October 8th, 2007 at 8:39 am | Permalink edit
RIMM $110 puts for $1.72 as mo play, stop at $1.50, look for $3, .25 trail. XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 9:51 am | Permalink edit
Oil coming down nicely so far, below $80 but we’ll see if it sticks. Not sure if inventory will be Weds as they often move it on holidays but they know a build-up is coming after we closed with 48M open barrels last month.
TSO making a nice turnaround – that one was hurting the $10KP!
October 8th, 2007 at 9:58 am | Permalink edit
IBM popping, watch your callers!
Markets doing well SO FAR on big commodity sell-off. MON making ATH let’s take a look at BG to follow with the $105s at $1.90 but only hold it if the Dow breaks positive and they hold $103. XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 10:09 am | Permalink edit
R killed the transports with very negative outlook, down 7.6%. Very glad we killed YRCW on Friday. FDX will be a buy if we can get them down to the $100-$102 level.
Old favorites gathering steam: BIDU, DRYS, FWLT, ICE.. Lots of buyers coming in, the insanity never ends. Looks like nat gas stocks are doing very well, that includes BTU and COP.
October 8th, 2007 at 10:38 am | Permalink edit
BXP – That was a speculative put and the stars do not seem to be lining up today but I’m accumulating at lower prices (as I said Friday). Spreads are ridiculous on this anyway, no one is selling to me at $1.10 right now.
AAPL – I rolled my callers out to Nov $150s because I didn’t want to give up the protection but now they have only $4 in premium. I’ll be rolling those up to the $160s, costing me $6 to gain $10 in position and $4 in premium but not until closer to earnings. Keep an eye on potential November rolls, it’s not worth giving up your protection to try to make a couple of bucks in October.
All steel taking a hit, not generally the sign of a healthy economy that the rest of the market (other than transports) is indicating. It seems from the pattern of investing the last few days like the projections are that we are all going to go home, lock the doors and play with computers and video games all day as that’s the kind of rotation I’m seeing.
It also seems like we’ll be getting some fast food – check out YUM!
GS/ALL OCTOBER CONTRACTS – Get out! They expire in 10 days, that means you lose 1/10 of your premium today 1/9th of the remaining tomorrow, 1/8th the next day…. If you don’t like a contract enough to roll it to November – sell it! You do not have time to recover from a dip. Selling Octobers for premiums is a great idea right now but doing so in order to hold onto your own October position is counter-productive.
There should be tight stops on all October and most Nov positions at this point. We had a great run and we’re near a possible double top, if we break out, there will be hundreds of doubles to choose from, if you overextend here and drop 25%, it will take you a 33% gain just to get back to where you were while the next leg of the rally passes you by.
There are 9 decliners for 5 advancers on the NYSE (5,000 stocks) and there are 180 new highs vs. 7 new lows being made which leads me to think that this rally is BS, designed to get you complacent. Don’t forget Fed minutes are this week and another cut is baked into all these numbers.
Speaking of stops – Nov RIMM Nov $115s gone from $25K. Taking profits on SYX too here and remaining JPM calls. XXX Keeping an eye on CSCO (in $10KP too). I forgot to note that the DD on RIMM $110 puts was in the $25KP as well.
October 8th, 2007 at 10:44 am | Permalink edit
BMY, GE – this is why we sell calls, it’s always something! Not a real issue but I’ll sell the BMY $30s at this point. XXX GE sells the machines, not the drugs and it’s only $65M in revs for BMY total. There’s nothing wrong with a black box on a drug like this as you don’t buy it monthly, it’s something they give you with the Ultrasound and this one says that they have to be careful with certain types of heart patients. Any sell off on this story is just silly.
RSTO – another one from the Buffett school of investing – idiots can run this company and make money…
October 8th, 2007 at 10:48 am | Permalink edit
BIIB – I don’t think I own them but I do like them if BTK keeps going. They could break to $70 in short order but the Nov $70s are $2.08, kind of crazy. I’d buy the Aprils for $5.30 and sell the Novembers for a $3.20 spread XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 10:55 am | Permalink edit
X with a nice bounce!
XOM coming off the mats at $90, XLE popped off $74.50 – these guys could rally the markets if they pull it together despite sub-$80 oil.
We have our Nasdaq leadership, hopefully the SOX keep going.
