Blog Archives

Floating Them Trillions

April 11, 2011

Good morning. The market was slow and virtually unchanged last week, with the SPY closing down a scant .28 at 132.86. The VIX was up slightly (.48) to close at a still relatively low 17.39. There was a little more movement in interest rates, with the 30-year bond rate up.15% to close at 4.63%.

History…Repeats Itself, Repeats Itself, Repeats Itself

April 4, 2011

Good morning. The market continued its advance last week, with the SPY up 1.5% on the week to close at 133.15. This is the highest closing since March 3 of this year, before the shocks of the Japanese reactor issues and the Libyan conflict. Even though neither of those has shown any improvement the market has moved on.

Laughter, Disbelief, Anger

March 21, 2011

Good morning. Volatile and down week for the market last week, despite a solid bounce off the Wednesday lows. The SPY was down 3.08 on the week to close at 127.76 (2.3%), which was still a solid 2.48 (2%) off the low made on Wednesday afternoon. The news regarding the Japanese earthquake damage and subsequent tsunami, soon overwhelmed by events at the nearby nuclear reactor facility, dominated the trading for the week. A big upward reaction to the market was directly associated with a coordinated G7 (first coordinated intervention in over ten years) move to stop appreciation of the Japanese yen in the aftermath of the disaster.

A Fine Line

March 14, 2011

Good morning. Despite a rally last Friday (after news of the disaster in Japan) the S&P closed down 1.63 (1.2%) to end a fairly volatile week. The VIX was up 5.3% to close at 20.07. Putting the VIX move into real numbers, we had been doing some long premium spreads in the SPY for those in the PIP program when the price of the weekly at the money straddle (SPY@ 132, the combined price of the 132 call and 132 put) was roughly 1.50 with 4-5 trading days to go.