Will We Hold It Wednesday – Nasdaq 2,603 Edition
by Phil - December 28th, 2011 6:53 am
Watch the Nasdaq.
That’s the index we need to catch up to the Dow now that the S&P is halfway to goal at 1,297 (from our Must Hold line at 1,235). The Dow is in La La Land, led by MCD (up 31%), IBM (up 26%), PFE (up 24%), HD (up 20%) and KFT (up 20%) while this year’s Dogs of the Dow are BAC (down 59%), AA (down 43%), HPQ (down 39%) and JPM (down 22%).
While the losers may seem to outweigh the winners, that’s not how it works as the Dow is price-weighted so BAC dropping from $14 to $5.50 "only" costs the Dow about 68 points (roughly 8 points for each Dollar), IBMs rise from $145 to $185 added a whopping 320 points.
So a 26% rise in one component and a 59% drop in another nets out to a gain of 252 points! At the beginning of the year, they had roughly the same market cap ($150Bn) but IBM has gained $70Bn and BAC has lost $100Bn which, of course, translates into a net gain of 2% on the entire Dow – BECAUSE IT IS THE STUPIDEST INDEX ON EARTH!
Our Members, of course, know this. I wrote "DJIA: The Most Useless, Overused Tool on the Planet" back in 2006, when GM was still part of the Dow so no need to rehash it all here other than to mention the fact that a 30-component index has made 5 substitutions in the 5 years since I wrote that article only serve to highlight how ridiculous it is to use the Dow to draw long-term conclusions. The Dow is manipulated because it’s easy to and Uncle Rupert sits with the other Masters of the Universe to decide how to use this headline tool to make things look as good as possible in the US markets.
That’s why CSCO and TRV replaced C and GM in June of 2009. C was at $28.80 and is down a bit, GM went BK from $45 (which would have been a 360-point loss in the Dow) while CSCO was disappointing but essentially flat and TRV is up $20, adding another 160 points so a 520-point swing (5%) on those substitutions alone. In September of 2008, AIG ($135 at the time) was swapped for KFT ($32). KFT is just $37.70 but AIG was…
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DiggMonday Mourning – Good Night Dear Leader
by Phil - December 19th, 2011 7:36 am
Oh, hello Mr. Seoul,
I dropped by
to pick up a reasonStick around while the clown
who is sickdoes the trick of disaster
Asia was in turmoil last night as news of the death of Kim Jong Il hit the wires. South Korea’s Kospi Index fell 3.4%, both the Shanghai and Hang Seng fell more than 2% at their opens but, along with the Nikkei, they all finished strong and down about 1.25%. My comment on the matter to Members at 11:29 last night was:
Meanwhile, Dear Leader has died and that shot the Dollar back to 81 and knocked the futures down half a point. Asia is down more like 2% as no one is please with Jr. taking over in South Korea. I always find that amusing when leaders who are hated die and the markets react negatively – as if the next guy could be worse. Markets just hate uncertainty but China is in charge of N. Korea – I doubt Kim’s son is going to suddenly declare war or whatever it is people are worried about. He’s just 27 and probably not suicidal
If anything (but I’m going to bed), I’d take oil long off the $93 line (/CL), which is where we liked them Friday. Gold already zoomed back to $1,600 and has been rejected there and the Dollar doesn’t look that strong above 81 so far.
So far, my logic is holding up as things have already calmed down and oil topped out at $94.50 at 5:30, for a nice $1,500 per contract gain in less than 6 hours. I find it easier to trade futures off news like that than they are to play during the US Market hours as the moves internationally, still seem to make a little sense while the moves in the US market are often pure nonsense.
Speaking of nonsense, David Fry agrees with me on Treasury rates as we are now falling below what you can get in an FDIC-insured deposit, which I consider the non-panic limit for rates. Unfortunately, we do get plenty of panic at a drop of the hat these days and TLT shorts were our big loser last week but we stuck with them for January, hoping things calm down over the…
Easy Money Monday – Robbing Peter to Pay Portugal
by Phil - December 12th, 2011 8:27 am
That was easy!
