Closed SPY Calls for a Loss

Lots of bad news (oil up, unemployment up, dollar down) hit the markets before the market’s open as we all saw.  Immediately I thought about the SPY calls I should’ve closed yesterday before market close.  I had a ~30% gain in the bag, but stayed greedy and hoped for more.  The SPY June 142 calls (SFBFL) that I bought for $255.24 I bought back for $152.75.

I’ve admitted I’m not the strongest option buyer.  This proved my point.  I made $70 a couple of weeks ago on SPY calls and had another $100 on paper yesterday.  I need to better define my goals with option buying if I’m going to continue trading it.  I saw the chart and the potential to make more and that helped greed set in when I could have made $100 in a day.  That was bad enough, but this morning, when everything started falling, I tried to wait it out and could’ve come close to break even, but saw SPY was hitting support on the 50 day moving average.  I waited, closed my browser and went back to work after setting a trigger alert for if SPY fell below the 50 day moving average.  15 minutes later it fell and I had to log back in to see I was down another $70.  I opted to cut my losses at this point and bought my shares back.  I’m still long on other positions, so if the S&P 500 rallies, I’ll profit there.  If it doesn’t, I’ll lose less than I could have.