OptionPundit

Tag: Stock Options Newsletter

  • OPNewsletter Jul 2010 Up +8.3%

    We are on track for our 28th positive month of OPNewsletter phase-2, as of last Friday close OPNewsletter Jul 2010 portfolio is up +8.3% on the maximum investment of almost 60% of portfolio capital. We have started opening Aug 2010 portfolios and our first portfolio is already positive.

    Let’s talk consistency first, especially on trades like Iron condor which is probably the most widely used option trading strategy. OPNewsletter has lost only 1 month of RUT iron condor since May 2008, and the drawdown was only 7.15% while gains have been around 12% on average per month. RUT Iron Condor for July 2010 resulted into +23% gains. If someone has invested US$10K, only in OPN RUT Iron Condor, this 10K would have grown over 5 times to $56K since May 2008. This period includes probably one of the most volatile stock market moves of our lifetime. Of course, I don’t recommend traders to invest all the money in iron condors only and which is why we have portfolio approach at OPNewsletter, to diversify risk/rewards.

    If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    During the month of July, we also opend, for first time, an Income portfolio on Google. Just for perspective, since our opening of this portfolio on June 14th, google moved from $480 to $506 and then from $506 to $434 almost without a pause. This portfolio has provided a great deal of learnings e.g. during this period, one of our backspread we opened for only $0.65 debit moved past to show $10 gains!!! Though it was tough and very volatile move, we still managed to gain 4% gains as of Friday close (still open) and we are in for the earning week and out theta gains are a few % points per day.

    Even though VIX and other implied volatility fell through the cliff in general, our Double calendar resulted into above +20% gains and Double Diagonal in positive (still open).

    These results do not include gains/losses on the speculative trades. It also feels good when I find adding value to subscribers as OPNewsletter members were already warned of the coming meltdown since mid April via constance market updates/projections. Though no one can be perfect or correct all the time, so far OPN has been able to serve well.

    If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    Profitable Trading, OP

  • OPNewsletter May +18%, June +5.3% (Open)

    Another turbulent and volatile period! Last week started with a huge gap up rally after EU announced a $1trillion bailout package but by weekend it was a different story. Now there are questions on how solid it was. The confidence barometer, Euro, is now 4 years low and maybe even headed for $ parity as I wonder if EU will really step in to avoid Euro slide.  They should be pretty excited as EU economy may get much needed push with a weaker Euro. For OPNewsletter, we are 77% in cash. Remainder of the cash is invested across 3 income portfolio and we are nicely up +5.3% for June 2010.

    May 2010 was a record month for OPNewsletter. Since the beginning of Phase-2 of OPNewsletter in Jan 2008, this was the highest % gainer. We achieved +18% gains in May 2010. This is coming on the heels of 9.7% in April 2010. We also avoided market meltdown by going into cash before pullback really started hitting hard. These results don’t include returns on speculative trades like VIX (a few times), Google, ISRG, SLGN, and many more. Euro slide didn’t come as much of surprise too, as we had started anticipating this move when 50days EMA crossed the 200EMA for the first time in 18months.

    If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    I have been covering market commentary on both OPDiscussion forum as well as on Twitter. Congratulations to all those who benefited.

    If I could make a suggestion, [b]pls don’t over trade this coming week[/b]; keep it simple and watch the show…just watch out for the two levels I mentioned ([b]Dow 10,300 and 10,700[/b]).

    There were a few trade ideas I shared in the Weekly OPN portfolio tracking; Look out for Silver (CEF, SLV). I think silver’s time is coming soon (how soon, I don’t know). Silver maybe more volatile then gold so you gotta be careful.  As usual pls do your due diligence before investing any single $$ into any stocks I/OP mention anywhere. Regarding Gold, congratulations to all those who have been permabull on this, it hit a new record high (but not quite high yet if adjusted for inflation). If you have sometime, pls do read the this link . This is a post I wrote in 2007 which I hope will provide a historical perspective of how far have we come since then.

    50DMA StocksFrom Market perspective, Internals don’t look attractive and it seems that this pull back still has a course to run. Whether this is a full blown Market Top or just a healthy correction in the on-going primary uptrend, we’ll know only in the Hindsight.

    Look at the attached chart of NYSE stocks that are trading above 50days moving average. The lows are getting lower, in fact recent correction had the lowest % of stocks trading above 50days MA in the last 1 year; including all the three pullbacks. The distribution days are increasing and 90% down days are also increasing which doesn’t paint a healthy picture.

    Here is what one industry veteran (Mr Richard Russell of Famed Dow Theory has to say) –

    Russell suggestion — Do your friends a favor. Tell them to “batten down the hatches” because there’s a HARD RAIN coming. Tell them to get out of debt and sell anything they can sell (and don’t need) in order to get liquid. Tell them that Richard Russell says that by the end of this year they won’t recognize the country. They’ll retort, “How the dickens does Russell know — who told him?” Tell them the stock market told him.

