Daily Market Newsletter

February 8, 2017
Non-Directional Strategies
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Semi-Directional Strategies
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Directional Strategies
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Market Commentary

It’s like everyone is holding their breath, unsure of what will occur next, yet afraid to take any risk. “You go first!” is what everyone participating in this market is saying. I have never seen a market pause for this long without exploding eventually, whether it’s up or down.

Back when I was only playing Iron Condors every month as my main strategy, I would have dreamed about a market like this, however I would always get run over EVENTUALLY on the breakout/breakdown from the coil. It took me a while to learn to avoid the seemingly “easy” setups with flat price action.

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Offensive Actions

Offensive Actions for the next trading day:

  • I have a trade entry for tomorrow, detailed in the “Whale” section below.
  • AAPL might be setting up for either a LP Iron Condor or a Short Call Diagonal soon.

Defensive Actions

Defensive actions for the next trading day:

  • Any vertical, butterfly, or diagonal debit spreads that we set up are risk-managed from day one, and no defense is really required.

Strategy Summary Graphs

Each graph below represents a summary of the current performance of a strategy category. For an explanation of what the graphs mean, watch this video.

Non-Directional Strategies

Semi-Directional Strategies

Directional Strategies

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Technical Analysis Section

Market Internals:  Volume was about average today. Breadth was mixed with 109 advancers minus decliners.

SPX Market Timer : The Intermediate line turned up into the Upper Reversal Zone, showing a bullish bias. This chart is very close to once again showing the somewhat rare “Full Bearish Cluster” which sometimes foreshadows a pause in the trend..

DOW Theory: The SPX is in a long term uptrend, an intermediate uptrend, and a short-term uptrend. The RUT is in a long-term uptrend, an intermediate uptrend, and a short-term uptrend. The Dow is in an intermediate uptrend and short-term uptrend.

VIX: The VIX rose 1.42% to 11.29, inside the bollinger bands. The RVX rose .68% to 18.67 and is inside the bollinger bands.

Fibonacci Retracements: Fibs are not in play right now.

Support/Resistance: For the SPX, support is at 2188 … with overhead resistance at 2300. The RUT has support at RUT 1300 with overhead resistance at 1393. All three major index charts that we follow are now showing a Golden Cross with the 50 day moving average crossing above the 200 day average.

Fractal Energies: The major timeframe (Monthly) is still charged with a reading of 39, almost into exhaustion. The Weekly chart is now technically exhausted with an energy reading of 36, due to the recent breakout. The Daily chart is showing a level of 57 which is completely recharged again; we are seeing the expected short consolidation at this level but it’s not going to last much longer as the daily energy must go somewhere.

Other Technicals: The SPX Stochastics indicator rose to 72, below overbought. The RUT Stochastics indicator fell to 58. mid-scale. The SPX MACD histogram rose below the signal line, showing a return of upside momentum. The SPX is back inside the Bollinger Bands with Bollinger Band support at 2259 and resistance at the upper band at 2304 and is at the upper band. The RUT is inside the Bollinger Bands with its boundaries at 1343 to 1383 and price is above the lower band. The Bollinger Bands are starting to squeeze, especially on the RUT.

We are seeing the market pricing in a shift in character out of the recent lifeless Fed-driven economy, and into an unrestrained one. I think this will bring about a big shift in how the market behaves, but a pullback to stoke up the negativity would be a good thing to see first.

 

SPX chart

Position Management – NonDirectional Trades

I have no positions in play; I will wait on the first significant pullback to allow me to secure put spreads below support.

Offense:  I still do not want to set up OTM credit spreads in this low-vol environment until we see real movement to the downside. If and when we get this movement we’ll need to identify levels that we want our credit spreads to be “below.” This is the same type of price action that was so perilous to HP condors back in 2013, so let’s not fight it.

If I see price drop to the SPX 2200 level, this might be our first opportunity to sell premium against that level.

I have no current positions:

AAPL might be setting up as a potential LP IC Condor candidate as well as a Time Spread (below) trade. .

I would want to see the price hit $134, then throw off the first red candle to enter the LP IC trade.

I have no current positions.

The next time spread will be on AAPL if the price rises up to tag the $134 level; I will set up a short call diagonal by selling the ITM call that’s about 7+ days to expiration, and buying the ATM strike with about another week of time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please note: If you trade these positions please keep the size small, to the point where you “do not care” about the success or failure of this position.

 

 

 

I have the following positions in play:

 

 

 

 

  • SDS Stock – I still own 100 shares of this stock from 2011 and will continue to write calls against this position with every correction/pullback.
  • VXX Stock – I own 12 shares of this stock and will hold until Armageddon occurs.
  • SLV Stock – I have 1000 shares of the SLV that was assigned at the $15 level, and I sold SLV FEB $17 calls (1/17) for $.19 credit. No action required.
  • GE  I will look to sell MAR17 $28 puts if the pullback continues and I can receive at least a $.28 credit.
  • TWTR  I added another ten contracts (1/3) of $13 FEB puts for $.20.  I don’t care about the recent bad press.
  • RIG I added the $12 MAR17 puts (1/30) for $.19 credit. .
  • X – I added the MAR17 $25 puts (1/30) for $.47 credit. .

Position Management – Directional Trades

Thoughts on current swing strategies:

 

  • 8/21 EMA Crossover -This one is gone. Looking for the next crossover, however it will be to the downside, and the first downside crossover is usually a poor signal. .
  • RSI(2) CounterTrend –  I’ll look for more of these in the near future; I need to tighten up the rule set first..
  • Daily S&P Advancers – if I see the number of daily S&P500 advancers drop into single digits near the close of any trading day, I will go long shares of the SSO.

I have no positions at this time.

I have the following position:

 

  •  DIA 10MAR 199/201 Debit Put Spread (1/30) was entered for a $.94 debit. I will look for a 50% return from this position. I show this as a $1.46 credit limit.

I have the following positions:

  •  BIDU APR17 190/195 Debit Call Spread (1/30) entered for a $.98 debit.Understand that I do not have a “stop” in this trade so if the price breaks down or does not move at all I will wave goodbye at it and not try to “mitigate the loss” via some other technique.
  • TWTR 16JUN 21/22 Debit Call Spread (2/6) was entered for a $.20 debit.

 

The XLU is breaking out and I’d like to enter a position tomorrow morning; I’ll enter the XLU 10MAR 48.5/50.5 debit call spread for about a $1 debit, or whatever $2-wide spread allows me to enter for about a dollar.  If the price gaps a lot lower tomorrow I will ignore this.

There is one setup that I like going forward:

  • TIF – we might see an attempted breakout prior to TIF earnings which I’d estimate would be in late February. A break above $82.20 would see me buying a 30-35 day $2-wide call spread for about $1 debit.

 

There are many, many charts currently showing a very large amount of energy on the daily chart, but are still in exhaustion on the weekly or even monthly charts. It appears to me to be a poor time to get too aggressive with directional upside plays.

The “Hindenburg Strategy” is meant to capture “value” from successive corrections that lead up to the final “death spiral” with a Bear Market. The basic principle is to buy 3-month out long puts on the SPY, and to finance those puts by the sale of credit spreads.

 

 

Quite honestly, selling the “financing” trades has been a huge challenge in this low-vol environment. I will only sell put spreads on decent pullbacks that allow me to secure put spreads 10% OTM

We currently have the following positions in play with this strategy:

  • SPY FEB17 200 long puts – I entered this position (12/7) for a $.95 debit.
  • SPY MAR17 203 long puts – I entered this position (12/28) for a $1.07 debit.
  • SPY APR17 206 long puts – I entered this position (1/27) for a $.92 debit.