By: The Trader

The Trader — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 12:44:20 +0000

I keep my CD ladder in a completely different account, so I don’t know how that will work for you. I think you’ve told me that you’ve been selling covered calls for a couple of years at least, so that should be enough time to get upgraded to full options trading rights. I can’t remember what the cut-off was for Ameritrade, but I just said I had one more year than they asked for and was approved immediately. With naked puts you’ll see similar returns, but won’t have to keep of your account on margin unless everything is assigned to you. Cool to see your account values grow like that. We started very similar this year and I’ve just been lucky enough to be able to deposit more so far. Greed is good, right?

By: Kadena

Kadena — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 11:05:02 +0000

Ok, let me come a bit more clean with my account too. I finished last year with $30,000 in my brokerage. This year I hadn’t deposited anything until a couple days ago, and which doesn’t “hit” it for 5 business days. My account value is about $36,400; and is also about $1,500 in the red. Meaning if the “red” monies came back it would all be worth nearly $38,000. However, my YTD is 20% with 6,000 being 20% of 30,000. Also, these are all trading gains. In a couple days my account value will go up $2,000 which was this weeks deposit. Now my holdings: 2,000 shares of AMT with July strike of 17 at 2.25. Obviously need the stock to come down some or i called this wrong and can lose up to 600. But I am protected if it drops all the way to 17. Also, SADLY, had purchased Wal-Mart a few days ago at 46.98, 300 shares, then it was up, then down, then up, so I sold for $100 profit and to reduce my margin which was uncomfortably high. Then, SADLY, WMT was up to 49.70 just yesterday, the day after I sold it for 47.47, so i missed over 2 dollar move and few hundred in profit if i sold at that price. oh well, with the money i bought 300 shares of GM at 29.98 and took June 30 strike for 3 calls at .90. It closed at 30.50 yesterday. Besides GM and AMT i still have the 300 shares or $600 in PUDC, which is very steady around my purchase of 2.17. I am eyeing the CD ladder concept and other cash reserves, such as yours, but may try to do it with liquid equity stocks with just small amount in 3 or 4 stocks, so some cash hopefully is always in “green”. I need to ask my brokerage if i choose a CD, if that can come out of my margin or if i must use my own cash, then my equity/margin account adjusts as necessary. But again, my job security has about 40 months left. More money = more opportunity, so congratulations with your goals, and be prepared for any direction the markets may take, up or down. Being worth about 40K now, i hope to finish the year somewhere above 50K—and then apply for more trading privileges, i.e. call buy, or put sell, not sure if i can get uncovered options at that time. But you’re right, it’s a great start to the year, and with a solid finish, we should have high hopes for 2008. May the work continue properly and successfully. Thanks again for allowing use of your blog, I appreciate it.

Comments on: End of the Month Summary

By: The Trader

By: Kadena