That Was The Week Ending 18th August- Options Expiry

Terrapin Trader,

Thanks To incredible charts.com

FTSE’s Tight  Range.( mon -fri … 8! ) Lower Volatility Down to 12.85- low of 6.98

Options expiry on Friday was quiet.

FTSE cash index-  7310 open  7324  close 7445 high  7302 low  Last week  ( open 7512   close 7310 high 7551 low 7297)

FTSE volatility-     open 9.36 close 13.93   (last week open 10.30 close 9.36 )

What Trades Would Have Done well?

Anything going short at 7450 (long put spreads- 7300/7200 ) if you’d been able to capture the sleepy vol- which I didn’t.

Options expiry was very strange and far from typical. You expect the auction at 10:00am to see a rise

Market Volatility

from    6.98 to 16.29 ( last week 9.36-18.55)   Options volatility was not convincing, given events

News

The Trump circus produces more crazy stuff, but this mostly fails to move markets- Oh Wait!!!! That was last week’s news. This is now on repeat.Again! And ……..again. Some horrible world events- some ‘ideological’, some weather driven- both man made.  Global weather is getting weirder. Carbon emissions continue apace. Check it out,by the way.

Summary

This chart explains pretty much everything:

ETFs are killing considered trading by ensuring the rising tide lifts all boats. Valuations, stock picking skills are consigned to history.

Published by Terrapin Trader

First found out about options in 1995.From the arcane magazine Exchange and Mart! First trade- a covered call on VOD in 1999. Made 10%,VOD almost doubled. That's when I realised I was not a good trader,and I was forgiven thanks to the amazing world of exchange traded options

1 Comment

  1. Another rant about ETFs which may be great for retail investors but they flatten market moves,and fail to engage.
    Much is made of algo trading-most NYSE stock trades are electronic. Black boxes work, like drum machines work- but we still like to see drummers. Although a black box turns up to work on time and sober and doesn’t try to chat up other people’s partners! I think we’ll see some volatility next week-just sayin’……..that’s not advice, probably wishful thinking

Comments are closed.