This NASDAQ 100 ($NDX) chart shows the past year of daily prices after the index finished the week at 2,748.26 on Friday, January 11, 2013. However, a drop that much would push the tech-heavy index below its 20 and 50 day moving averages (dma). The 200 dma would be challenged and would have to be the extra…
Profit Taking Tuesday
My new favorite type of order is a trailing stop. I only used it on one of my orders that hit today, but maybe I should’ve used it on all four since prices improved somewhat after my trade. A trailing stop works the same on option contracts as it does for a stock or ETF….
S&P 500 Chart – January 4, 2013
This S&P 500 ($SPX) chart shows the past six months of daily prices after the index finished the week at 1,466.47 on Friday, January 4, 2013. By the time stock futures first printed on January 2nd, all investors could see the “risk-on” trade was back. The moving averages were no longer going to be weighted down by…
Sold February IWM Covered Calls
I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I needed some more cash flow for February options expiration and could probably use some covered calls on my small cap ETF, IWM. I was able to knock out both of those needs with a single limit order. Yesterday afternoon, I entered an order well above the bid/ask with the…
Sold UCO Covered Calls for April
Yesterday, I mentioned that I might sell covered calls on my 600 shares soon. I didn’t wait much longer before pulling the trigger today. The first debate I had wasn’t if I should sell, but what I should sell. I was trying to pick between selling the covered calls for February or April expiration. I…
2012 Stock Picks Contest – Final Results
For the past few years, I’ve joined some of the top financial bloggers of North America in a friendly stock/ETF picking contest. We each picked four stocks or ETFs at the beginning of the year and tracked them quarterly, without any changes allowed. I hung onto my third place standing to finish the year, well…
Dow Jones Industrial Average Chart – December 28, 2012
I charted the daily prices for the past three months on the Dow Jones Industrial Average ($DJIA, $INDU, $DJI, the Dow) after the index closed at 12,938.11 on Friday, December 28, 2012. The trick is waiting for that swing to happen. Every day the fiscal cliff goes unresolved (tomorrow night is the deadline), the deeper the…
Dow Jones Chart – December 14, 2012
I charted the daily prices for the past month on the Dow Jones Industrial Average ($DJIA, $INDU, $DJI, the Dow) after the index closed at 13,135.01 on Friday, December 14, 2012. This week I zoomed in on only the most recent month. I wanted to highlight the moving averages more than anything right now. The 10…
S&P 500 Chart – What’s Not To Like?
This S&P 500 ($SPX) chart shows the past 3 months of daily prices after the index finished the week at 1,418.07 on Friday, December 7, 2012. However, prices have been rising (outside of AAPL and a few others). The SPX chart shows that the Williams %R indicator gave the green light in the second half of November….