After what started off shaky for some of these positions ended up being a boring finish for March options expiration and that’s what I like. It’s nice having all of my positions finish out of the money with no option assignments. It gives me the freedom to reassess what I should be holding and either get back in to some solid positions or wait for them to come back down from their little rallies.
This is what I had going into today:
Here is how each underlying stock finished by the end of the day:
- AFL – finished the day at $54.10, $4.10 above my strike after spending some time in the money just a few weeks ago.
- EEM – finished the day at $41.19, $0.19 above my strike and was my closest option to being in the money.
- KFT – finished the day at $29.63, $1.63 above my strike and I could’ve aimed at a higher strike without much concern since KFT just stayed solid the whole time I held it.
- SSO – finished the day at $41.45, $4.45 and $9.45 above my two strikes – I doubled up on SSO during a dip and it paid off. I had plenty of room to take a bigger risk, but enjoyed having no worry over this one through expiration.
- VIA – finished the day at $33.69, $3.69 above my strike. VIA stayed solid after an initial dip to also finish well above my strike.
For the most part, these underlying stocks (and I guess the entire market) have had a crazy run so far for March. I am going to have to give some serious thought to what I should do next. I’m pretty sure I’ll open another position on SSO close to at the money, but probably do it like I did for this expiry by starting with a small position and then adding to it if we get another dip. I want to be sure I have exposure to the upside, but at the same time want to be sure I have some cash ready if we fall another 5-7% again. I still think we’re somewhat safe from a 20+% correction and could also use a small dip to keep this bull market in check.
As a side note, AXA finished today at $21.35. I left a lot of money on the table by closing this early when it dipped. AXA was trading at $19.35 at the time I closed the position last month. That’s $800 I could have saved by waiting until today to close my naked puts. The rest of my positions made up for it to give me a profitable expiration, but I recognize I could’ve done better. At the same time, I did replace my AXA position with other options that are doing well, so it’s not exactly an $800 mistake when you consider the replacement positions. Still, I made a mistake by buying it back earlier than I should have.
I’m still easing my way into heavier exposure and today just opened the doors to get back into an options selling spree for any stocks I think could be worth a try. I took in some good premiums this week and just need to get back in the habit of doing that every week so that when I take a loss I still have the profit growth to reach my end of the year goal.