1. Hey Stanford: I am amazed at your short yet useful posts. You must be very efficient! Just a question of curiosity: are you in "retirement" like falconview, or are you doing this on the side. Thanks
TJ I was in retirement two years ago, then ran into a Madoff like situation and now I am back to work and looking for other ways to recover. How long that takes depends on the success of my lawsuit with my financial planner who screwed up big time! Also have another very interesting business venture coming up. Not sure what you meant by helping others, can you elaborate on that? Will look at this strategy and test it. Thanks for the idea.
Michael: My very heart felt sympathies with you in your situation. I hope your planner is well financially so that when you win you recover all/most of what you lost including opportunity cost. If you have the capital and interest, there might be another idea. I cannot write about it here, but I can email you or PM you. (I still have to send you my comments on your email). With regard to helping others, the post meant friends and family who are also looking for ways to have a safer return on their money without the risk of handing their money to careless hands, and might benefit from what you would do for yourself (assuming you do well, which I believe you would because you are an intelligent individual). My best wishes to you for a speedy come back to the helm in your finances!
Stanford, I noticed something about RUT put options. I am going to send it in a PM. If you think it would be useful to Falconview as well, I can forward it to him. TJ Max!
TJ, I have so much to learn before I even start using my real money, let alone that of any family or friends. Losing my own I can handle, but not other peoples. Thanks for the confidence, I will work hard to keep it. Michael
Ha! Ha! Well I got a kick out of coming on here at 3 a.m. and seeing a bunch of messages and questions. First off TJ. I did not get rich in real estate. Weeelll depends on what makes you rich? I made enough on my house sale at the top of the real estate bubble, to triple what my house was bought for seven years earlier. Putting 2/3 rds of that in Bank C.D.'s in Belize at 8 1/4% allows me to live comfortable, on a budget, at a higher level of style than I would be able to in the USA. The bank C.D.s this year were dropped to about 7 1/2% interest, paid quarterly. Bit tighter on the budget, but hopes that trading will bring back a better lifestyle. I want an airplane again. Though I may be too old, but I have a commercial pilot who is a nephew. Maybe he can fly me places? ( grin ) Retiring in Belize we live on about $600 a month. Medical for the most part is FREE, socialized medicine. That helps in old age. Cashed in my Medicaid, or whatever it was the monthly deduction. The strategy I got off the internet was to buy either PUTS or CALLS and any time you got a minor reversal ( presumably in a trend ) put on an opposite simple debit spread as insurance. Take a quick short move in profit and hold the long options for resumption of the trend. Pretty much what you were talking about a bit later in your posts. Haven't tried it yet. Which is why I was interested in short moves of the index for the simple debit spread. It seems to work often enough to be logical just from casual observations, but not all the while. However the trend options are supposed to cover any small losses in this, the internet blurb said. __________________________________ Quote: 4. I did not understand the timing point. Could you pls. explain? With respect to when to close? Plan is until expiration of first option, if price of stock reaches the strike price (which ever comes first), or short option's price becomes a penny. unquote I did not understand this piece. From what you have explained, I do not understand it at all, from a placement and operational view. _________________________________ Quote: 2. I recall reading earlier on this thread an offer from you to share your timing methods (not in public but via PM/email). I do not remember if it was an offer to Stanford and me, or to Stanford only. If it is to Stanford only, it is fine and I will not be offended. If you extended it to me as well, I would be interested to read it. I am always interested in what others do. Unquote. Send me your private email and I will send you the trend timing method. Stanford already has it and is sworn to secrecy. He cut his finger and using a drop of blood, swore a blood oath. ( grin! ) Like all such things it is VERY SIMPLE and obvious. There is in my observations a specific point in time and place to use any strategy. Knowing that, is the name of the game, and staying out of the market otherwise. The knowing when to stay out of the market and being able to do so, is the most important part. Just my opinion! So for each strategy you feed me here, I try to figure that point and place and how long to hold it. Otherwise I don't trade. _______________________________ Stanford quote: Falconview, good work! What is total amount of capital that you are using at the moment with all the paper trades? Michael unquote Scratch paper trades are just token amounts to establish whether the timing, entering, exiting parameters work and the money involved is not so important for the learning purposes. The short answer is "I don't have a clue! When the trades are over and I am summing up, I calculate it just to put the amounts on here for learning purposes." For instance in the CALLS I have come to the conclusion, partly from my experience of 25 years ago, which I am just remembering, and again in this single repeat experiment, that premium ballooning is the thing and I have to sell anytime we get an OPENING GAP, or closing surge. Take the money off the table and run! When the volatility or premium ballooning collapses on a slight correction, or the market slows in congestion, you can replace the trade for a longer term trend, at a lower price. The important thing is to catch the premium ballooning. I believe in the past week ( 3 days ) those CALLS went from something like 11.60 to $15.20 once, then lost half the value to 7.80 or something? Then bounced back up yesterday to 15.70 again. So I cashed in quick. Riding a longer term trend, the memory comes back to me, can take you a long time to make that money via the trend, fighting the TIME DECAY effects. You want sudden premium ballooning profits in straight CALLS or PUTS is what I remember now. You also trade 20 to 45 day options. Not trend running profits are so important, which can be uncertain, due to volatility collapse and time decay effects. Straight CALLS and PUTS are short term trades. You capture a GAP, or end of day price surge. These are my opinions only. I also have no experience in spreads. __________________________________ TJ quote: With respect to when to close? Plan is until expiration of first option, if price of stock reaches the strike price (which ever comes first), or short option's price becomes a penny. -unquote- The keep through expiration on short time side in the time spread I get. I didn't understand the other part. But am presuming it is because the time spread is OUT THE MONEY?
TJ and Falconview, does your market prediction give you an idea on the next month? If so, are you thinking up down or sideways? Thanks Michael
Stanford No I can't predict that far ahead into the future. Nor do I care. OPTIONS are a quick game. Because of leverage costs and penalties and time decay. It is enough to guess for the next two or three days. More than that is gambling badly. I gave you by private email recently this morning a critique of the thinking process in the NDX credit spread implementation. You notice there is an amalgamation of what three indicators or so, are telling you. You gain this through practice. Like learning to play the guitar. I was looking at the 3 month daily chart this morning to see what my amalgamation of indicators were telling me, from historical behavior. It pays to do this once in a while. Keeps you sober without joining the AA.
Stanford The volume indicator I sent you is still in the positive GREEN. So the trend is still running.
Stanford A half hour to go or so. The strike I want at 2025 ,or 2025 just has no premium at all. It is showing negative. The closest strike is the 1950 which has good premium but far too close for me. Within my deviation safety parameters. Will give it about 40 mins and then if I can't get where I want, will forget that leg of the Iron Condor. My wife wants to go shopping.