All traders go to heaven

Louis lost more than 30 grand last year trading options. That's a lot of dead presidents right there. Sadly, Louis reads to much MarketWatch and Bloomberg, and stays on Twitter for too long. Sadly, Louis has also read this site and because of that he is considering to continue trading. God save his soul.

"I am a newbie trader, transitioning from a full time job to trading options. I lost over $30K trading last year and desperately need to turn around my anxious and stressful life. I cannot go on waking up in the middle of the night with my heart wanting to explode. My health is deteriorating because of concerns about my future. Most traders deal with a lot of trades and I cannot handle that pace anymore. Hopefully I can learn from you and stop being depressed. I wonder if you have any good advice for me. Seems you know what you are doing. Thank you. Be blessed by our Heavenly Father."

Closed Put side of RUT unbalanced Iron Condor

Just a couple of days after selling an SPX 1925/1930 Credit Put spread using August options I got rid of an old RUT August 1150/1160 Credit Put spread.

Closed $RUT August 1150/1160 Credit Put spread for 0.55 debit. Initially opened for 0.60 Credit.

— The Lazy Trader (@lazytrading) July 29, 2015

August 2015, second SPX Credit Put spread

Well, a little earlier than anticipated in the weekend analysis, today I sold a Credit Put spread on the SPX index. The reason being: all three indicators that I follow quickly reached extreme pessimism levels at the same time.

Got filled on $SPX August 1925/1930 Credit Put spread for 0.30 credit.

— The Lazy Trader (@lazytrading) July 27, 2015

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (July 25, 2015)

A definitely weak market that went from 2126.85 down to 2079.65 is what we got (-2.27%). Year to date the market is now only up +1.01% and looks sick to everybody you talk to. But, this is not a democracy. The markets, if anything are similar to a dictatorship or a totalitarian system. One of the places where the opinion of the majority is useless, and many times just flat out wrong.

I was pretty active during the week first opening the RUT 1120/1130/1330/1340 unbalanced Iron Condor with September options then closing the August SPX 1815/1825 Credit Put spread early to lock in some profits and get ready for possibly opening another Credit Put spread in the near future.

Closed August SPX 1815/1825 Credit Put spread for profit

Well, it is an unusually active week for me. Yesterday I entered the first trade of the September monthly options expiration cycle and just one day later I'm making another trade but this time it is a closing play.

September 2015 RUT unbalanced Iron Condor

Today I entered the first trade of the September monthly options expiration cycle

Sold September $RUT 1120/1130/1330/1340 unbalanced Iron Condor. 2.35 credit in total.

— The Lazy Trader (@lazytrading) July 22, 2015

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (July 18, 2015)

The S&P500 went from 2080.03 to 2126.64 for a 2.24% gain. Very strong week. I didn't trade, as anticipated in my previous analysis and just kept baby-sitting my positions. July expiration is in the books and the SPX 1935/1940/2220/2225 unbalanced Iron Condor finally expired, improving the performance of the portfolio to +15.90% YTD. Five more months ahead folks. I'm really excited about the rest of the year. I will try my best to close the year up +30% and have my first full year without a draw-down, but we all know things in the markets cannot be forced. I will continue to open my trades and manage them as usual without forcing anything for the sake of an arbitrary number in the end. We'll see how the rest of the year unfolds.

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (July 11, 2015)

The S&P500 started the week at 2068.76 and closed it at 2076.62 for a small 0.38% gain in the end. On Wednesday I took advantage of the extreme pessimism prevalent everywhere forecasting the end of the Universe and sold an August SPX 1815/1825 Credit Put spread that is looking pretty good now. I never talk about fundamentals just because to me it doesn't make sense to do so, but Greece in this case is old news that the world has been dealing with for 4 years now. Financial institutions have cut their exposure and risk in Greece from the 2011 levels and it is not as catastrophic as the media portrays. China is perhaps more concerning but pessimism is extreme when only 20% of the stocks are trading above their 20 Day moving average and the whole world has bought Puts already to save their butts from the Apocalypse. If the market sell off was going to happen it needed to happen fast and catch people off guard. An elevated VIX allows you to position your strikes comfortably far out of the money providing you with nice cushion for error. It's just good odds.

August 2015 SPX Credit Put spread

Today I entered the first position of the August 2015 monthly options expiration cycle:
Sorry I meant the second position:

Sold $SPX 1825/1815 August Credit Put spread for 0.60 credit.

— The Lazy Trader (@lazytrading) July 8, 2015

Weekend Portfolio Analysis (July 4, 2015)

Hello comrades from all over the world!
Today I'm writing to you from sunny and awesome Orlando, Florida!

We arrived late last night and focused on an intense, passionate game of Monopoly that brought out the worst of us amongst angst, desperation and arrogance. At one point I had so much money I ended up paying another player $5 to have him roll the dice for me (like he was my servant), as I was tired of rolling the dice myself and needed to improve my quality of life.

But this is not Henrik's traveling adventures! This is not about Henrik, the mundane Cuban Monopoly gambler. This site is about trading and the legit joy of seeing your capital consistently grow without the slavery of a 9 to 5 cubicle. So, let's get down to it shall we?!

Financial Products that suck - CFDs

Once you have been writing on a site for a while, it won't be long before institutions, brokers, newsletters, etc start bombarding you with partnership proposals for you to promote their products. Over time, I have received dozens of such proposals and in many cases it has been about products I didn't even know existed. Having this market disease I have, most of the time I end up researching these products, just trying to expand my horizons by learning new things.