALB NVDA TSLA Puts
Sold 1 ALB Jun 21 2024 90.0 Put at $0.08.
Sold 1 NVDA Jun 21 2024 121.0 Put at $0.05.
Sold 1 TSLA Jun 21 2024 165.0 Put at $0.06.
Using up all my buying power. Expires tomorrow.
#EveryLittleBitHelps
SPX
Rolling to just inside the expected move. C’mon Mr. Market take a run at it.
Rolled SPX Jun 20 2024 5460.0 Puts to Jun 21 2024 5470.0 Puts @ 5.50 credit (14.70 total now)
SPX 0dte trades 6/20/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX Jun 20th 5435/5455-5540/5560 condor for 1.05, deltas -.07 +.07, IV 16.05%
VIX Put Expiration
1 VIX Jun 18 2024 12.0 Put
GME Diagonal Puts
Bought 1 GME Jun 28 2024 19.0 Put / Sold 1 Jun 21 2024 23.0 Put at $0.15 Credit
Bought 1 GME Jul 05 2024 18.0 Put / Sold 1 Jun 21 2024 23.0 Put at $0.16 Credit
Covering the cost of my original buy of Jun 21 2024 10.0 Puts a month ago
Overnight strategy details
#SPX0dte #SPXah I started “#SPXah” hashtag for this. It is basically the same IB/condor trade we have been doing same-day but placed around 9pm Pacific and closed before the next day’s open. I recently discovered that SPX options can be traded from 5:15pm to 6:15am PT, whereas before I thought it was only 3a-6:15a.
(I’m usually post times in ET but using PT time here since that’s where I live)
Overnight moves CAN be large, but lately we’ve been in a period with the market making its moves during market hours and the overnight being fairly calm. I tracked the price of the condors with a 5-pt middle and 30-pt wings from 5:15pm onward. I have seen little decay in the price between 5:15 and midnight, so waiting until 9pm to enter the trade. To exit trade before 5:30am, when data releases typically happen, we can usually only expect .85 t0 1.50 in profit.
The premium does NOT move very much with minor swings. It seems we need at least a 20 point move before we hit a 2-dollar stop level. So in the first two live trades I’ve done, I entered bracket orders to take profits at 1.10 and stop-loss at 2.00. I had one loss and one win.
The chart below shows the 10 days tested, with notes. For two weeks potential profit is +3.76.
You must monitor the /ES chart for movement, but look at the $SPX option chain to determine the centered strikes, looking at the puts and calls that are each closest to .50 delta.
I’m thinking best approach is to make sure the first 4 hours (5:15-9:15pm) have no major market moves from the close. If earnings or something have caused volatility, skip the trade as it is more likely to keep moving overnight. Also, may be best to avoid large events occurring the expiry day, even though test trades on both Jobs and CPI reports worked, because the premium sold was so high that the IV drop made up for the move in the index.
Check out the chart and let me know if you have questions.
SPX Update
Just looking at my oldest position (one spread). Dec 2027 5000/5000/5400. Set the position back on Feb 7th when the market was around 5000. Since then we’ve rallied 10 percent. There was about a month in there where I collected zero premium and had to roll the short put sales down while we were selling off a little. That can be expected. It is nice to see that decent money can be made even when the market is going big against your synthetic short LEAPS.
Here’s the actual numbers:
Cost to open the position: 22500 debit
Cost to close the position: 5400 credit
Loss on LEAPS: 17100
Total daily premium received: 32000
Net gain if closed everything today: 14900
That works out to about 46 cents on the dollar going to profit.
My thoughts: In a flatter market these would make really really good money. Been pretty much straight up the whole time but pretty easy to keep up with the lossses on the LEAPS. Already over halfway to covering max loss and the trade still has 182 weeks to run (130 weeks if I close it a year early).
Decision to make:
1. Do I close now and reset the LEAPS higher to reduce the risk and margin in the daily sales?
I say not yet since a selloff can still help the LEAPS and plenty of time to roll down the daily sales and margin requirements are still not terrible. I can’t confirm but it feels like the higher we go the less short deltas the LEAPS have. It feels like the losses are bigger as the LEAPS initially get out of the money and get closer to max loss. Pretty easy to sell the daily to flatten the delta on the overall position now with the LEAP deltas only being short 26 where they were initially around 50 at the beginning of the trade.
Gonna continue and see how things play out. So far so good.
#fuzzyspxexperiment (so I can find this post in a search LOL)
EDITED: Changed last paragraph from “in the money” to “out of the money”
SPX
This might cool things off a little…selling half the expected move.
Bought to Close SPX Jun 17 2024 5400.0 Puts @ .20 (sold for 12.55)
Sold SPX Jun 20 2024 5460.0 Puts @ 9.20
SPX 0-dte trades 6/18
SPX
Gonna be on the road rest of the day so rolling early on the first little dip.
Rolled SPX Jun 17 2024 5400.0 Puts to Jun 18 2024 5405.0 Puts @ 6.00 credit (12.55 total now)
SPX 0-dte trades 6/17/24
#SPX0dte Sold to Open $SPX Jun 17th 5400/5430-5435/5465 condors for 13.70, IV 15.71%
Earnings 6/17 – 6/21
Economic Calendar 6/17 – 6/21
Retail Sales numbers Tuesday, market closed Wednesday, PMI reports Friday
Markets
Even within tech there is a staggering divergence – yesterday the Nasdaq hit a new record high despite more than 70% of the index closed lower on the session!
OptionsExpiration
The last one for a while as I wait for my account to be moved
EXPIRED:
1 BMY 43.5 Covered Call
1 BMY 44.5 Covered Call
1 CVS 61.0 Covered Call
1 GILD 69.0 Covered Call
1 VFC 14.0 Covered Call
VXX 13.0 Covered Calls
WBA 20.5 Covered Calls
1 UPS 133.0 Put
1 AAP 59.0 Put
1 KOLD 29.0 Put
1 BOIL 27.5/23.5 Bear Call Spread
1 GME 15.5/17.5/40/42 Short Iron Condor
1 GME 15.5/25/65/70 Short Iron Condor (now completely out of GME)
1 SBUX 86/80 Bear Call Spread
VXX 11.0 Diagonal Puts
VXX 17/13 Bear Call Spreads
ASSIGNMENTS:
1 SQQQ 9.0 Put (last night)
1 PARA 11.5 Put
CLF 16.0 Puts
Last Straw for Fidelity
After making a mistake and buying back at $0.01 a SPY put that I sold as part of a diagonal spread on the same day I sold it, Fidelity put my IRA on restriction for 90 days because I couldn’t meet a $28k day trade margin call.
I’m done with them. Moving this entire account to TT
SPX
Another round. Nice end to a record week…53.10 in premium. Thank you Fed! (technically 7 trading days going back to last Thursday)
Bought to Close SPX Jun 14 2024 5395.0 Puts @ 1.05 (sold for 15.90)
Sold SPX Jun 17 2024 5400.0 Puts @ 6.55
GME
#shortputs
#closing
#releasingcapitol
Btc GME 14 JUN 2024 29 PUT @1.11
sto Wednesday@3.19
XBI
Adding.
Sold XBI Jul 19 2024 88.0 Puts @ 1.30 and 1.40
Options Bistro 