Thursday, November 29, 2007
Bernanke Hints of Further Rate Cuts
Bernanke seems to be hell bent on kicking the bears in the nuts. Tomorrow could be a strong day. We'll have to see how DELL's earnings affect the day's proceedings.
Today's day is what the markets needed, a long deserved rest. We're so used to 3 digit moves these days, that today might have seemed like a boring day to most. It's still very volatile out there, so be careful.
Today's day is what the markets needed, a long deserved rest. We're so used to 3 digit moves these days, that today might have seemed like a boring day to most. It's still very volatile out there, so be careful.
Sell - 1 SHLD Dec 100 Put @ 6.00 (Bought @ 3.00)
Ignorance is bliss! I had no idea that SHLD was reporting today, otherwise I might not have even taken this trade. I was thinking of closing it yesterday, good thing I decided not to.
Closed this a little after the open. Some thing that I've realized trading big earnings based moves is to get rid of options at the beginning of the day, that's when the premiums are usually the highest.
As a side note, I bought this put option @ 3.00 when the stock was trading at around 111. Now it's at 104 and the option is still selling for only 3.00. Goes to show what an IV drop can do to an option price.
Closed this a little after the open. Some thing that I've realized trading big earnings based moves is to get rid of options at the beginning of the day, that's when the premiums are usually the highest.
As a side note, I bought this put option @ 3.00 when the stock was trading at around 111. Now it's at 104 and the option is still selling for only 3.00. Goes to show what an IV drop can do to an option price.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Buy - 1 SHLD Dec 100 Put @ 3.00
Buy - 1 RIMM Dec 110 Put @ 7.00
Not too sure about this one. It looked like it was weakening intra-day, but the late day rally did some damage.
Labels: RIMM
Sell - 1 LEH Dec 60 Put @ 5.10 (Bought @ 4.20)
Sold this one, but shorted a few shares a little above 60.
Sell - 1 AAPL Dec 170 Put @ 5.60 (Bought @ 5.15)
Got stopped out in the morning. Had I held on to it a little while longer, could've had a pretty nice profit. Coulda woulda shoulda..
Monday, November 26, 2007
Buy - 1 LEH Dec 60 Put @ 4.20
Bought this on a break of 60. Initial target is around 56. I thought I put in an order to buy 2, unluckily it turned out to be only 1. I might have been better of just shorting the stock instead. But it is what it is...
Labels: LEH
Buy - 1 AAPL Dec 170 Put @ 5.15
AAPL looked overbought to me. I waited for it to reach the mid 177 area, which I thought might act as resistance. I bought it after it fell below 176.50. I was monitoring it closely, and might have closed it had it taken out the highs. But it never came back up to even test the point at which I bought it.
My first target is 170. I'll also be putting a mental stop on this if it decides to take off tomorrow. On a daily chart, it might have formed a shooting star, which is bearish.
Labels: AAPL
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Todays action
The last hour or so wasn't very kind to the bulls. Make sure you have a list of stocks to short or buy puts on close at hand... you could be using it very soon.
Labels: market
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Out of the woods?
The past few days, when my portfolio was getting ravaged by the bears, how I wished that my portfolio contained a few short positions. I was 100% long. A few shorts would have definitely eased the pain. I read a few articles which mentioned a balanced portfolio should contain 70/30 or 80/20 long / short positions... i.e. 70% long and 30% short or 80% long and 20% short. Well.. the market has given us a chance to do so.
It was a nice day for the bulls. I did recover some of the losses I've had the past few days, but not nearly enough. Are we out of the woods yet? Perhaps not. The market's fallen down so much so quickly that it's created a lot of resistance levels up ahead.
I had mentioned the 134 level in the DIA in a prior post as a strong support area which was broken. This could now end up being a resistance level.
SPY also could be running into resistance.. perhaps around the 149 area.
I would still be careful in this environment. I'll be looking for some low risk short/put entries at possible resistance levels to balance my portfolio.
Trade well!
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Sinking Dollar
I read an article on CNN Money, in which they have an interesting chart. If history repeats itself, it won't be good for the market at all.
The markets fallen down quickly and on heavy volume. In doing so, it's formed a lot of resistance levels up above. So trying to reclaim these levels could be a tough task.
The Friday close was disheartening for the bulls. I read an interesting post on another blog in which that person mentioned that if the market closes weak on Friday, it usually opens weak on Monday as well. I've seen that happening a few times before, we'll see if that happens this time as well.
I'm expecting (could be read as "hoping") a short term bounce. But I feel that this bounce will be used by people to offload some long positions and possibly load up on shorts.
It's a scary market out there, so be careful.
The markets fallen down quickly and on heavy volume. In doing so, it's formed a lot of resistance levels up above. So trying to reclaim these levels could be a tough task.
The Friday close was disheartening for the bulls. I read an interesting post on another blog in which that person mentioned that if the market closes weak on Friday, it usually opens weak on Monday as well. I've seen that happening a few times before, we'll see if that happens this time as well.
I'm expecting (could be read as "hoping") a short term bounce. But I feel that this bounce will be used by people to offload some long positions and possibly load up on shorts.
It's a scary market out there, so be careful.
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
POT
I traded POT today, bought one option mid-afternoon, sold it towards the end of the day. I'm still cautious with the current market so didn't want to hold it overnight. One thing I liked about this trade was that my bid was matched and so was my ask. Usually it happens the other way around for me. So at least I was able to make money off of the spread... which usually for these options could be around 50 bucks.
I bought this for 9.40, sold for 10.40.
POT still looks to be consolidating the huge move it made a few days ago. This could break out above 124.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
DIA - Watch the 134 level
What a difference a day makes. Just when things were going well, 14000 was within easy reach... now we're just looking for some sort of a support. The 134 level could be very important for DIA. If it can't hold that level as support, we could easily see 13000.
Be careful out there...
Labels: DIA