Who’d have thought Europe’s problems could be over just like that? Certainly not us, as I was quite skeptical Friday Morning (see yesterday’s Stock World Weekly for the Executive Summary of the Week’s Events). As I noted in Friday morning’s post, we had ended the day on Thursday very bullish – too bullish I decided on Friday morning and I called for cashing out into the weekend at the end of the morning post. In the morning Alert to Members, I repeated:
When in doubt, sell half and, in this case, I want to get back to more cash by the day’s end in the White Christmas Portfolio as the WCP is too bullish and I’m just not in the mood to risk it so we’re not going to be too brave if the "rally" stops or even slows down.
The markets were very kind to us, heading higher all day long and giving us great exits. Heading into the close, we got a bit more bearish and, aside from existing hedges like our EDZ spread (mentioned as our key hedge in last week’s Stock World Weekly), we added DXD (ultra-short Dow) Jan $15 calls at $1.25 but we offset those with short FCX Feb $33 puts at $1.25 in our virtual White Christmas Portfolio, with 10 of those contracts on each side netting a free spread with unlimited upside (with the downside being owning FCX cheaply). As I pointed out to Members, DXD was $18.50 just 3 weeks ago.
At 3:26, just before the close, we added the SQQQ (ultra-short Nasdaq) Jan $16/19 bull call spread for $1.50, which I pointed out had a nice 100% potential upside all by itself but you could also, for example, offset it with things you REALLY want to own if they get cheap – like shorting a GOOG Jan $500 put ($1.20) or an AAPL Jan $320 put ($1.25) or a MSFT 2013 $20 put ($1.10) – the idea is to just thing of what stock you REALLY want to be jumping in and buying if the market throws a 20% off sale. If there’s nothing, then you should be thrilled with the 100% potential gain on the raw spread.
But THAT wasn’t the easy money (I’m not so egotistical that I would guarantee we open lower when it’s…
Thanksgiving Thoughts
by Phil - November 24th, 2011 5:27 pm
What an ugly finish November is having!
We’ve been trying to get bullish with little success and, if we are not reversing tomorrow, I will be regretting the wasted time poking at bullish plays when we could have been going "wheeeee" on the slide.
I thought that blue line on Dave Fry’s chart was going to hold, it’s about 2.5% down from our Must Hold level for the S&P on the Big Chart (1,235) and that would have been a reasonable (and slight) overshoot of the 10% drop we were expecting so we played for the bounce but now we’ve blown our -5% line at 1,173 and our next support level is -10% at 1,112 – a very sad level to revisit if we do.
Technically, of course, we’re breaking down. Fundamentally, I’m not so sure. The fear is palpable as Europe looks terrible and clearly all these austerity measures are taking a toll on the Global economy but it’s simply NOT showing up in the data yet. PMI’s are dropping across the Globe but the Purchasing Manager’s index is a SENTIMENT indicator that reflects the OPINION of the buyers about business prospects.
As I have been pointing out (yes, there was a point) in my recent series of articles about market and media manipulation – there is a protracted campaign underway to push sentiment down – to chase retail buyers out of the markets.
Who is doing this? Perhaps it is the IBanks, who want to bottom out the market ahead of QE3, when we’ll be off to the races again. Perhaps it is the Fed and Treasury, who want to chase people into the $140Bn worth of bonds they have to sell each month. Perhaps it is the Republicans, who want to campaign against the worst possible economy next year to prove that Obama has blown his handling of the economy almost as bad as Bush did – so we may as well try one of their idiots again since it seems to make no difference. Don’t laugh – I have a button for Romney that says that…
Whatever and whoever is behind the negativity (and let’s not forget Germany, who are angling to take control of the EU and will be able to do so if things deteriorate further) – our job as investors is not to particularly care – but…
Monday Morosity – “Hard Times Ahead” says Rajoy
by Phil - November 21st, 2011 6:41 am
Mariano Rajoy won the biggest majority in a Spanish election in almost 30 years, and told Spaniards to brace for hard times as the nation fights to avoid being overwhelmed by the debt crisis. Bonds continued to drop. Rajoy’s People’s Party swept the ruling Socialists from power after eight years, winning 186 of the 350 seats in Parliament, compared with 110 for the Socialists’ candidate Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba.
