Overlords Investment Conclave [OIC] Recruitment Thread

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Thu Jul 08, 2021 10:35 am

Even after paying my property taxes, my cash is creeping up, so I bought on the dip today. Not feeling particularly good about valuations of companies I understand, I decided to work on my appreciation for Robinhood’s turning my broker commissionless on security trades. I decided to broaden my view into broad ETFs and picked up my first share of QQQ, a couple of shares of IYY to track the DJIA, and a couple of shares of VTWO to track the Russell small cap. Probably not the best time to do such things but I had money that probably would have burned a whole on video games I won't play or something else just a dumb. I imagine there’s more correction coming but then I didn’t throw in a lot of money. Commissionless trading makes it much easier to buy a few hundred dollars in equities at a time rather than waiting to accumulate a few thousand and then putting it all in the same basket (even if that basket is SPY or VTI, which is what I mostly did at $7 a trade)

Moving forward, active trading has been fun and profitable, but I see this as a time to start consolidating back into the broad ETFs. Not sure what I'll keep and what I'll sell. It will probably depend largely on which of covered calls get pulled from me. I'm likely to lose IVZ next week, which is way ITM, and that will probably quickly get sunk into three new baby tiny positions unless something catches my fancy between now and then.

NEGG back down to $50 this morning. Not sure if that is the shorts doubling down or the squeezers finding themselves without momentum.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Thu Jul 08, 2021 12:46 pm

Friend texted me to look at XELA on open. Bought some at $2.93, sold $3.64. It went as high as $3.87.

Volume is looking meme-ish but I'm happy to be out with my little chunk.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Jul 19, 2021 9:22 am

Lost some covered call positions on Friday. Being so used to the stocks only going up, seeing a 1% dip pre-market has me ready to dump it all back in to the indexes as if 1% is this huge fall. I'm going to try and temper myself but that is generally the plan so I'll set myself to buy a share or two at a time on the way down across various indexes starting with whatever the opening prices are. I won't have very deep pocket, so if it's a long fall, I won't get to take too much advantage.

xwraith · Post by **xwraith** » Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:35 pm

My patience with AMD finally paid off.

Bought to close my $90 September puts just now and will wait and see for a re-entry point. I'm targeting > 2% premium at < 30 delta after there is a pullback.

Had sold some covered calls on my AMD holding to hedge a bit against another sell off after earnings and to allow me to rebalance my portfolio a bit. I was thinking that if I should make 20% on those calls I should just close them out and hold, but things moved too quickly after earnings... so they'll get called away in a week or so. Still have a real large position in AMD though between shares and LEAPS I have. Plan to sell off a few LEAP contracts that have a higher cost basis and take the profit on them in case of a major market movement down. They are all Jan 2023s so plenty of time still.

At least I feel that I made back all of my losses and then some from my foray into a single GME put I bought a couple of months ago. Ah well lessons learned with that one.

(edit for grammar)

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Fri Jul 30, 2021 3:02 pm

Good for you. I bought a few shares at $72 and then sold them right back $85. Made a hundred bucks was happy, wishing I coulda warranted buying more.

I've been of the opinion that the ride and days of free money is largely over and that I have no clue how to do valuations after the last year plus. Now all of the talking heads are doing their valuations "relative to the market" and that sounds like a recipe for disaster. At the same time, TINA so if my covered calls sell, I put my money into the indexes. When my CDs mature, I put my money into the indexes. If I get too much cash accumulating in my savings paycheck to paycheck I put money into the indexes. I'll bite the bullet when the pullback happens and hope it's not too bad.

I did allow myself to get in the hype and bought OTLY during its downturn about a week before they got accused of cooking their books. That is now a reminder to put it all in the indexes (and TROW which rises and falls in alignment with indexes with a slight tech weighting to keep them a little bit higher)

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Aug 03, 2021 12:11 pm

Played HOOD a lot between 33.5 and $37. Out now but it's having a day.

Old friend TA crushed earnings, up 20% on the news. DSKE similar crushing, up around 10%.

