GOOG – yes, buy back calls we sold if we get a good dip ($525ish).
PCLN – don’t buy into any rally unless Europe turns, bulls are beyond delusional at this point.
WYNN is on plan – we want it to hold $140 for the week.
Markets again holding up very well at 13,400 but again we need the Nas to take 2,600 and the S&P to take 1,485 to confirm whatever it is that it’s confirming.
Sold BIDU $240 puts for $9.30 to protect Oct puts ($4 in premium).
Oops that was BIDU $250 puts!
BIDU rolled Oct $220 puts to $230 puts for $3.30
What a struggle, not looking good but I’m not dumping my upside protects just yet either. Fed tomorrow can send us anywhere from 13,600 to 13,000 easily.
RMBS – I already sold at .85, 75/100 of them.
WYNN – I sold the $140 puts on Fri for $2.95, still about the same price but no need to sell them if the markets are heading down but definately a sell if they don’t hold $141 for the day.
AMGN – no reason to pay them .60, we’re only going to roll him to October anyway if he doesn’t expire worthless.
GOOG calls – I sold the $520s (mostly) and right now I appreciate the protection but I will keep a $1.50 stop (off lows) on them here.
COP – I have the Oct $80 puts at $1.24, wish I had rolled them up. I’m not messing with September anythings right now. I still like XOM’s ability to make a catastrophic move and I really think $500Bn is a very tough line for them to cross.
Rolling – while I roll my own calls generally 10 days before expiration, I generally hold my CALLERS/PUTTERS to the bitter end. Even if they have a .15 of premium, unless I think they are going to expire in the money AND that things will go their way between now and expiration, I am loathe to give up the insurance until usually Thursday. Fed makes me want insurance more, worst comes to worst, I have a bad month and I roll them, if I roll them ahead of the Fed, I give up insuance and one of my precious months.
FXI – those are puts? I have the Jan $147 puts even at $11.40 and I’m content. If the market turns up I’ll sell some $153 puts, now $3.20 of pure premium against them but I doubt it.
IRBT: “Late Friday, the Pentagon awarded privately held competitor Robotic FX Inc. a $279.9 million order for 101 robots to be used by U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan to detect explosive devices and roadside bombs. The Burlington, Mass.-based iRobot has developed robots for the military in the past.
JPMorgan analyst Paul Coster said “we view this as a significant setback for iRobot.”
“We expected iRobot to win this business, even if it required a margin concession,” Coster said. “The loss of the contract to a start-up suggests neither IP nor economies of scale are barriers to entry, and iRobot’s sales and marketing execution may be flawed.” He cut his profit estimates for 2008 and 2009, but kept an “Overweight,” or “Buy” rating on the shares.”
Massive overrreaction, buying Dec $20s for $1.60 XXX
SBUX – textbook example of why its crazy to buy out your callers and give up insurance. ANYTHING can happen during expiration week but one thing you know for sure is that your caller will have .05 or less premium on Friday. On the $27.50s your roll spread is .55 so until that seems to be in danger there is no worry. I prefer to have flexibility for as long as possible and, in the case of SBUX, I may decide to risk being naked at $27 and hope we hold it and come back a bit before I sell Octobers.
GRMN is a very scary stock to short. LIKE RIMM and LVS, lots of good reasons to but you can’t explain that to the buyers…
Oil is holding upthe markets and not doing a very good job of it at that. $80.16. Nat Gas with a big comeback over $6 and that’s bad for SU.
DAWJD Oct 134 CALL [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 150
DAWJC Oct 133 CALL [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 150
DAWVD Oct 134 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 400
DAWVA Oct 131 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 100
DAWVE Oct 135 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 100
DAWUE Sep 135 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] -100
DAWVC Oct 133 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] 150
DAWUE Sep 135 PUT [DIA @ $134.46 $0.16] -150
UQQLX Dec 50 CALL [QQQQ @ $49.22 $0.04] 200
QQQIX Sep 50 CALL [QQQQ @ $49.22 $0.04] -200
VIX going way overboard defending the Dow, up 2 for the day, close to 10% on a 60-point drop.
AAPL – of course $145 is safer but is that .62 really going to make you sleep better at night? Rally/bounce is based on report that net worth of US hoseholds rose 2.1%. I know my household did their share but I’m a little concerned that many of those households belong to oil lobbyists and not the other 299,500,000 people in the country.
I never understand all this knee-jerk buying and selling. I thought the market would go down and it’s down, wake me if it goes up for more than 10 minutes but the real move isn’t for 25 hours and 13 minutes when they release the Fed minutes. You should be using this opportunity to tighten up your positions and get our of what Septembers you can as a move in the wrong way will crush you with no time to recover. Oil is at $80.33 and the energy sector is barely moving – that should tell you something.
Why is FSLR getting killed at $80 oil?