    He is of the view that one should monitor the two Averages ($DJI and $DJT) hit “spear point” lows, Industrials at 10380.43, Transports at 4298.12 and he considers these to be of extremely importance. If both Averages hold above their May 7 lows, it will be a bullish indication; If both Averages turn down, and one Average violates its May 7 low but the other refuses to confirm, that could be a very bullish sign; If both Averages break below their May 7 lows, it will be a very bearish action, and could predict a crash (the two Averages do not have to break on the same day, but the closer in time they both violate the May 7 lows, the more authoritative and bearish the action).

    Besides a 10,300 level that one should be careful about, I think hard rain is not coming until the averages drops below following levels-  Industrial at 9,835, Transports at 3,740. Though I am not an expert on Dow Theory, I would stay clear if Dow drops below $10,300 and will reposition to re-enter around 9,835 but with risk management plans in place, in case Markets drops further. If However, Dow manages to remain above 10,700, I think we might have run this pullback course; at least for now.

    Thank you all the positive feedback on “Financial Freedom” article. I am glad you liked it and that it could add some value to your existing knowledge. If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    Trade Carefully, Trade Profitable, OP

  • OPNewsletter April +9.7% (closed); May +12% (Open)

    While markets are struggling to make any meaningful advance, for OPNewsletter, we are having another excellent month. We closed April’10 portfolios for +9.7% gains, and for May income portfolios, we are up +12% with 3 weeks to go. These results don’t include gains on speculative trades. Another point to note, these were also two months when I significantly upped investments allocation. In April’10 we invested 88% of capital and this month we invested 75% of capital. If one considers compounding effect, these income trades resulted in +18% gains on overall capital in just two expiration cycle alone (still 3wks to go).

    We achieved most of these results, by having plans in advance and shifting our option trading strategy in way so that more trading alerts can be sent before or after market hours to allow even working professionals to benefit.

    OPTweetsHere is a snapshot of my speculative trades (even for free ideas, just check the screenshot of my tweets). It was an excellent time to generate gains from Goldman Sachs (GS), Harman (HAR), Wynn Resorts (WYNN), VIX, Google(GOOG), Baidu (BIDU), Intuitive Surgical (ISRG). The only losing trade was McAfee (MFE) (we played it as a takeover rumor) which was also up +40% at one time.

    If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    It has been over 3 years since OPNewsletter was first introduced. I am so thankful to all subscribers and a special thanks to those who have been with me since the beginning. It’s been an absolute pleasure and honor to serve this community.

    As part of my final phase of OP Brand development, I am discontinuing “No Profit, No Fee” business model after May expiration cycle and make it a fixed fee. Old members may recall OPN Phase-1 was introduced @ $28/month, Phase-2 @ $148/month. I shall continue to limit subscribers through waitlist so that we continue to have quality in the OPN besides obtaining fills for our trades; for new members, their first month will still be “No Profit, No Fee”.

    With this change, I hope to bring more value to OP subscribers via-

    1. Introducing multiple months’ strategies; tracking those on monthly basis is challenging as those span over various months.
    2. Introducing more opportunity via additional income trades; I often run out of the limit for a $10k model and hence I step back from suggesting new trades.
    3. Spending time on developing OP into a full scale Option’s boutique introducing trading options on futures, forex and add even other countries.
    4. Eliminate transaction time required in refunding; instead redeploy that time to find more opportunities.
    5. Spend more time/develop plans for speculative/directional trades as well.

    I hope to bring more and more value to OPN members and make it much more rewarding experience. Thanks again for your valuable feedback.

    OPNewsletter is still not about “make money” in 5min per day. It still requires one to think and act vs let robots do it for them (at least to begin with). There are no short cuts for making money, consistently. Making money is a hard work and requires one to be patient and to learn and continuously sharpen the craft.  If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the wait list as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    Though it is still an art to make 5-10% monthly on small capital, making rather big % on large capital accounts, consistently, is a completely different game. (How large are the investments via OPNewsletter Portfolio?). That’s what the aim is, so that even if you have a medium to large sum of capital from retail investor perspective, OPNewsetter should be able to help you make consistent income.

    Option Trading strategies used were Double Diagonal, Iron Condor, Iron Fly, Butterfly Spreads, Credit spreads, Calendar spreads, Vertical spreads and some more.

    If you are not an OPNewsletter member and would like to sign-up, pls click here to sign-up for the waitlist as OPNewsletter subscription is open via invitation only.

    Should you have any questions, pls let me know,

    Warm regards, OP