Watch out now, finally got ES option trading in my prop account so will try and post my regular SPX spreads and ES ones if I enter any as well
FYI, An investment club representative and myself went to Chicago and visited with Maverick and the Vtrader Group. It was a pleasure to meet Maverick and discuss the arena of options. He was openly honest and sincere in speaking with us over a two hour period while the market was making new lows. We have an entirely different perspective of professional trading with Mav's insights. The addition of 'haircul margin' and cross-margined risk profiles have given trading option a completely new light. May I suggest if anyone is in the Chicago area, to give Maverick a call and visit his office. Thanks Mav for the opportunity to visit and the time you took away from your day to enlighten us. We'll be in touch, Murray Grand Rapids Investment Club
Phil, Have you or are looking to do credit spreads using options on futures with your 'haircut margin'. We just spent the day with Maverick.... it was very interesting, as you well know. The cross margin gives a new name to risk management BTW, put diagonals were huge this month..... top side calls diagonal almost worthless (1340c) but... will be rolled into credit spread using the 1325c for .70 Murray
I did follow my plan, once the SPX was 15 pt's away from the short, and there was some major possible downward movement in the market if you listned to all the talking heads, blogs, news, etc. it was a smart decision at the time. So in my brain, I know I did the right thing. In my heart though, you can't help but feeling like you threw away money or left it on the table. For me, it seems like critical decisions that I make in trading always turn out the wrong way when I can judge them in hindsight. But again, without a crystal ball I would have closed out of that trade 9 times out of 10.
Since I am using X-Trader now, I am adding the ES options as we speak and will trade those spreads here. In the prop account I had the SPX 1165/1180 puts for JUNE which I just let sit there since I did not see us hitting even with a post CPI dip.
You took out insurance to protect your portfolio. Insurance is expensive and that's all there is to it. If you prefer to follow your heart and gamble, rather than use your brain to insure your longevity in this business, then you will be probably go broke in no time. You made a good decision. Congratulate yourself on doing so. Mark
On 06/13 I closed out all my losing positions when SPX was around 1228. BTC SPX 1250/1235 $9.8 , loss $890 BTC SPX 1250/1235 $9.4 loss $940-$90=$850 BTC SPX 1235/1245 $6.4 loss $540x2 = $1080 BTC SPX 1235/1245 $6.2 loss $620-$100 = $520 Total loss $3340. These wipes out about 2-3 months of profit. My loss will reduce after expiration due to the profit on short call about $1000. My trading plan was probability bet and the loss would fit within my risk limitation. However, somehow, I decide to reduce the lost by closing them earlier when there was a lot of value left in the long side. Now SPX is back around 1248. Had I stayed with my trade plan, I would not loss this much. So, it looks like I paid dearly for not following the trade plan :-( I'm not blaming anyone but myself. I'll take off for a while until I feel better. -Nick
Closed my JUL OEX 610/620 bear call. It was at 92% max profit. Took away $1.15 credit. Wasn't going to wait another month for just 8%.
I left 2% of port value on the table also but i feel no regrets. Thats a huge amount of money for 1 day of work. Obviously many support levels were broken which mostly invalidated the reason why you opened the trade in the first place. In this situation protecting your risk is number 1 priority. Worry about the profits with your next trade before the reasons get invalidated again. There will be plenty of chances to make profits but only few to protect yourself from the inevitable big hit. If you learn to put risk before profits all the time even when you arent threatened, you will be a much more consistent trader who will survive longer than their counterpart. I hope that was helpful.