Lots of beats this earnings.

SEED halted on circuit breaker.

Callback:

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Mar 12, 2021 11:36 am F position is finally getting way too big. Trimming some here but staying in.

Also, took some profits in SEED, reduced position by 40%. Added DSKE.

xwraith · Post by **xwraith** » Tue Aug 03, 2021 9:46 pm

Interesting article about Archegos and their relationship with their banker.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/artic ... rgin-calls

xwraith · Post by **xwraith** » Wed Aug 04, 2021 5:04 pm

This chart: https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ ... PriceRatio

Tempting to buy some XLNX and play the merger event. With all the run up on AMD it makes it look real attractive, not without risk though.

noxiousdog · Post by **noxiousdog** » Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:44 pm

Huge set of statistics released by JP Morgan. [url=https://am.jpmorgan.com/content/dam/jpm ... ets-us.pdf]

Notes/pages I found interesting:
Page 6 - forward PE and future returns are HIGHLY negative correlated, but it's a much tighter fit for 5 year returns vs 1 year.
Page 13 - large growth stocks dominate returns, and PE/s are double 20 year averages.
Page 20 - Macroecomic stuff.
Page 21 - CDC herd immunity hypothesis.]
Page 30 - Inflation
Page 35 - Climate change attitudes
Page 57 - Covid Vaccine receipients. The US is #3 (of large enconomies) .. far behind China and the UK... with the percent of population with 1 dose of the vaccine. Germany is likely to surpass the US if it hasn't already.
Page 71 - R&D as a percentage of sales by sector.
Page 76 - Sector returns over 20 years. Spoiler: REITS are #1.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Tue Aug 10, 2021 9:57 am

So I almost increased my Albertson's (ACI) last week based on the Delta Hoopla driving markets, figuring I could set up another covered call. The I reminded myself again and again. "I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings" I check this morning and it's up 10% and rising on the day. It's up from 20 to 28 since I didn't buy. My existing covered calls are so ITM I won't be be getting them back. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Aug 10, 2021 10:05 am

LordMortis wrote: ↑Tue Aug 10, 2021 9:57 am So I almost increased my Albertson's (ACI) last week based on the Delta Hoopla driving markets, figuring I could set up another covered call. The I reminded myself again and again. "I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings" I check this morning and it's up 10% and rising on the day. It's up from 20 to 28 since I didn't buy. My existing covered calls are so ITM I won't be be getting them back. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings. I am increasing cash, consolidating on individual positions, and only increasing my index holdings.

Take a small chunk and trade with it. Use the rest for your core goal(s). If your trading is successful, you will have an ever increasing share to trade with. If not, you didn't risk much.

More importantly, it will allow you to stay the course with the majority of your holdings will still scratching that trading itch.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Aug 10, 2021 10:12 am

noxiousdog wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:44 pm Huge set of statistics released by JP Morgan. [url=https://am.jpmorgan.com/content/dam/jpm ... ets-us.pdf]

Notes/pages I found interesting:
Page 6 - forward PE and future returns are HIGHLY negative correlated, but it's a much tighter fit for 5 year returns vs 1 year.
Page 13 - large growth stocks dominate returns, and PE/s are double 20 year averages.
Page 20 - Macroecomic stuff.
Page 21 - CDC herd immunity hypothesis.]
Page 30 - Inflation
Page 35 - Climate change attitudes
Page 57 - Covid Vaccine receipients. The US is #3 (of large enconomies) .. far behind China and the UK... with the percent of population with 1 dose of the vaccine. Germany is likely to surpass the US if it hasn't already.
Page 71 - R&D as a percentage of sales by sector.
Page 76 - Sector returns over 20 years. Spoiler: REITS are #1.

Lots of info, thanks.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Tue Aug 10, 2021 10:20 am

I was using my covered call money to increase my trading positions, combined with a chunk of my maturing CDs and a very small part of new monies every month. Then one day my trading positions portion of portfolio overtook the value of my positions in the indexes, so I have to remind myself of that constantly, as my real goal is buy and hold to accumulate enough to bridge the gap from now until 59 1/2, so I can check out.

