Option to Profit
Week in Review
APRIL 18 – 22, 2016
| NEW POSITIONS/STO | NEW STO | ROLLOVERS | CALLS ASSIGNED/PUTS EXPIRED | CALLS EXPIRED/PUTS ASSIGNED | CLOSED | EX-DIVIDEND |
| 1 / 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 / 0 | 0 / 1 | 0 | 1 |
Weekly Up to Date Performance
April 18 – 22, 2016
This was one of the best weeks that I can remember in a long, long time.< /strong>
For the market it was a decent week, but for a change, most everything went well on a personal note.
There was a single new position opened for the week and it out-performed both the adjusted and unnadjusted S&P 500 by 2.1%
That was just pure luck, though.
That position ended the week 2.6% higher, while the S&P 500 was 0.5% higher on the week.
Even better was that existing positions, continuing to find strength in energy, commodities and really all around, ended the week 1.4% higher than the S&P 500.
The only negatives were that there were no assignments and one short position got assigned.
With no assignments, closed positions continue to be 7.8% higher, while the comparable performance for the S&P 500 during the same holding periods has been 2.7% higher. That represents a 189.2% difference in return on closed positions. Unfortunately, though, there are very few closed positions on the year.
I’m not quite certain what the theme was this week.
Sure, there were earnings and sure, oil was higher on the week, but I’m not really certain what made the market do what it did.
Mostly, I find the last two days of the week, when some big names disappointed, to be pretty optimistic.
Up until then, the market had been happy with earnings beating lowered expectations.
But the fact that it could brutally punish some names for not only missing earnings, but continuing to provide lower guidance, yet still close higher, is pretty impressive.
I was just happy to have made a trade and gotten a chance to roll it over, while at the same time being able to sell calls on an uncovered position.
There was only a single ex-dividend position, but all in all, getting some income for the week, while watching asset value continue to climb nicely higher, left me feeling pretty good.
With a little bit of cash for next week, but less than I thought, as the one possible assignment turned into a rollover, I still am open to the idea of adding some new positions, especially since I have none expiring next week.
While there are 3 ex-dividend positions next week, I’d like to add to the income stream.
Other than earnings next week, which promises to make things busy, maybe an FOMC Statement and the GDP release the following day could shake things up a bit.
I guess that if the FOMC announced a rate hike it would be pretty embarrassing if the GDP was flat, but you never do know.
For now, even as volatility falls, I hope that markets continue this move higher, as the bottom line is really all that matters and I do enjoy watching some recovery in beaten down energy and commodity prices, while it lasts.
I think that those increases can last, I’m just wondering how long the market will follow, but as long as it has already done so, why stop now?
This week’s details may be seen in the Weekly Performance spreadsheet * or in the PDF file, as well as in the summary below
(Note: Duplicate mention of positions reflects different priced lots):
New Positions Opened: M
Puts Closed in order to take profits: none
Calls Rolled over, taking profits, into the next weekly cycle: M
Calls Rolled over, taking profits, into extended weekly cycle: none
Calls Rolled over, taking profits, into the monthly cycle: none
Calls Rolled Over, taking profits, into a future monthly cycle: none
Calls Rolled Up, taking net profits into same cycle: none
New STO: WY
Put contracts expired: none
Put contracts rolled over: none
Long term call contracts sold: none
Calls Assigned: MAT, MRO
Calls Expired: none
Puts Assigned: STX
Stock positions Closed to take profits: none
Stock positions Closed to take losses: none
Calls Closed to Take Profits: none
Ex-dividend Positions: FAST (4/22 $0.30)
Ex-dividend Positions Next Week: F (2/27 $0.15), MS (2/27 $0.15), KMI (2/28 $0.125)
For the coming week the existing positio
ns have lots that still require the sale of contracts: AGQ, ANF, AZN, BBBY, BBY, CHK, CLF, COH, CSCO, CY, DOW, FAST, FCX, GDX, GM, GPS, HAL, HFC, HPQ, INTC, IP, JCP, JOY, KMI, KSS, LVS, MCPIQ, MOS, NEM, RIG, WFM, WLTGQ, WY (See “Weekly Performance” spreadsheet or PDF file)
* If you don’t have a program to read or modify spreadsheets, you can download the OpenOffice Suite at no cost.