“Hard times lie ahead,” Rajoy, 56, told supporters outside the PP’s headquarters in Madrid, giving no new details of his plans. “We are going to govern in the most delicate situation Spain has faced in 30 years.”
Spanish borrowing costs continued rising toward euro-era records (6.6% this morning) even as the PP won a mandate to slash the budget deficit, overhaul the stagnant economy and reduce the 23 percent jobless rate. Rajoy, who hasn’t given details of his proposals, won’t take over for a month, prompting him to say on Nov 18th he hoped Spain wouldn’t need a bailout before he’s sworn in. Miguel Arias Canete, head of the PP’s electoral committee and a former minister, said today markets need to give the party time, as ministers won’t be appointed until Dec. 21 and Spanish law doesn’t allow Parliament to resume any sooner than Dec. 13.
So NO QUICK FIX IN SPAIN IS POSSIBLE – let’s face that fact now so we’re not endlessly surprised by it as the rumor-mongers can now have a field day attacking the lame-duck outgoing Government ahead of the transition. Meanwhile, our own do-nothing Congress looks to be heading towards certain disaster as we have what appears to be a TOTAL FAILURE of the US Deficit Reduction Committee to do anything to actually reduce our deficit.
Now I don’t want to point fingers (cough, Republicans, cough, cough) ahead of our National Holiday that celebrates unity and goodwill and crap like that. Let’s just say "they" couldn’t agree, so now it’s going to be Hard Times for America as we, in theory, will kick in $1.2Tn of automatic cuts including (gasp!) over 5% of our nation’s Trillion-Dollar annual Defense budget. Oh, not until 2013, of course because our Government doesn’t really have the balls to cut anything under any circumstances.
EXCEPT, of course, aid to the poor. THAT they can cut and cut and cut and cut. Payroll tax cuts –…
Testy Tuesday – 1,072 or Bounce!
by Phil - October 4th, 2011 8:06 am
Has it been a week already?
That’s right – last Tuesday our title, after 3 bullish days, was "S&P 1,200 or Bust (again)" and bust we did! At the time I said "It’s not that I’m flip-flopping – we’re simply playing the range and if the trip from the bottom to the top of the range is just 2 days – then flip-flop we must!" Our bearish hedge in that morning’s Alert to Members was 30 DXD Oct $18/20 bull call spread at .70 ($2,100) offset by the sale of 10 GE Jan $15 puts at $1.05 ($1,050). DXD is already at $21.34 and the bull call spread is $1.30 (30 = $3,900) while the 10 GE short puts are $1.75 ($1,750) for a net $2,150, up 105% in the first week – even if the short puts were not stopped out with a smaller loss.
We also ran our Long Put List that morning (see Weekend Reading for recap of that strategy and list of short trade ideas) and those, of course, are up huge across the board as things got so bad yesterday we even had to short IBM – our list’s last brave holdout. Another fun short we played that day was a ratio backspread on CMG.
Taking advantage of selling into the pre-earnings excitement, we were able to add the following trade to our virtual $25,000 Portfolio:
Earnings are on the 20th, the day before expirations so I like the volatility crush of selling 5 $340 calls for $9 ($4,500) and buying 3 Dec $350s for $15 ($4,500) for a free spread. No matter what CMG does, $4,500 of premium will be gone from the callers on Oct 21st, then the Nov whatevers can be sold, hopefully for another $4,500 in premium or perhaps we can just pull the trade so let’s do one set in the $25KP and see how it goes.
