The current bull market is over four years old. That age seems to be the time when most bull markets begin to fade, but I’m betting this one is different. The main reason is that the preceding recession was deeper than the usual decline and that means the recovery should be longer as a reversion…
Tag: SSO
Jumped in with SSO Again
I got caught wishing and wanting this morning. Once the S&P 500 (SPX) started moving south a couple of weeks ago, I was counting on a little better correction than we saw. I was wishing for a better dip because I wanted to load up even more on stocks. I was wishing for a bigger…
Closed Out Some Risk
I sold a vertical call spread on TLT (20-year Treasury ETF) for a $0.28 net premium less than a month ago and closed it today, a month before it was set to expire. While TLT was trading at $116.54, I bought to close 10 TLT June $127 calls for $0.07 and sold to close 10…
Profit Taking: SSO and QQQ
I feel better about my IWM naked put trade from yesterday. I was scared the rise in the Japanese yen would kick off more algorithmic selling today as it did yesterday when the yen hit parity (1 to 1) with the US dollar. Instead, IWM is higher and I’m up more than $100 on my…
Added Naked Puts on Leveraged ETFs
This morning’s positive jobs data caught most investors off guard. Not only did it beat forecasts by 10,000, the previous month’s number was revised 50,000 higher. Much of my concern for the market’s direction came from my view that if the jobs data is weakening, the economy will follow. Based on today’s employment data and…
Removing Risk – SSO, QCOM
A lot of traders like to add to positions as markets move higher. I’m usually in that camp too, but the S&P 500 has had a hard time getting up to the 1,600 level on prior attempts and after bouncing around it this week. I figured I should remove some risk and either be ready…
Sold Far OTM SSO Naked Puts
I just got back in town yesterday after taking a few days off for vacation. (I highly recommend a day at LegoLand Florida if you have a 9-year old son, just get there at the open.) I set-up all of my limit orders to expire before I left my office. I didn’t want something big…
Options Expiration – March 2013
This has to be one of the most boring quarterly options expiration days that I can remember. The market didn’t know what to do with itself after such a long rally and didn’t do much. The morning trade looked like it might finally turn into the start of a decent profit-taking day, but by the…
Shifting Risk with MVV, SSO and TBT + A Trading Model Change
As I mentioned last week with my TWM trade and in my $SPX chart on Sunday, I’ve grown more bearish lately and I made some more changes today. I started with a basic sell to lighten my overall exposure to the markets. I sold 200 shares of SSO for $41.88 and received $8,375.01 after commissions. I…