3/12 Recap

CPI came inline this morning and we’ve had a fairly chaotic session. Initially the SPY popped to 515 and immediately sold off to 511 followed by a big move over 516 and another selloff. The data coming in weekly now shows inflation isn’t really done and turning around. We still have PPI this week on thursday so we will have to see what comes of it then, for now markets are reacting well to the news. Markets are more concerned with AI and the future right now than the macro side of things.

On a longer timeframe we’re getting tighter and tighter with the 8 and 21 ema getting real close, the SPY continues to refuse to close below the 21 ema and remains in a short term uptrend over the 8 day. Right now bears would need that 50 day right over 490 to break for them to make a big move otherwise fighting this is a losing battle.

Yields, below, have turned up today, we just cannot get any clarity anywhere. The data comes in and then the fed digs into the bullpen and sends out one speaker after another to confuse everyone with what they’re thinking and a timeline. Markets do not like question marks and it seems like the fed is doing this intentionally in their attempt to keep markets at bay but it isn’t even working as nobody even believes them, including Biden who spoke friday and said the fed would be cutting interest rates soon.

Recent Trades

AAP is up 4% today after striking a deal with Activist Dan Loeb yesterday, I highlighted this one in the 2/8 recap when it saw 3 big trades including 2 put sales and a big call spread bought at 70/80 expiring this week, that seemed nuts then with the stock just over 64, not so crazy with AAP over 78 today. If you put on that risk reversal I noted below it is up a few hundred percent in a month.

That’s the thing I tell you all, yes I post 150 trades give or take daily in my database but I only highlight 5 per day. I have a pretty good grasp on what constitutes a trade worthy of note after years of doing this everyday. I know there are alot of trades going off and it is very hard to know what is a hedge or what will work, but those 5 I point to are because I look through everything and think those are what stand out most to me for one reason or another. If you take that and you combine my approach of selling puts into strong support levels you have a good edge in the market. When I built out this substack my goal was to not be just another options trading service or someone pointing out nice charts, anyone who wants can find nice charts or go get data from the CBOE can filter it and post trades.

I wanted to give you my insights on how to look through all this data and how to utilize it to help you structure the trades. I have a unique process I put together over the years and trying to explain how to use things like risk reversals or ratios to lower your basis even lower than the big players placing trades is what I think makes this a unique offering. The process is what I want you to learn and implement because it is repeatable in any market, even bear markets. There are always going to be pockets of strength and those are identified through understanding what charts are showing and option flows.

Trends

1 Week

2 Week

1 Month

Today’s Unusual Options Trades

Below is today’s link to the database and as always it expires tomorrow morning at the open. I will have the rest of today’s trades added to the database by the afternoon.

Also, my screen would not turn on yesterday, so I’ve been working on my laptop the last 2 days, it is really hard to fit my daily options table below in a screen grab off of it, so they’re delivering my new screen this afternoon. For today use the link below to look at the options table for today, sorry again