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Huge SPX & moderate VIX swing today on negative FED sentiment. I was able to pick up an initial Jan Put spread on the down run for pretty descent premium... TS p.s. [edit: the down run transient on SPX now appears to be correlated to a momentary oil up spike. Apparently "the market" is...

Credit Spread Traders this might be a good week to get in on some options positions for Jan or beyond for higher premium. I have found that a busy economic calendar of events, especially in an options expiration week, is an excellent time to get a rev up in VIX volatility and corresponding...

Hmmm, now that you put it that way I am looking t this a little deeper. Technically, even if trading through 2 separate accounts, if he bought opening positions both long and short on the same day on the same option underlying/strike/calendar I now think he could be considered by SEC ETF rules...

I am not 100% sure what you are attempting to do but you have 1600 total active contracts between both accounts not zero if that is what you mean. Attempting to make your own market? I don't think there is a legal issue with what you are doing since I don't recall signing any broker agreement...

Awesome VIX shot up to toward 13 there for a bit so I am going to try and set up some Jan put/call spreads about 70 or so out and its now giving fair premium as SPX hunts for support up and down. But Jan is a long options period so I'll attempt to opportunistically average in over the next 2...

The most important thing in renting is computing your cap rate relative to other local rental markets. After that it's making sure the seller is not lying through their teeth on revenues, occupancy rates and maintenance costs. Many managers let the place run down so bad that true maintenance...

I have been resisting the calendars since: 1) I am trying to produce a fairly regular monthly income stream and front month IC has worked out pretty well (80% of the time) with a natural expiration credit/payout timeline and 2) I am not experienced with calendar spreads on the SPX and wonder if...

I suppose if I am going long I should look into some mechanism to hedge or profit from a USD/CAD relationship change. This is a bit of a new area for me. I don't currently play currency futures or currency forwards at all since my broker does not support it. So if I keep to my current broker I...

Who needs a currency hedge with tax and spend Democrats in control of US government? They just inherited: 1) 9 trillion in debt (from a Republican gov who purposely poisoned the pot before exiting), 2) a busted medical insurance market, 3) a hemorrhaging Iraq war cost, 4) social security &...

Agree - too much cash sitting in money markets and too much M&A and stock buy back going on. Tremendous value gap with record earnings sustainment. This bull wants to run. The only issue that still bothers me is housing. But rates are way down so I think those using their homes as an ATM can...

Amen - this low vix is seriously screwing with my income strategy of writing credit spreads rather than working for a living. It's about time for a large contrarian news bombshell to get things stirred up again... TS

haha - you should have knocked on wood - SPX JUST dropped 5 points.... If you take out my huge block of short puts I am suing for malpractice... TS

Thanks - I now think I am definitely going long since there is essentially no remaining risk and all I can envision is positive news. There are still possibilities for: a new government reinstalling favorable tax legislation or stretching out the tax time or 2) Private equity taking it all...

Agree - too much global equity and cash in money markets and a hammered US dollar. The EASY money is here in the US and a high probability of a rate cut in 2007. I tried to buck this trend in Oct and the bull wiped out a huge credit spread position I had 50 points above the front month's...

How about a reverse mortgage ? Or sell a portion of equity interest to a private investor? TS

Well its been about 6 weeks since the Halloween Canadian Trust Bust. I was advocating speculating on a dead cat bounce. Where do trusts stand now to those that got in within a day or two at the bottom? It looks like the speculation payed off in spades... I am WAY UP on my portfolio of...

Sale VOLUME are off 85%. Prices are off about 15-20%. I have a brokers license and as a personal investor in this market am extremely competent in gaging relative worth. I'd be very happy to give you a list of properties that I think could cherry pick the best of the best. In my opinion, if...

I could use some advise on how best to profit on SPX motion from what I anticipate to be a strongly trending bull market in a what I project to be declining VIX environment with occasional spikes/chop down. As a front month SPX credit spread trader I am now looking for opportunity to get into...

I am not far from you - east on the Atlantic coast here in the Cape Canaveral area. Our county relative to the rest of FL is much better off but our absolute sales numbers are way way down. We lost 200 Realtors who are dropping out of the profession for 2007 - which is very good news for me...

I jumped in this a few weeks ago as a minor play. Cramer hates the company but some of the aggressive growth funds like it. Hans has always signaled that they are open to a take over. I think there is a current M&A kind of mentality out there and people are hoping to get in on it here. Or, it...