Blog Archives

You Can’t Be Half a Gangster


Good morning. It was a huge week for the market last week, with the SPY up 8.52 (7.3%) to close at 124.86. That number represents a gain of 2.3% over the last two weeks, and a decline of 1.4% from the close three weeks ago on 11/11. The VIX last week dropped a full 20% to 27.52, indicating strongly that the market perception of risk, at least in the short term, has dropped significantly. Why the sudden change in market attitude?

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Social and Economic Health


Good morning. Sort of an inside week for the market last week, what we in the business would call a premium sellers dream. The SPY was up a whole .41 on the week, moving from 102.97 to 103.38 (.4%). The VIX was down a little, from 25.01 to 24.76, not much of a drop considering how little movement there was. For those looking to buy long term put protection, as we do in the PIP Program, the cost for at the money put protection for December of 2011 is in the 15.5-17% of the underlying range for 28 months.

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The Heart of Darkness


Good morning. The hits just keep on coming. Last week the market (SPY) was down $4.22, or 4.9%, and yesterday it followed up with another drop of $3.54, or 4.2%. That brings the unhappy totals for the year to down 12.2%, and it is only mid-February. Yesterday’s “official” reason for the sell-off was the continuing stream of bad economic numbers from Asia and Europe. Remember how we were forced to listen to some of the so-called “experts” within the last couple of years ago telling us how Asia was so strong that even if we went into a recession it would not matter to them? How is that theory working? And why were those morons on my TV set?

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