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Saturday, September 28, 2013

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (September 28, 2013)

SPX went from 1711.44 down to 1691.75 for a -1.15% decline. I didn't trade this week and I consider the market to be in total no man's land right now with plenty of room to move in either direction.

Saturday, September 21, 2013

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (September 21, 2013)

September expiration was yesterday an with it the Sept SPX 1560/1565/1760/1765 Iron Condor and the Sept RUT 935/940 Bull Put spread expired worthless for full profit. The total gain in the model portfolio was +$365 after commissions, which represents a +3.69% gain in respect with the initial balance for the month of $9880.

After September expiration, the model portfolio shows a balance of $10245, or in other words it is up +2.45% for the year. That's certainly terrible compared with the S&P's performance this year. But it represents a great improvement since February. The first two months of the year took the model portfolio to a draw down of -14.22% when it reached its lowest balance of $8578. From them until now the portfolio has grown from $8578 to $10245 for a +19.43% gain in the last seven months, which is pretty good. And all that, in the middle of a very low volatility environment, which makes it harder to collect premium and a most of the time furiously bullish market.

Friday, September 20, 2013

November 2013 SPX Iron Condor

Today I sold an SPX 1565/1570/1800/1805 Iron Condor with November expiration options as follows:

Bought 4 SPX November 1565 Put @5.70
Sold 4 SPX November 1570 Put @6.10
Sold 4 SPX November 1800 Call @3.40
Bought 4 SPX November 1805 Call @3.00

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Calculating Implied Volatility using Excel

The following is a guest post by trader, blogger and good friend Gavin from Options Trading IQ. Check out his website for useful information and a transparent approach to trading.

October positions adjustments

What a day in the markets today! I made three trades in total, all of them using October options. Before going to the action, these are the positions that I had in October:

October SPX 1575/1580/1750/1755 Iron Condor
October RUT 1120/1125 Bear Call Spread

October 2013 $RUT Bear Call Spread

This is the RUT trade I entered yesterday which I didn't find the time last night to blog about

Monday, September 16, 2013

October SPX Put side. New roll up

Today I modified the SPX 1540/1545/1750/1755 Iron Condor by closing the puts and opening a new put side using strikes 1575/1580

Saturday, September 14, 2013

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (September 14, 2013)

What boring last couple days we had in the markets! And boring is always music to option premium sellers' ears. Thank God the last two days were boring because the first three were the always nasty type of rally accompanied by vol contraction. SPX jumped from 1656.85 to 1687.99 this week for a +1.88% gain. I took advantage of the move and slightly tweaked the original SPX 1525/1530/1750/1755 October Iron Condor on Tuesday by closing the Put side (1525/1530) and receiving additional credit for the new 1540/1545 Put spread.

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

October SPX Put side of Iron Condor rolled up

As per my tweet today in the afternoon

I closed the Put side (1525/1530) of the October SPX Iron Condor
At the same time I opened a new Credit Put spread on SPX a little further up (1540/1545)

Saturday, September 7, 2013

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (September 7, 2013)

There was no trading activity this week, just babysitting the two September positions and the October Iron Condor. SPX went from 1635.95 to 1655.17 for a +1.17% gain. This move puts the Iron Condors of the portfolio in much better shape. And now it looks like a potential downtrend channel is being formed after the high of the candle on Friday was rejected as it touched the upper end of the channel which coincided with the 50 day Simple Moving Average.

Monday, September 2, 2013

Turtle Trading System Automated. Method 2. (Forex Expert Advisor)


The legendary story of the Turtle Trades. Pretty intriguing isn't it? If you don't know about the Turtles and the story behind them, you can read here. My question always was, are the mechanical systems that they used still valid today? Are those systems still profitable? Are they applicable to Forex?