Trading in covered calls is very fun but I have a sincere belief that the free money portion is gone and I am not a stock picker. I'm not that smart and I've been burned enough by bombshells going off over the last five years. After all the free money that has increased my positions in the last 18 months, I have to continually remind myself of my own stupidity and ignorance. I will never be the smartest guy in the room and the smart guys aren't trying to make me money. As you once said, I am chasing their table scraps.

What I really want to do is de-leverage my securities, in general, even pulling back on my index ETFs, but there is literally no where else I can find to park it that isn't putting my money under that mattress. I keep checking various bonds and CDs and keep coming up empty.

(also everything is in small chunks. 100 shares of ACI is nearly $3000. Even when it was under $2000, that's a lot for me to trade and a lot of risk, which is why spread it around so much outside of my ETFs.)

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Thu Aug 19, 2021 9:47 am

I have been largely accumulating cash and putting in limit "GTC+ext" orders to progressively buy index (QQQ, IYY, VTWO, SPY, VT, VTI) on the dip... Well, all that accumulation seems to have lost its liquidity.

I now have few more index fund shares and almost no cash. I hope that's not a mistake. They keep talking 5% dip and I'm OK with that. They've also been talking 5% dip for like six months while also saying the ride is not over out the other side of their month, so...

Anyhoo, The last day plus close, has put me in the position of sticking to my plan of sticking with consolidating into index funds rather than playing games of pick'em.

rittchard · Post by **rittchard** » Wed Aug 25, 2021 12:47 pm

HI all - I'm new to this thread, and even though I've dabbled in stocks and stuff for a long time, I've only recently been more active with some of my investing. Mainly because a friend of mine started getting obsessed and keeps sending me stuff lol.

One of his latest ideas was dividend stocks, so I have been dabbling some in that as well. I haven't read a lot but it kind of dawned on me (which I'm sure is obvious to most people here), if one were to re-configure their portfolio to ALL dividend stocks with, say, 6% yield as the target, they could pretty much live off dividends alone indefinitely (as long as they actively dumped losers and kept good ones...). Say you had $1M, that's like $60k/year which an individual could live on. It just seems a little too easy. I'm sure there are risks I'm not aware of, but I've tried to choose ones that are considered fairly safe. As long as they don't drop to zero in an instant, it seems like you'd always have plenty of time to react and pick something else suitable.

I realize this probably sounds very naive to most of you, but it just seemed oddly too easy, yet still very intriguing to me.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Wed Aug 25, 2021 1:08 pm

A 6% yield is fairly high but yes, that is a strategy.

Obviously the problem with putting everything into dividend stocks is that you risk missing out on broader rallies and also limit yourself to stocks that pay dividends.

Avoid chasing unusually high dividends as they often indicate a poorly performing stock that will either cut the dividend or continue to decrease in price.

I don't chase dividends but I do like them. Some of the dividend bearing stocks that I own:

DUK
GAB
TSM
CWH
CARR

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Wed Aug 25, 2021 1:08 pm

I am not a seasoned veteran like much of thread and I am heavily invested in dividend stocks. From where I sit what you need to know is encapsulated upthread, by whom, I can't remember. You diversify because major events happen a lot and you'll never see them coming. Beyond that 6% dividend is usually paid because either the stock will never grow or because the people who move the market collectively see too much risk. Risk of what? Likely the dividend being cut. I've been burned by this time and again. FGP cooking the books, F losing market share, T spinning off WB, BGS releassing more shares, GSK spinning off their OTC properties. None of which I could have foreseen, but got hit by nonetheless.

I go after equities knowing other people move the markets and I'll never be the smartest person in the room. So why is it I can get 6%, what is keeping everyone else from jumping at that deal, what happens to me when I wake tomorrow and they cut that 6%?

