Took a loss on NFLX, but I'm using this as the canary in the mine. Still, I'm making more than the loss back from the rally in FB and ADBE. That ADBE pre-earning announcement is pushing shares above $200 now, and I've had quite a run on this position from $185. The ADBE Feb 185 calls were just above $5 at the time, but are above $16 this morning.
Added NFLX on a momentum move. Using NFLX Feb week1 260 calls avg price for me was 3.40. I want to see it test $265 by next Wednesday. I think it can happen.
Thanks, NFLX is one of the first large cap techs to report, and that run up ahead of earnings was wild enough (I know because I locked in nice profits from that run), so I thought there might be a reversal even if earnings were good. I was wrong, momentum continued, and here I am going long calls again yesterday. But I closed out 1/2 my NFLX position this morning after watching what looks like a possible reversal. I'll keep the rest to see how tech plays out next week. But, I still have some of the human fear/greed factor that I want to limit as much as possible. Ex. that BA call trade went from $3 to $14, and fear of losing that profit made me sell it. Those calls ended around $40 at expiration. That's the big reason I'm writing my trades into this journal.
I'll continue to hold ADBE and FB Feb calls through this potential mess. I think we might see a run up on FB ahead of earnings in about 2 weeks too. I'll know how FB mught trade once we see GOOG, AMZN, and AAPL (all of those usually report earnings before FB).
Tally so far this year. I held PYPL for nearly a month and the gain was only +394. I did make nice profits in BA and NFLX calls in early Jan when I figured I'd practically close my eyes and pick 4 trades. Picked out NFLX, BA, and AAPL Jan calls along with ADBE Feb calls. I made 2320 on NFLX, 2042 on BA, and took a loss of -258 on AAPL. I'm still angry at myself for leaving about 4000 in potential profits from BA in the market when I sold way too soon. Took a small 180 gain on GS when it opened higher and started fading following its earning. I'll take note of this for next quarter. Took the loss on the NFLX put spread at -767, and locked in 1/2 NFLX feb wk1 265 call for +567. We'll have to see how the final 1/2 does, but I want to see if NFLX overshoots 265 and touches around 267-268 early next week. It'll be on a short leash though cause I can't turn this winning trade into a losing trade. As for new trade, this market is getting volatile, not sure what will move at this point. I just saw some good earnings from MMM (it moved 15 points after its last report) and shares were about to fade this morning only to rebound back to a 5 point gain. It just feels a bit shaky right now. LRCX had a decent report, it touched 220 and is now at 207. So we're getting something close to bearish reversals right now.
Optionsinvester, any thoughts on A (Agilent Technologies) ? Earnings on February 14, 2018 after the closing bell. On 01/19, "A" at a stock price of 73.07 had a block of 40,000 put contracts appear in the volume column on the FEB70P at a Bid= .56 / Ask= .64 where as the Open Interest was only 380 contracts. The next morning there was 40,256 contracts in Open Interest and it is still there today. A has gone up (currently 74.03) almost a dollar since that 40,000 contracts appeared on Jan 19 and the put option have dropped in value to Bid= .41 / Ask=.43 Since none of the other February Call or Put strikes have more than approximately 1,000 contracts in Open Interest on Jan 19 or currently, this is considered an "Unusual Volume Event." The question is: 1: Did an Insider sell 40,000 FEB 70 put contracts at the Bid=.56 knowing that the earning were going to be Good and he could pocket an extra $2,240,000 at option expiration on Feb 16, 2018, or 2: Did he buy at the Ask=.64 knowing earnings were going to be Bad and make a killing if A drops a large amount? Kinda makes you go....hummmm?
That's interesting, I'll look into that, since we've got a bit of time, and the oi is holding at 40k. But, right off the bat, I would think it's a large fund hedging his long position. If there were no other volume at other expiration or strike price to match, then he's prob long 40k puts to hedge his long stock position. I traded $A back in November and it finally broke the string of gaping up following its earning results. My initial guess is that the fund manager probably saw that too, and with the market just pushing up, he wants to hold $A, but is playing it cautiously with a hedge. That's how I would play it if I held stock in $A leading up to its report this time around. If you look at the previous 4 reports, $A had traded up every time after its report except for the most recent one. That change could be the start of a change in investor sentiment that could lead to more sell off following its earning report.
NFLX is all over the place today. Just closed out 1 more call on the Feb wk1 260 call. Of the 4 calls I ended up with yesterday, I locked in profits on 3 of them. I can feel safe holding the last one through the weekend and just see how high NFLX will run. I was wrong about 265 and even the overshoot to 268. NFLX hit 272 already, so I'm not even going to put a new target out. I'm just going to ride this through the weekend and see how things play out next week with more earning reports from large cap tech stocks.