PUTS and CALLS

[SpartacusSchmartacus]

Wanted to throw in that the September stock market is statistically the worst month followed by October. This year is different tho (they always say that). I'm long the market and armed with long duration contracts, expecting a bumpy ride to get there but don't want to be left behind. Not sure when holiday sales numbers will start being talked about? But when they do talk about up-beat consumer sentiment polls, excitement will begin to brew.

[NW-Bound]

Got $10K worth of premium on covered call options out, with most expiring next week. There are a few that are in-the-money, and the rest expire worthless.

Being more active with covered call writing this year, I have collected YTD total premium equivalent to 2.5% of the total stash size. It is higher than my living expenses YTD.

It sounds nice, but it is really the total return that matters, and mine is not that great. In other words, without the covered call premiums my total return would be lousy.

[cyber888]

Have NVDA .. bought $217 .. now at $276 ... I sold covered calls at $290. I also sell Puts below strike price. CAT .. sold covered calls at $155.

[Fedup]

My options are up, not at giddy level yet. I hope traders don’t shake out this trade from me.

[SpartacusSchmartacus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpartacusSchmartacus Wanted to throw in that the September stock market is statistically the worst month followed by October. This year is different tho (they always say that). I'm long the market and armed with long duration contracts, expecting a bumpy ride to get there but don't want to be left behind. Not sure when holiday sales numbers will start being talked about? But when they do talk about up-beat consumer sentiment polls, excitement will begin to brew.

move along folks - There is absolutely nuthin bearish to see here.
In spite of traditionally weak September/October and a trade war, we have nothing but horns on this chart to date. There will be down days but we don't know how long or how deep. Hang in there with conviction - don't be a day trader.

[Fedup]

Still hold firm on the call option from one of the Dow stocks. This morning, I initiated another option on one stock, the purpose of this trade is to let the premium expires worthless. In general, I don’t have too many trades going on at the same time, I can’t keep track of too many things easily. So far so good.

[NW-Bound]

As reported in another thread, I had 35 contracts expiring last Friday 9/21. A majority was out-of-the-money covered calls, with only a few out-of-the-money put options. Had only 2 calls getting assigned, and the stock already dropped today. Nice! Heh heh heh...

The market is down today. Will wait a bit before writing the next batch of options for October. The total premium I get this year will be a 6-figure number. That's enough for me to live on.

[Fedup]

I initiated a trade on a car company. Let’s see how things will turn out.

Edit to add, I have closed this trade with a $2 profit per share. I’ve heard on CNBC that there are deals that were turn down. So I rather take my profit. Short and sweet.

[Fedup]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fedup Still hold firm on the call option from one of the Dow stocks. This morning, I initiated another option on one stock, the purpose of this trade is to let the premium expires worthless. In general, I don’t have too many trades going on at the same time, I can’t keep track of too many things easily. So far so good.

I closed on this option, I made .03cent per share. I closed it because I realized it was a wrong strategy, when you are wrong, cut your loss and move on.

[Fedup]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fedup I closed on this option, I made .03cent per share. I closed it because I realized it was a wrong strategy, when you are wrong, cut your loss and move on.

When I closed this option, I initiated another trade, that trade did amazingly well until today. So I closed that trade for a profit. Why did I sell? I have too much of it already. The short term trade allows me to profit while holding the long term trade.

So now I’m back to just holding one trade for long term.

[Fedup]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fedup Edit to add, this morning, I initiated a trade on a stock in the Dow, this will be a long term hold, my options go out to 2020. Deep in the money. Will see how this pan out, so far I’m ahead of this morning.

I’m embarrassed to post that I’m no longer a long term holder on this trade. Market has shaken this trade from me. I closed this trade with only $5 gain per share. It went up to almost $30 per share until the last few days, for a while I looked like a genius.

But I decided to close this trade because I still had a gain, and even though the stock went up today, the option went down in value slightly. I’m afraid my gain would evaporate to nothing.

I will not going back to this trade, at least not in my trading account.

[thepalmersinking]

I sell covered calls in my Roth, traditional and 401k accounts on core holdings only. I do it every January. I go out 1 year and pick the most out of the money call. It’s good for +/-$15k which I immediately reinvest. In last 10 years I may have had to roll a call up once or twice.

[Fedup]

Put on another trade base on news regarding Facebook. We’ll see how this pans out.
Ultimately, I would like this trade to expire worthless, I get to keep the premium.

[NW-Bound]

Just spent $27K on forcefed stock purchases from puts getting assigned.

Still have another $37K tied up on cash-covered puts that are in-the-money now, and these expire soon.

Darn, my stock AA is getting higher, against my wish to reduce it. Else, I would be selling puts at this time.

[gcgang]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound The total premium I get this year will be a 6-figure number. That's enough for me to live on.

Great job! I think I've got net losses, or just minimal gains, on my option writing, as I've had to roll up and out most of the time to avoid getting called away.

[NW-Bound]

Thank you, but no I do not feel that good about this. The reason is despite the large premium I got, my shares dropped so much in price that the 6-figure premium is just a consolation.

I did get assigned quite a few times, and if I just sat on the cash, I would do well. However, being a stock lover, I wrote cash-covered puts to buy them back. Both the premium of the call and the put are not enough to make me whole.

The stocks I like to play options on are semiconductor, EM, and biotech stocks/ETFs. These are very volatile, hence the premium is much higher than something benign like Walmart or Procter-Gamble. So, I got addicted to these stocks.

[Sunset]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Thank you, but no I do not feel that good about this. The reason is despite the large premium I got, my shares dropped so much in price that the 6-figure premium is just a consolation. I did get assigned quite a few times, and if I just sat on the cash, I would do well. However, being a stock lover, I wrote cash-covered puts to buy them back. Both the premium of the call and the put are not enough to make me whole. The stocks I like to play options on are semiconductor, EM, and biotech stocks/ETFs. These are very volatile, hence the premium is much higher than something benign like Walmart or Procter-Gamble. So, I got addicted to these stocks.

I'm a bit dumb, but what's EM ?

[NW-Bound]

It's emerging market.

If you look, you will see that the 3 sectors I named were pummeled in the last month, and lost more than the S&P. Cost me some big money. Or rather, I have been giving back some of the gains I made last year.

[NW-Bound]

Woke up late this morning, when the market had been trading for 1 hour already. Looked on the Web, and saw this headline about 3M and Caterpillar earning reports being under par. Uh Oh! I have both.

I had sold a 3M call with strike price of 210 expiry 11/16 on 10/17, premium of $3.05, when the stock is at 203. It is at 187 now. Yikes!

Bought back that option for $0.33, then sell a new one at strike price of 192.5, same expiry, premium of $3.5.

Trying to make a few bucks here and there to reduce the damage. Still just peanuts, considering that 3M's went as high as $260 back in February this year.

PS. I have owned 3M for a long time, and still have a very decent gain on it.