One Big Game of F***ery!
It’s been a while since I’ve mused, and hoping I begin to contribute more regularly again. Let’s discuss 2015 a bit shall we. What a game of f***ery. Traders love to say the volatility provides such a great environment to make quick dough and they are correct; however, much easier said than done. As much as I would have loved to have banked on all these quick moves, my biggest wins this year have been from swing longs as I have only played for quick moves a couple times. I do intend to take advantage of the volatility, but before just jumping in I want to get accustomed to the new environment (meaning adjusting to the options pricing and quick entries/exits) .
This Week: Whether you believe in options pinning, in manipulation, in delta hedging, in astrology, doesn’t matter to me. I will present to you some interesting graphs and you can decide for yourself how the market has moved in relation to them (please forgive my sarcasm below…I am sassy after all).
Here is a few open interest graphs that I used this week to either keep me out of trouble or gain a few bucks (it is not easy to make money going long calls or puts to play the pin game, but selling options can be hugely beneficial. And, even more important to me is it can help me stay out of things that look good just based on technicals alone – i.e. AAPL at the start of the week).
AAPL: Opened on Monday at 112.46. Hmmm what happened? 
BIDU: Opened on Monday at 226 – hmmm now under the calls at 220
FB: Opened Monday at 77.84. Hmmm, looks like 75 (where the calls and puts meet) was payed a visit by FB price.
GOOGL: Opened Monday at 499.40. How crazy that now it’s trading above all those 500 puts.
GS: Opened Monday at 187.36. And weeee down below all the calls. 
LNKD: Opened Monday at 226.61. Hmmm now below all those calls at 220. 
SPY: up – down, up – down, up – down and hanging around what level (hint – the last two digits are 00)? 
TWTR: Hmmmm….
Z: This one I did play with long puts because I saw a good opportunity. Z was trading around 104/105 and I thought the risk/reward looked pretty good that it would drop. Low today was 93.75 after a high of 104.85 yesterday.
Note: as the week comes closer and closer to an end, the stocks can once again move more freely as the premium has already been sucked dry from all these calls and puts. So although most of them will likely pin, outsized moves happen quite often once the premium has been sucked out.
There are more examples, but I think you know what I believe to be true. If you think this is total BS that is great, I am extremely happy for you and please feel free to never read my blogs again; however, I prefer you don’t argue with me about it. Maybe I like this kind of voodoo. 🙂
Finally, I want to remind you that this is harder to play than it looks because hindsight makes it a lot easier to see what you could have done. Nothing is easy when it comes to trading, but if you find tools that can help you skew the risk/reward in your favor then you can be profitable.
I try my best to navigate the markets with my subscribers daily and I always start the week with a comprehensive write up with open interest, commentary and set-ups. If you are interested in seeing a sample of what I write up for my subscribers over the weekend feel free to email me at rsassy.spy@gmail.com.