October 8th, 2007 at 11:29 am | Permalink edit
Personally, I’m just scanning around but seeing no much worth looking at. Volume is low and, as I said before, it looks a lot like high flyers are being pushed by early spikes that have little follow-through.
BSC taking a nice hit and the sector’s going with them.
GOOG spread of Jan/Oct $600s for net $25 XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 11:35 am | Permalink edit
SHLD Dec $155s/Oct $150s net $4.20 XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 11:38 am | Permalink edit
Oil down $2 bucks now! OII refuses to go down, I love their spunk and I’m going to show it with another round of $75 puts at $1.05 XXX
October 8th, 2007 at 11:53 am | Permalink edit
Boy we really don’t want to fail 14,000 on low volume (or high volume for that matter).
INTC holding up nicely but SOX can’t take 500 and they need to be at 505 or the whole Nasdaq is in jeopardy.
October 8th, 2007 at 12:02 pm | Permalink edit
MA turning way down.
BXP and VNO having a nice rally – should be very Fed minute dependent to hold these levels.
DCX Weds 11am strike deadline. Like GM, they are probably a buy on a downturn.
October 8th, 2007 at 12:41 pm | Permalink edit
GOOG was to buy the Jan 600s, now $38.30 and sell the Oct $600s, now $15.80 so the spread, now $22.50 is the net, I like this play as the current $600s are all premium and we can still sell Nov and Dec calls.
NYSE down 79, dow being held up with mirrors.
Will the S&P hold 1,550?
FWLT – way too dangerous to sell puts (or calls) against.
NEM – absolutely. $45s now .80 and well worth the chance with 2 weeks left but it is a gamble!
October 8th, 2007 at 2:02 pm | Permalink edit
I don’t have a CY position in the $25KP but, if I did, I would certainly want to collect that premium!
RIMM $110 puts will probably work again for another mo trade.
IBM – Happy and I think it will break way over $120, when is the question but I’ve sold $120s against mine.
October 8th, 2007 at 2:38 pm | Permalink edit
Oil looks very dead to me here for the day,would be amazing if they can get it back over $79 but you never know.
Selling a few GOOG $600s naked in stock virtual portfolio as I’m willing to buy them if earnings are so spectacular that they blow through. Each contract obligates me for $60K in stock though… 8-( Kind of like buying Berkshire. If GOOGLE hits for $620+ I would simply spend about $10 per Nov put to lock my price at the top against the call premium I’m certain to collect. That way I can either hold and hold the puts or sell and hold the puts or just put the stock to my putter at the agreed price depending on what happens when I take the assignment.
CSCO – No reason to go if we stay green today on the Nas but otherwise I’d take $1.50. They are November reporters so that call should stay strong for a while.
IBM – rolling to $115s was safe but don’t let them get away from you when you can transfer all of that premium to the $120s.
Oil NOT coming back – $78.97,down $2.25 for the day.
October 8th, 2007 at 3:35 pm | Permalink edit
HMY – what am I doing. Nothing. Gold went down $8 and you would think it’s some kind of industry disaster. I’d DD here but I’d rather wait for .15 if I get so lucky.
The NYSE is still down 69 points, notice the downside lead on the Dow:
http://finance.yahoo.com/charts#chart28:symbol=^dji;range=3m;compare=^nya;charttype=candlestick;crosshair=on;logscale=on;source=undefined
C – always good to buy on dips.
Is CME just going to lie there and watch Google go?
October 8th, 2007 at 4:08 pm | Permalink edit
DIA puts – I have them as a cover but I’m not playing them to win – too dangerous in this market.
GM – at this point I’m rooting for them to hit $40 so I can do a ‘mon back on puts but otherwise, they are too much a part of this insane market.
This was actually a pretty good market day. We didn’t have energy, we didn’t have bankers, brokers or builders but we held up well – nothing to complain about!
GOOG – I cannot stress enough that the proper way to enter a spread is to take the long and set up a sell-stop on the position you want to sell short. That Google play got $2 better while we were talking about it. All you have to do is buy the long (which is protected by time) and look at where you are now (it was $25) and then say “well I guess I’ll risk 5% to get a beter entry.” So you set a $1 trailing stop on the current $600 calls and then don’t worry about it. Of course, once the call goes from $15 to $18, you should take into account that you can’t lose and pop the stop up maybe .50 more for each $2 you gain.
That being said, I took $18.50 as I thought THAT was crazy, they are at $22 already!
Way too euphoric but that’s why we have to switch off our brains for these rallies.