CMG took a nice dip since then (now $292) and the 5 Oct $340 calls fell to $2.20 ($1,100) but the 3 Dec $350s have held $8.60 ($2,580) for a net profit of $1,480 off a trade that cost no cash just 7 days ago. These are the kinds of trades we love around earnings season. We didn’t need to hold it for a month and now we can free up the margin (about…
TGIF – Closing a 12% Down Quarter
by Phil - September 30th, 2011 8:15 am
1,320 – That was the S&P close on June 30th.
1,160 – That was the S&P close after yesterday’s wild action. A neat 160-point drop (12%) in 3 months for the World’s largest market kind of sucks, don’t you think? My commentary in June 30th’s "It’s the End of the Quarter as We Know It" post was:
We feel fine because we cashed out on the long side (shorter-term, unhedged positions) and we really don’t care what the market does today or tomorrow but we are betting this rally reverses and we will be taking some (more) short hedges today – hopefully selling into the last legs of this fairly fake-looking rally.
My top downside picks to play the sell-off were EDZ ($17.90 at the time, now $28, which is up 36% even without using options to make a spread) and TZA ($35.50 at the time, now $51.10 – up 44%). As I said in that morning post: "I didn’t think they could take the Dollar below 75 but they hit 74.54 last night and it remains to be seen if they can hold it down in real trading, especially with the Pound weakness (see this morning’s Alert) and the Yen’s unwanted strength. Something’s gotta give and we’re betting it’s this fake, Fake, FAKE rally…."
We were shorting oil futures (/CL) at $95 (now $80, up $15,000 per contract) as we thought the holiday weekend was the end of the run but we did keep heading up to $100 (down $5,000 per contract) before finally getting a drop to $75 (up $25,000 per contract) in early August.
One funny play from that June 30th Member Chat was the VIX Aug $15/17 bull call spread at $1.20, selling the $16 puts for .50 for net .70 on the $2 spread. That just seems so cute (and obvious) with the VIX at 38.84 now (it was 30 at the end of Aug for a full 185% gain on that hedge).
Other hedges we liked in that post were the TZA Oct $31/42 bull call spread at $3, selling RUT Aug $710 puts for $2.90. The RUT puts expired worthless so net .10 on the spread that is currently $20 in the money for pretty much the full 10,900% gain.…
Thrill-Ride Thursday – Finding Bottom
by Phil - September 29th, 2011 8:30 am
MacDuff once said:
I grant him bloody,
Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,
Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin
That has a name; but there’s no bottom, none.
That’s the way the markets feel this week as we, like Henry V – head once more into the breach (or close the wall up with our EU dead!). I had said on Tuesday, that it was 1,200 or bust on the S&P (as usual) and we failed to hold 1,200 and we busted and then we failed to hold the bottom of the rising channel David Fry had drawn at the top of that post (117.5 on this chart) and so we tumble back down towards our much more reliable -5% line at 1,140, which I drew in red.
While tricky, it is not impossible to trade this kind of action. We are very fortunate to have been trading this exact range on our virtual $25,000 Portfolio and we just had our best 2 weeks of the year, despite the insanity, with a net $16,475 gain since 9/15. That’s 66% of $25,000 right there and we’re now at $97,400 and on track to hit our $100K goal for the year on Friday as long as the Russell doesn’t fail 645. If not, as with many trades this year – we’ll work it out!
That’s the whole point of this portfolio exercise – to illustrate the idea of balance, even in aggressive short-term trading. We are never all bullish or all bearish and sometimes we’re wrong but, generally, we simply do more shorting at the top of our range and more buying at the bottom of our range and then we simply sit back and wait for the winners to come in. Of course for almost every winner there’s a loser but then, a week later, the losers are winners too!
OK, so PATIENCE and BALANCE – that’s those are our two points! And taking profits off the table. Right, then our THREE points are patience and balance and taking profits off the table while not being greedy. So that’s FOUR points. Amongst our points are Patience and Balance, Taking Profits off the Table and Not Being Greedy.
As I often say to Members, if you wake up in the morning and you’re not sure if you want the markets to…
Just Another Manic Monday – Value Investing
by Phil - September 26th, 2011 8:27 am
Up, up and away!