That said, wait for smarter people to weigh in... I'll never bet the smartest person in the room... (And I'm still in T, BGS, F, and GSK all of which are in the red after the aforementioned shift but I bought them in lots of 100 and sell covered calls, sort of making a dividend that way. FGP was the single biggest investing mistake I ever made and guides some of my decision making. I lost a lot of money on them)

Edit: LB is one of those smarter people.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:48 pm

FWIW I have a pretty big position in MMM, solely for the divvies. In the notes section of my portfolio tracker where I normally would have sell targets and ratings and such, I only have ‘never sell’ written there.

Bought a big position in BMY for same reason.

While both those (less so MMM) have much more risk than an index fund, I am kind of treating them as such in my portfolio, and while their share prices meander, boringly, they are throwing off mad cash.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Wed Aug 25, 2021 11:42 pm

GAB throws off 10%. Love seeing the DRIP shares pile up. Plus 23% price appreciation in the past year. It's on the verge of too good to be true but the last offering was over subscribed.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:10 pm

Today would have been a buying day for me if I weren't of the mindset that it's time for me to be much more in cash than I have been. This might be the end of buy and hold for me and I just stay at hold and occasionally sell to raise living expenses. We'll see.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:11 pm

LordMortis wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:10 pm Today would have been a buying day for me if I weren't of the mindset that it's time for me to be much more in cash than I have been. This might be the end of buy and hold for me and I just stay at hold and occasionally sell to raise living expenses. We'll see.

I'm selling some here. Not convinced we aren't about to correct.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:18 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:11 pm
LordMortis wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:10 pm Today would have been a buying day for me if I weren't of the mindset that it's time for me to be much more in cash than I have been. This might be the end of buy and hold for me and I just stay at hold and occasionally sell to raise living expenses. We'll see.
I'm selling some here. Not convinced we aren't about to correct.

You have that feeling, too, huh? Due to normal market ups and downs, or what will surely be a horrible pandemic winter coming up?

The thing is I have tried REALLY hard to not trust my feelings when it comes to investing. Or at least it raises internal alarms when I start trying to guess which way the market's going to go in the short/medium term, based on what my gut tells me.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:18 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:11 pm I'm selling some here. Not convinced we aren't about to correct.

I'm not smart enough to predict such things. You and I had this conversation this same time last year when I was pulling up investments and I asked how long the crazy ride could last and you responded "longer than you'd think" and you were right. I missed a lot of gains and actually lost money moving things into a money market before saying screw it and throwing it back. I also screwed myself selling ridiculously high covered calls on my index investments that weren't ridiculously high enough.

I've been convinced we're going to correct for over a year. I'm going to endure some great pain when it finally does happen. I hope I'm strong enough in cash to get through it.

Of course all of the free money is gone now and people can go back to sports gambling. All that's left super low interest rates asset purchasing to carry us and we're spoiled, so you're probably right, but I'm still not smart enough to make the right move.

Edit, you had a caveat

It can't go on forever but it'll probably go longer than you think.

Thing is, missing out on some gain it better than holding the bag when it tanks.

Zaxxon · Post by **Zaxxon** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:34 pm

Carpet_pissr wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:18 pmThe thing is I have tried REALLY hard to not trust my feelings when it comes to investing. Or at least it raises internal alarms when I start trying to guess which way the market's going to go in the short/medium term, based on what my gut tells me.

This is the correct viewpoint.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:46 pm

Carpet_pissr wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:18 pm
LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:11 pm
LordMortis wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:10 pm Today would have been a buying day for me if I weren't of the mindset that it's time for me to be much more in cash than I have been. This might be the end of buy and hold for me and I just stay at hold and occasionally sell to raise living expenses. We'll see.
I'm selling some here. Not convinced we aren't about to correct.
You have that feeling, too, huh? Due to normal market ups and downs, or what will surely be a horrible pandemic winter coming up?

The thing is I have tried REALLY hard to not trust my feelings when it comes to investing. Or at least it raises internal alarms when I start trying to guess which way the market's going to go in the short/medium term, based on what my gut tells me.

Lot's of factors, mostly feelings, but enough of them that I'm comfortable moving more into cash.

