Spring in sight, as well as a fine trading week (+ 5.7%)

We had a dusting more snow this past week, but it's over now according to weather guru Cliff Mass ... For me it looks like this going forward:

I had an insight on my earnings trades up to the beginning of this week: I was trading the 0.08 delta short strikes ... mostly! I was moving to the 0.10 delta when there were 0.00 prices at 0.08 ... So I STOPPED DOING THIS! Clearly, the closer to the money the lower chance of winning ...

So this past week I was more careful: I traded just the 0.08 with only occasionally hitting 0.09 ... and I won 12 of 12.

Target (TGT) was the smallest winner for me, just because I goofed and didn't set the closing order price at 1/2 the credit (I made 6 cents rather than the 13 cents I should have) but otherwise the only slight weirdness was with SSYS. This was a short strangle:

I was short the 22 put and the 33 call ... and see the flirting around with $22.95 and slightly below on Thursday? This trade was showing a loss at this point, but since it was still well away from the short strike and only one day until it expired I figured it would come in ... and it worked! The price recovered early Friday and I got out for my expected 50 percent credit!

Sosnoff and company were whining about Costco earnings today ... but then they like to sell the .16 delta ... at 0.08 it was no problem and I made full profit!

Up this coming week: the Fabulous NDX trade on Thursday, otherwise only 9 earnings trades (all I can find with enough profit at the 0.08 delta to be worthwhile ...)

More next week!

Another mixed week (and spring didn't come yet)

First, my natural gas 5-day trade didn't work ...  It's not spring yet:

The snow is slowly melting but we still have plenty around.

I give up on short-term trades except for the one I'm dependent one: the "fabulous NDX" trade ... and now earnings trades, which I have been testing for a few weeks.

This week I went 13-3 ... I made tactical error in one the losers, BKNG, holding on to see if it would come back in the next day before expiration. It was already below both put strikes, but not yet showing max loss. It continued down the next day (expiration Friday the 1st) So I should have closed it out quickly, the way things turned out.

I think Tastyworks may have BKNG marked incorrectly in options liquidity. They have a 4-star ranking system, and BKNG gets only one star.

But on entry to the trade I had a limit price of 56 cents but got filled at 82 cents ... then when closing out on Friday a.m. I thought I'd have to give as much as 20 cents extra ... it was a 5-point-wide spread so should have collapsed to $5 nearing expiration. I put in the order for $5.20 ... and it was filled at $5.03! This is better than some allegedly more liquid underlyings have done ...

So: $86 - $503  ... a $417 loss. Annoying, but it could have been worse ... and I also could have closed it out for about 1/2 that loss the day before, darn it.

BBY and VMW were also losers, but smaller ones that I closed quickly.

This week we have earnings reports from Costco and Target ... more next week!