I´m trying to work it, so I make a profitable once a week long straddle trade. That said, I didn´t make anything this past week. I am however holding two long straddles with real money.
Essentially, I´m trading the hourly chart. The movement is up and down within the longer weekly bar. Not making any money this past week doesn´t bother me, because at the hint from the lovely lady, DerivativesG, who said she makes money working for the hedge fund, with 3 rd month out options in long straddles, my one sample showed me that I could see my two long straddles I´ve accumulated this past week, could recover with IV ballooning in the second week. I did add a second long straddle, at 75 ticks apart successfully. I was tryiing for 1 strike apart, but didn´t get it. The only worrisome thing is that IV is increasing and the VIX is up to over 20. The spreads on the two long straddles I´m holding are overpriced, the ISE shows. Not much, but a bit. We have broken out of the intermediate term bull trend and are now in the growing range bound conditions between VIX 19 and Vix 25. Increasing IV means while my premiums are swelling ( already made the market makers spread debit on one long straddle and just under that in the other long straddle,) I have to still make back my commission costs. The second week should do it this coming week, as the prices gyrate up and down inside the weekly bar and I have already successfully moved to 3 rd month out options. We shall see what we whall see? If I can close both long straddles for a profit this week, that would keep me on track to gain 5% a week per bet, hopefully per single straddle per week. Long straddle profits this way run between 1% and 8% so far in training.
If however, the week to come, moves up slowly, my premium will deflate I think. If it surges I will profit. Not at all sure I can hold for 3 weeks to get a result? Hasn´t happened to me yet, so have no reference on this.
On the other hand, the DMI indicator is predicting a setup for a move of some kind. All three lines are below the 20 line and still going down. Which shows that some sort of move is imminent in a few days.
The index is between my two straddles, so I guess it doesn´t matter which way the move goes, up or down. It is just the acceleration, velocity and pressure that matters.