Day to day action lacks direction or conviction. Buy dip, take profits, repeat.

Memes are now controlled by the pros. I get the feeling that a whole swath of new investors is slowly getting wiped out.

Delta/winter COVID.

Less stimmy.

Fed running out of ammo.

Rent relief ending.

Mega caps leading all indexes, soft underbelly waiting to be exposed.

Uncomfortable valuations in a lot of sector leaders.

Political uncertainty.

Price inflation.

Winter (literal, not figurative) is on the way and gas and coal are going up.

No single thing is enough but lots of headwinds. Despair isn't a traditional market bellwether but I see it having an impact this time around.

I'm not shorting but I'm trimming. Holding cash for single, short-term, high conviction trades.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Mon Sep 13, 2021 9:49 am

"Suddenly Everyone Thinks the Stock Market is Going to Plunge"
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/suddenly ... 30650.html

Valid or not (as usual), if enough people feel that way, and the media starts talking about it enough, it will probably become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

malchior · Post by **malchior** » Mon Sep 13, 2021 9:53 am

Markets correct. Markets especially correct in September.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Mon Sep 13, 2021 10:42 am

China isn't helping either.

There are times where missing out on gains hurts. This isn't one of those times for me.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Mon Sep 20, 2021 11:02 am

Today is the day that makes you remember why you are holding a massive MMM position.

It's literally the only holding in my entire retirement portfolio that is not in the red (and there is no positive news to speak of in case you're wondering).

Edit: Ha! From the time I started posting that until I hit POST, it dipped into red.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Mon Sep 20, 2021 11:07 am

(rubs hands)
Sooooo, who's ready to do some shopping this morning? Lots of things on sale! LRCX (LAM Research - semiconductors), KBH (homes)?

Also...we have 84 smilies with guns and not one with money?! Come on!!!

Zaxxon · Post by **Zaxxon** » Mon Sep 20, 2021 12:24 pm

Huzzah for tax loss harvesting on days like today.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Sep 20, 2021 5:52 pm

Carpet_pissr wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 11:07 am (rubs hands)
Sooooo, who's ready to do some shopping this morning? Lots of things on sale! LRCX (LAM Research - semiconductors), KBH (homes)?

Also...we have 84 smilies with guns and not one with money?! Come on!!!

I want to buy but I'm building cash. It's been a painful week and a day but I'm not selling, so it's not painful yet. I'm down about three months living expenses in 5 trading days. Not good when I'm trying to fill in the gaps so I can quit my job.

Still if I weren't serious about quitting my job, I'da been throwing money in today and if it continues to drop, I'd be throwing in even more. I've got enough in "extra" cash to make about 3 dips in the water during this bit but it's staying cash.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Tue Sep 21, 2021 10:41 am

Some random thoughts about the homebuilder sector (leaders include Lennar (LEN-B), KB Home (KBH) and DR Horton (DHI)). I've owned KBH for a little while now - bought it around the same time I bought my semiconductor companies, and for similar reasons, so maybe semiconductors should be discussed as well.

The thinking is this, and it's probably too generalistic and macro to be much good from a real, solid investing perspective, but maybe someone can fill in the gaps:
There are many specific sectors that have been and continue to be squeezed by supply chain problems. Since I bought shares in companies based on this idea, it's actually spread out (trickled down is probably a better comparison) to more sectors. Expected sales are coming in lower for many of these companies, quarter after quarter (see LENNAR's results today). I haven't dug into the specifics of Lennar, and don't currently own it, but from a wider perspective, these missed sales targets are justifiably blamed on the super challenging, and currently dysfunctional supply chain (and it seems like this will continue for a while - semiconductors as well).

So I smell an opportunity as a retail investor. And note that I am referring to the top companies in these sectors, I think that's important. The longer these sales forecasts miss and supply chain issues continue, the more that demand is pent up, and keeping share prices low. At some point, the supply chain issue will resolve itself, and when it does....$$$$. The tighter things are, the better the margins should be (and they do seem to be improving in the sectors and companies I am watching). EARNINGS (as opposed to sales) seem to be in line, but again, due to wide misses in actual sales numbers, we may be seeing artifically low share prices as the market might be perceiving "something wrong" with the companies that keep missing estimates.

