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Showing posts from January, 2022

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A Classic Apple Story ... or ... An Apple Story In Disarray

It's Thursday after the close. 1) This is how Apple closed. What I am showing is it's five day chart. 2) Here are it's Calls and Puts on one series of options that expire tomorrow. We are showing the 262.50 series of Calls and Puts. I am impressed by how tight the bids and asks are. Some other stocks like Walmart also trade like this. ......... 3) Look at the price increase on the Puts today. This was a day when the D.J.I.A dropped 669 points on the day. These Calls now look cheap to me, but who needs to be in a game like this? There is no tommorows after one day options. Most short term option traders avoid the stress of holding last day options going into the final day of their trading lives. There will always be new action in tomorrows trading session. Let's watch and see what happens.

Disappointment on The Opening - Caterpillar Earnings Report

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Caterpillar's earnings report. What I see is 4th quarter sales up 23%. Strong 4th quarter earnings of $3.71 per share.That's a solid number. Just think, the supply chain issue isn't being used as a mistake. Now look at the the opening options market. The stock is down on the news. Management made a few remarks about near term headwinds. They do that sometimes to temper growth expectations. These two quotes are the 205 Call series which expire today. One is at 9:44 a.m. and one is at 10:03 a.m.. They would be very dangerous to consider purchasing since its very unlikely that they could ever shake off this downward spike so early in the morning. So now what? It's at this time in the morning when the decision to reacte to this bad news gets tricky. The stock is down like ten dollars and the DJI is having a good day. There is a strong tempation to jump in on the upside hoping for a quick reversal. That's one of the things that makes option trading so difficult. One...