Volatility
September 19, 2021 | Daily JAM, Short Term, Volatility |
Profit warnings for the third quarter, which ends on September 30 for most companies, have started to worry Wall Street. So far most of the revisions have come from materials producers such as PP Industries (PPG) and Sherwin-Williams (SHW). PP Industries, for example, lowered its sales number for the quarter by $250 million. That’s a decent-sized hit on Wall Street’s projected $4.3 billion in sales. Sherwin-Williams said that limited availability of raw materials is hampering its ability to meet demand. Quarterly sales could fall by a low single digit percentage year over year. But there are signs of a more extensive problem.
September 17, 2021 | Daily JAM, Volatility |
The CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index (VIX) closed at 20.69 today, up another 10.7%. That took the “fear index” above the 200-day moving average at 19.98. The VIX had previously moved above the 50-day moving average at 17.86. I’d be surprised if we don’t see more market nerves driving more buying of S&P hedges to send the VIX higher next week.
September 16, 2021 | Daily JAM, Volatility |
Time–and more–to admit that this insurance policy I took out on March 24 against a big drop in stock prices isn’t going to pay off. I paid my premium and other than peace of mind–maybe–I got nothing in return.
September 13, 2021 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, Top 50 Stocks, Volatility |
Back on September 4 I posted a video on YouTube and this site “September and October 2021 Worse Than Usual for Investors?” that argued that September, the worst performing month for the Standard & Poor’s 500 from 1950 through 2020, and October, historically the home of the biggest one-day or one-week stock market crashes, stood a good change of being even worse than usual this year. I cited factors such as the Fed’s September 22 monetary policy meeting, a potential stalemate over the raising the debt ceiling, and economic uncertainty created by the Delta Variant (see last weeks weak jobs report as evidence on that front) as reasons for thinking that we could see a repeat of the historical weakness and volatility this September and October–but with a bit of supercharging. I don’t want to revisit all the reasons I gave in that video–Hey, just watch it, ya know?–but let me add a couple of points that I didn’t mention in the video. Like the effects of the continued shortage of chips on car manufacturers and hence car sales. Like the run-off in federal Pandemic economic help that’s now scheduled for this fall. Like signs of weakness in consumer sentiment and business confidence. Instead of more on “the problem” lets talk about potential solutions- the “what should I do stuff.”
September 4, 2021 | Daily JAM, Short Term, Videos, Volatility |
I’m starting up my videos on JubakAM.com again–this time using YouTube as a platform. My forty-sixth YouTube video “September and October 2021 Worse Than Usual for Investors” went up today. The “solutions” post will go up Sunday.
August 30, 2021 | AAPL, Daily JAM, Volatility |
The Apple September 17 Call Options with a strike of $150 in my Volatility Portfolio climbed another 23.3% today. The options looks to be moving up as traders position themselves for a bump in Apple after the company’s next new product day–speculation has the date for the announcement of a nee iPhone as September 14 with pre-orders to start on September 17. The announcement is likely to be big news and will probably drive the stock higher. For the September 17 Call Options, however, the date is something of a double-edged sword since a September 14 announcement–a big positive–runs right into the time decay of the options since them expire on September 17.
August 20, 2021 | Daily JAM, Volatility |
A day after shares of Microsoft (MSFT) hit another all time high (see my post from yesterday August 19 on why) the shares have tacked on another 2.63% (as of 3:10 p.m. New York time) today to trade at $304.58. That has pushed the price of the September 17 Call Options with a strike price of $285 in my Volatility Portfolio up another 42.04%.
August 19, 2021 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, MSFT, Stock Alerts, Volatility |
Today Microsoft (MSFT) closed up 2.08%. The NASDAQ 100 was ahead just 0.51% and the Standard & Poor’s 500 gained only 0.13%. The gains took Microsoft shares to a record intraday high of $297.35. Why the extra pop in Microsoft shares? Because today Microsoft raised the price of its Microsoft 365 productivity suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams, Outlook and Enterprise Mobility) by as much s 20%, effective March 1. The price increase is the first since the launch of Office 365 ten years ago.
August 17, 2021 | Daily JAM, Volatility |
One of the really tough things about trying to make money from options is that you need to get both the direction and the timing right. It finally looks like the market direction on the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) has turned in my direction. When I bought the September 17 Put Option on the IWM back on March 24, the ETF was trading at $212.04 and I was betting that the economic uncertainty that had battered the small cap stocks in the Russell 2000 would continue. Which would have made the Put Option I bought with a strike at $215 more valuable.
August 17, 2021 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, MGM, VIX, Volatility, WH |
I try to use big up and (especially) down days in the stock market to stress test my portfolio. One of the things I look to learn from a high volatility down days is how the hedges that I’ve put on to protect my portfolio work under big stress. So, for example, on a big day down day like July 16, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 725 points, I looked to see if 1) the hedges I owned worked to reduce or better yet eliminate my downside losses, and 2) how much those hedges were costing me in opportunities for upside gains postponed.
August 12, 2021 | Daily JAM, Volatility |
Today the CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index (VIX) dropped another 2.24% to 15.70. That puts the “fear index” back in the “complacency zone” where I’ve been looking to buy Call Options on the VIX in anticipation of a bounce back to the top of the current zone at 20 on the next “bad news” day. (Whatever the bad news might be.)
August 5, 2021 | Daily JAM, EVGO, Long Term, Millennial, Volatility |
Today President Joe Biden unveiled a plan that would speed up the transition to electric vehicles in the United States. Included was an executive order (in this case a goal) calling for half of new passenger car sales to be of electric vehicles powered by batteries and fuel cells or plug-in electric hybrids by the end of the decade. And new proposed regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Transportation Department on greenhouse gas emissions and fuel efficiency for cars, SUVs and pickup trucks through model year 2026. The proposed regulations would reverse a Trump administration freeze on fuel-deficiency standards that was itself a reversal of the Obama administration regulations that would have ramped up average fuel economy to 54.5 miles per gallon by model year 2025.
