Options Expiration – August 2010

 Today’s option expiration finished somewhat differently than I thought it was going to as of a week ago.  Here’s the breakdown of how it went down:

• VXX, two August 24 Puts – I’ll be assigned 200 shares of VXX on Monday morning.  Instead of trying to roll these puts I sold covered calls on the shares I’m about to be assigned.  While VXX was trading at $23.07 I sold two September 24 covered calls at $1.25 and received $248.97 after commissions.
• AVAV, two August 25 calls – AVAV stayed below my covered calls strike and I’ll be holding onto my shares.  I plan to sell covered calls at the $22.50 strike on Monday or Tuesday.  I’d like to see a little bounce first, but won’t wait too long.
• CVS, two August 33 puts and 100 shares assigned as of this morning from my third option – I might just dump these shares for a loss.  I was expecting $28.40 to hold and it didn’t.  It looks oversold and due for a bounce, but I’m not sure I have the patience.  If the premiums were better I might extend my stay with it.  That might be what I do once the October contracts are posted next week.
• JPM, one August 37 put and one August 42 covered call – This strangle went well for me.  JPM went as high as $41.70 on August 2nd, but retreated all of the way down to $36.81 (in the money) today before finishing around $37.15.  I might write another strangle, but at lower strikes next week.
• CSX, two August 52.50 puts – I’ll be assigned 200 shares of CSX on Monday morning and might wait a few days before selling covered calls on it since it appears to be close to the bottom of its trading range.
• ITRI, one Aug 75 covered call – ITRI has fallen more than $10 in less than three weeks.  Therefore I’ll be holding onto my 100 shares and writing another covered call.  I’m still debating at what strike I should sell.  I like ITRI long term, but am starting to think I might have time to take in some more premiums at lower strikes before it rallies again.  I’ll decide next week.

I have a lot of options expiring in September, so any other new options I write in the coming weeks will probably be for October so I can continue to spread out my risk into different expiries.