As I mentioned in Friday’s morning’s post, we did a lot of bottom-fishing on Thursday as we began to develop Disaster fatigue with long plays on XLF at $11.50, shorting TLT at $123, shorting VXX at $49.50, TNA at $34.50, BRK.B at $65, AA at $10.20, VLO at $19, IMAX at $15.75, BA at $58.32, AGQ at $170, CHK at $27.50, DIS at $30.14 and ABX at $47.50. They were hedged, of course and, for the most part, you still had a nice chance to make those entries on Friday – but not so much this morning as the futures are up about 1.5% already (7:30).
Friday morning, in my Alert to Members, I reminded them that BCS looked like an excellent VALUE to me, no matter what the PRICE was ($8.75 after hitting $8.40 the day before) and this morning, that PRICE is up well over 10% in EU trading. Did the VALUE of BCS change materially over the weekend? Of course not, certainly not by the $4Bn their market cap gained – like the song, the VALUE remains the same – only the highly variable price of a share of BCS is undergoing ch-ch-changes…
I pointed out similar hedged, long-term plays could be made on GS ($94), MS ($13), BAC ($6) and C ($24). Of course we hedged them per our discussion in the morning post (TZA was our morning choice but we’re out over 650 on the RUT) but then we went long on EWG (Germany) again with the very aggressive Oct $16,18 bull call spread at $1.30, offset by the sale of the $17 puts for .90 for net .40 on the $2 spread. 10 of those in our virtual $25,000 Portfolio cost $400 and can return $2,000 in less than 30 days if EWG is over $18 and, guess what – they’re over $18 this morning!
Another bullish bet we placed was USO Nov $28/30 bull call spread at $1.30, selling the $27 puts for $1.10 for net .20 on the $2 spread with a 900% upside if USO simply doesn’t drop from where it is now. That’s what’s nice about options – you don’t need the market to go up to make money good money. On this trade idea, your worst-case scenario is owning USO at net $27.20, about 10% lower than it…
TGIF – Stop the Week, We Want to get Off!
by Phil - September 23rd, 2011 8:35 am
What a disaster!
Of course, that’s why we have Disaster Hedges, right? August 11th was the last time we did a "Hedging for Disaster" post which included a LONG trade idea on gold that’s done now (we’re short) after gaining over 300%. We’re a little mixed in our results on the other hedges but that means we can SWITCH HORSES – from the trades that have already worked to the ones that haven’t yet. That’s how we cash out our winners on a regular basis – it’s the pony express of investing. Our other Disaster Hedges from that post were:
- DXD Oct $23 calls at $2, selling Oct $27 calls for $1.15 and the Oct $19 puts for .70 for net .10. That spread is currently -.05 so down 150% so far and a nice horse to switch to, offering a .05 credit on the $4 spread.
- FAZ Oct $65 calls at $22, selling Oct $72 calls for $20 and selling JPM 2013 $20 puts for $2.05 was a net .05 credit as a backstop to our long financial plays. FAZ is now at $71.34 and the October FAZ spread is now $3.70 but the JPM puts are now $3 so net .70 is only up 1,500% so far. Should the financials stay low, we get the full $7 from the spread and we’re obligated to buy JPM for $20 (now $29.27) in 2013.
- SDS Sept $26 calls at $3.20, selling Sept $32 calls for $1.65 and selling VLO Jan $15 puts for $1.20 for net .35. SDS is only at $25.73 so far (not a disaster yet) and the spread is now net $1.25 and the short VLO puts are .17 so net $1.08 on this one is up 208% and we’re not even at goal – that’s pretty good! Note the spread is LOWER than when we started so this can also be used as a fresh horse with a different offset, like X Jan $15 puts for $1.20 for a net .05 trade.
- TBT was stopped out with a small loss at $24 (fortunately). My comment at the time, with TBT at $24.88 was: "Keep in mind though, that the Fed has said rates will stay low through 2013 so it would be wise to uses stops on the puts, at least, if TBT fails to hold $24!"
- EDZ
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
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