I was on a good role with picking the direction of Monsanto (MON) for the past few months, but seem to have lost my touch lately a little. With that in mind I decided to end my long run with MON for now, take my loss on the stock and move to another position. While MON…
Month: April 2009
Rolled Naked Puts on NDAQ
The NASDAQ OMX Group (NDAQ) has been more than a little bit volatile over the past few months, but at the same time has become somewhat predictable (I hope). It’s been trading consistently in a trading channel for a while now and I expected it to get back above $20.00 again by now to move my…
When is it Smart to Refinance a Mortgage?
Ever since mortgage rates started falling I’ve been waiting for the best time to refinance our home mortgage. A few months ago I received a promotional letter from the same mortgage broker I’ve used for our past two mortgage loan closings – one mortgage refinance and one original mortgage loan. I’ve referred him to 8-10 friends and…
Bearish Apple (AAPL) Option Trade
After charting the DJIA this weekend and AAPL this morning I decided to make a bearish trade on AAPL. I won’t claim this is much more than a gamble since the April options expire in just five days which means I don’t have much time for AAPL to turn in my favor. I’m expecting the…
DJIA Chart – 6 Months Ending April 9, 2009
I charted daily prices for the Dow Jones ($DJI) for the past six months ending Thursday, April 9, 2009. Outside of any other technical indicator the big scary monkey on this market’s back is the horizontal line that comes across the entire past six months right near the highs of the past six trading sessions. A lot has hype…
Sector and Industry Breakdown
I used to run this drill on my portfolio every month to make sure I was staying fairly diversified, but have fallen away from it for a while as I wasn’t concentrating on opening as many new positions as much as managing what I already had on my plate. I’m starting to get more bullish, although with…
XLB Vertical Put Spread Credit
I’ve been watching the Materials Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLB) for a while after I bought and sold put options on it last year and in January of this year. I kept thinking it would fall more and hasn’t. So I kept waiting and charting. I was working on an XLB chart this morning for my other blog and after I saw XLB…
TDW Stalled and I Sold Covered Calls
Tidewater Inc (TDW) dipped with the most of stocks this morning and I decided to reduce my cost per share again. While TDW was selling at $39.51 today I sold 2 TDW April 40 covered calls (TDWDH) at $1.40 and received $268.50 after commissions. I’ve been considering it for a while, but thought TDW might…
S&P 500 Chart – April 3, 2009
The last time I charted the S&P 500 ($SPX.X) I was confident enough that it was going up that I even said it was a buy in the title. Today I’m not as confident. The big technical indicator that drew my attention last time was that Williams %R broke above oversold and confirmed that direction…