The bounce in US stocks continues off the Christmas Eve low, but it is showing signs of short-term exhaustion. Does this mean we go right back to lows? Not necessarily. I’m in the camp that some sideways chop would be constructive for the markets overall. As such, I’m in the mode of looking for smart delta neutral trading plans. [Read more…]

We’re headed back to our friendly neighborhood bank teller at JP Morgan Chase. She seems to like handing us cash. Twice she has been quite generous to us and the post-Christmas bounce in shares of $JPM gives us extra interest in coming back for a third helping. [Read more…]

Just as the final week of the year — the days between Christmas and New Year’s Day — are generally to be avoided by anyone looking to put new options trades on, so too are the first couple trading days of any new year. Especially this one. It was highly unlikely you were going to make your year by trading during the holidays, and similarly, there’s no reason to believe that any trades you nail on the first trading days of 2019 will be memorable this time next year.

As I type this at 12:45am ET, overnight S&P Futures have already traded as high as +34  and as low as -25 from Monday’s close. And I expect further indecisiveness to be pervasive during the first two full trading days in 2019. Sure, the nimblest of day traders likely will have a lot of action this week to make it worth their while, but those of us looking to put on options spreads with several weeks or months until expiration will best be served letting some of the nuttiness of the first 48 hours shake out. As such, we’ll be sitting on our hands until the end of the week, waiting until Friday to put on our first new position of 2019 (stay tuned!).

Meanwhile, we do have open positions with January expirations that will warrant our attention this week. Here is a quick breakdown of current positions with January expirations that we’re still in (haven’t hit our profit targets): [Read more…]

Happy New Year everyone! We’re happy you’re here. 2018 was a great first year for All Star Options. We pulled some profits out the market in both directions, we had some fun, and its been an incredibly rewarding challenge for me personally to share my experience with all of you and teach you some of the tricks of the trade I’ve learned in my 20 years tackling the markets.

We always welcome questions from the community about existing trades, questions about position management, and questions about our insight into various scenarios and trade ideas. And as such, I thought I’d take some time today, as we head into the new year, to lay out the way we think All Star Options subscribers can get the most out of their experience here and address some common requests we receive. [Read more…]

U.S. Stock Markets will only be open for a half day tomorrow Monday December 24th for Christmas Eve and closed on Christmas Day. And the following week will follow a similar pattern, being completely closed on Tuesday, January 1.

And the muck in between is no-man’s land, especially given the market we’re current in as best described by our pal Howard Lindzon: “This is one shitty market.”

Unless you’ve got positions in distress that need defending in this sloppy, bearish tape, it’s best to sit on the sidelines and wait until Wall Street gets back to work for real after New Year’s Day. As such, we will not be adding any new positions to the All Star Options portfolio this week.

We’re fortunate [Read more…]