Featured

Does It Look To You That McDonalds Is Gaining Legs Again?

Here is it's three month chart. Let's add some flavour. Let's pull up the details of a April 21st blog I wrote. 2,200 new stores being opened this year, up slightly from the year before. Even if same store sales are now off slightly isn't the projectory still upwards? Their business model still seems to be working. Now this, part of a May 1st 2025 blog. A razor thin adjustments to profits. That's what makes figuring out what is going to happen next so difficult. Now a look at how McDonalds traded on Feb. 6th, 2025. This was the morning after it's quarterly earnings report. Now a look at something more extreme. Let's now go back to a different reality three years ago. The McDonald's story is constantly in a state of evolution. The following snippet might help you realize the power of these quarterly earning reports. Sometimes they are stonger than expected. August 6th will be the date their next earnings report comes out. Here now is how McDonald...
Post a Comment

"Apple" at 3:15 p.m.

Last week we talked about "Apple" being a nice stock to trade options on and one of the reasons given was it's one dollar spreads on it's option. Most other stocks in that price range have options on them which have wider striking prices. A 120 Call, a 122.50 Call and a 125 Call for example. That's what you are most likely to see. That being said, the underlying price swings with these "other stocks" needs more of a noticeable and extended directional move to be able to play them successfully. Weekend articles mentioned "Apple" doing well in a rising interest rate environment because of it's abilities to make money on borrowed money forming low cost debt. I wouldn't read too much into that. Today with the D.J.I up 90 points going into the closing trading hour of the day look at how well the 13 series of Call options that expire this week are trading. Up slow and steady all afternoon.
Notice also one again how the volume of daily trading in this series exceeds the open interest. That's always the way it is. The focus always seems to be on interday trading. ^^^^^^^^^ A Next day update. Notice how the market was down and the volumes of trading was way down.
All things considered the stock rallied again on the opening and then off slightly and these premiums dropped accordingly. Let's now look at how the "Puts" now looked on todays action, this time the 134 Puts and not the 133 Puts. Money can be made both ways.
You can see the low of the day on these "Puts" was about 1:20 p.m. when Apple spiked a touch.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Living on Kraft Dinner?

Image
What does the word disconnect mean? As a verb it means "to sever or interrupt the connection of or between; detach". Option trading - one day options - is a disconnect from the world. What happens to slightly "out-of-the-money" Call options on Costco when the stock shoot up thirty dollars on the day? I will show you what happened on Friday to Costco Calls and the options on a few other stocks I frequently watch. What a disconnect from the real world. But before that a look at how the indexes traded. 1) Costco. It's five day chart and a look at how three of it's option series moved upwards in one day. You may not know how to read these printouts but try to read the highs and lows on these option pricings. One printout shows an "at-the-money" option which means you are buying a contract on the stock, good for one day only at a locked in price equal to (or very close to) what the stock is currently trading at. The other two contracts shown are ...
Read more

A Fireside Chat - One Year Options and Thirty Day Options. Which is Better?

Image
Some say to think small, not big. Trying to play Disney options is thinking big. It is a stock slightly out of favor. If we start with it's a three year chart, we will see it is down by about 50% over that period of time. Now it's one year chart. If the stock can break 110 in early 2024 the sky is the limit. It does have a lot of moving parts so anything could happen. Look at these Calls options one year out. One year in options buys a lot of time.They look reasonable. If the stock ever inched up to the $105.00 price level in the three or four months these options would jump up in price by about 50%. Even more if they had really good news. Yet it's the "what-if" aspect of the equation that castes such a trade in doubt. "What if" stories just don't cut it. There are to many variables in play. Then again, why are we even thinking of long-term Call options after a December's rally? Let's switch gears. If consumers are out spending for X-ma...
Read more

The Little Engine That Could

Image
Walmart again. It's all I seem to blog about. Here is it's five day chart. The stock keeps going up and the option series are set up in one dollar spreads. Even a fifty cent move on the stock moves the needle on these Calls. Look at how this series of Calls was trading yesterday at 3:00 p.m.. Now here is this same series of Calls just before noon today. Thirty days of upward action like this punctuated by the off day of decline. Now notice the higher volume of trading in the series of Calls with the higher striking price. These are the ones's with more leverage. At the same time look at the five day chart on Costco. The two stocks sometimes trade in tandem. Humpty dumpty sat on a wall .... a had a great fall. Someday soon a fall might happen but what a great ride it has been.
Read more