I am sure there are other sectors that this could apply to, but I am currently focused on homebuilders and semis (specifically KBH for home, and LRCX (Lam Research) and AMAT (Applied Materials) for semis).

Let the hole poking begin!

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Tue Sep 28, 2021 8:48 am

I'm still out but in this dip, F is keeping me afloat short term. They have found their inner Tesla. Every time they say "moar-EV" their valuation goes up. Farley was on CNBC this morning talking about accommodating a million batteries a year. He wouldn't come out and say it, but at 2,000,000 annual sale and million 1,000,000 capacity in battery mfg, that would suggest they've up their short term projection to 50% BEV. F goes from $12.50 to $14.25 and rising while the rest of the market if falling when they are in the middle of a supply chain collapse.

Crazy, man crazy.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Sep 28, 2021 9:28 am

I've been mostly inactive. Bought more POWW and DUK last week and some BTC when it hit $41K but other than that, nothing. Oh, and GAB position DRIPped a hundred shares last week on the divy. That was nice.

F is still my biggest single position and I may trim it here.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Tue Sep 28, 2021 9:42 am

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Tue Sep 28, 2021 9:28 am F is still my biggest single position and I may trim it here.

I did the opposite. I set long term calls and will the position trim itself if F is at $20 in January of 2023.

Also, It was hard not to buy more last week but I'm holding strong and building cash. As I plan to be post work, it's hard looking at inflation staring us in the face and I'm not sure what to do with all my positions. So, hold, stand, sit pat. Whatever you want to call it. I'm hoping my cash plus maturing CDs is a 1.5 year's living expenses and we'll see what we do with my portfolio in the meantime. While I'm still working, cash, cash cash. If I work long enough and collect dividends and covered calls enough, maybe I can get that two years before having to worry about it.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Wed Sep 29, 2021 9:46 am

Nothing new but something interesting to me that happened this time last year. My value of my positions is going down while at the same time the value of my covered calls is going down (which means the value of buying calls is getting more expensive). Last year this seemed to have happened for good reason bu the end of October securities started shooting up again. It would seem no on wants to buy right now but everyone is betting that everyone will want to buy in November.

Not particularly meaningful or insightful to anyone but interesting to me, probably because it's my money.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Wed Sep 29, 2021 9:57 am

The value of calls is up because volatility is up. It's not that people are betting on higher equity prices by Nov, it's that there is greater uncertainty about equity prices in Nov. If you look, I bet puts are also up. VIX popped big yesterday.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Wed Sep 29, 2021 10:17 am

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Sep 29, 2021 9:57 am The value of calls is up because volatility is up. It's not that people are betting on higher equity prices by Nov, it's that there is greater uncertainty about equity prices in Nov. If you look, I bet puts are also up. VIX popped big yesterday.

I'm too selfish to look at puts. (meaning I don't do them, so I don't learn them) I have a hard time understanding them, so I stay away from them. I know they are Calls in reveres but they still don't click in my brain. I think the trading I would do in puts (I only do derivatives on positions I own) would required me have a margin account and that is something I won't do. One day I will sit down and learn the game but I don't know when that day will be. I'm trying to get out of the workforce, so playing and learning (usually the hard way) isn't something as willing to do now. Hence my not buying last week, even when I'm up to almost 10% cash and growing,and even as I have another 15% in CDs that will mature in the next 12 months that won't be put back in to CDs for peanuts returns.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Wed Sep 29, 2021 10:26 am

A put is just the opposite of a call. With a call, you are buying the option, but not the obligation, to buy a stock at a certain price. With a put, you are buying the option, but not the obligation, to sell at a certain price. Requirements should be the same since neither requires margin and won't auto-exercise of your account can't cover the risk.

Implied volatility tends to affect them the same, meaning the higher the IV, the more expensive they get.