Fed (I have to get a cut an paste for this!): no cut: Cramer and pals decimate the market. .25 cut, Cramer and pals have a 100 point tantrum, others relieved (best case). .50 cut – Foreigner dump dollar, shorts get shorter and Cramer and co start to worry maybe something is actually wrong with the economy.
I’d go with .25 and a strong statement about inflation concerns but will keep an eye on housing and job situation as the data rolls in ahead of October meeting. That’s me being political… If it were really up to me I’d raise rates and say it is not the responsibility of the Federal Reserve to use US assets to fund a commodity bubble or bail out those speculators who casued that bubble but it is our job to fight inflation and insure the good stature of the US dollar, which is strong and will become stronger as we take a firm hand with speculators while making sure we work with regulators to ease the burdens that have been placed on consumers that have been innocently caught up in this liquidity crisis as that too is the responsibility of the Federal Reserve.
I’ll give you the final text after I chat with Ben tonight…
People have stopped (paused) selling. Not really buying but the selling really calmed down. I think there are a ton of shorts who are simply terrified of getting burned tomorrow but anything less than a 1/2 point cut or a 1/4 point cut with a “more to come” statement is going to really encourage them.
BEAS popping again.
ISRG on a nice roll off a bottom, I’d like to see them test it again but I’m wathcing them. These guys are good for $300 down the road but I’d really like to see them at least make a good run at $175 after the massive earnings gap they had.
UAUA – at least we have one realistic airline… CAL falling in line too.
Too much hope pinned on a rate cut: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118998118233229036.html?mod=yahoo_hs&r u=yahoo
Oh yeah, I did forget to mention that. I have October puts because even IF Bernanke puts on his Santa suit and drops .50 on the market, within 2 weeks people will realize it did nothing to change things. Meanwhile the dollar will clearly take a dive, driving up our deficit, the price of oil and the price of gold while import prices skyrocket. That will be a good time to be short too!
Tomorrow we have:
PPI at 8:30, that’s been running hot.
LEH and BBY earnings
Da Fed
Congressional hearings on Food Safety (trade wars) and Corporate Fraud (here? no way!)
GM’s Wagoner is speaking at a conference tomorrow and I so doubt he will say anything to justify a 20% run in the stock since last Monday so I like the GM Oct $32.50 puts at $1.50, selling 1/2 the Sept $35 puts for $1.40 XXX
GOOG – nice trade, let them expire unless things go way south, then maybe roll down to the $520s but not even worth it unless we’re heading below $524 with momentum.
Watch MCD at $54.50 – we really don’t want to lose that one!
PCLN- I doubt they’ll hold up with the airlines tanking. Keep an eye on WYNN and LVS. if they go down then the travel sector is going down and PCLN won’t be immune.
LFG making new lows. FAF joining them, FNF soon to follow with $17.50 puts at .40 as a risky mo play on the Fed disappointing the mortgage industry.
GM – oops October! Damn, I’m doing that a lot lately… Not used to October yet.
If they are this nervous 24 hours ahead of the Fed, what is tomorrow going to be like?
GS Oct $195 calls back at $6.30 still good upside protection as they will hold a lot of value regardless due to GS earnings on the 20th. If the Fed does cut .50 then GS is “in the bag” almost no matter what this Q says.
BIDU – good one J! I assume you meant $220s??? I’d take $10 off the table by rolling to the Dec $260s at $25 and sellling the $250s for $5.25 since that’s pure premium and you can always roll him down to the $240s once you pick up $3 on the first guy (assuming it ever does go down).
Opt is right, it’s killing me to be neutral as I’m pretty bearish but ANYTHING can happen tomorrow and cash will be king.
My advice to Juliet was too good, selling the BIDU $250s naked for $5.40 XXX if you have the margins.
DIA is ahead of the Dow, that’s unusual…
Woo Hoo – rallying oil into the close!
UNH and HUM making a move on Hillary’s health plan. They should because it’s Federal assistance to put 42M more people on private health care.
TASR got their first French order, Oct $15s at .95 XXX
TASR – couldn’t fill, bidding $1.15 on Dec $17.50s will sell calls into initial excitement if Cramer picks up on it, which he should because he read my article on TASE and the French elections a few months ago and turned it into a pick on his show so it’s a chance to show how smart he is…
FSLR – I’m putting my foot down at $80 oil and rolling my Oct $110s to $105s for + $1.50 XXX
AMZN – nice but it sounds like you already held it too long. I’m not very pro AMZN at a p/e of 119 so I can only say sell at this level, I was hoping they’d test $90 so I could short them myself. …
BIDU – Yes that is proper but personally, as long as I can afford it, I prefer to roll to 2x a higher call, this close to expiration I usually leave myself enough margin slack to do that once or I could cover with the Oct $260s at $13.80 as it then becomes a premium play. So far I’ve got my first 5 at $5.40 and I’ll take another 5 at $7.50 and if we get to $10 I’ll sell 10 more, that will average me above $7.50 and I will certainly be able to sell 2x $260s for more than $3.75 if this thing hits $257.
