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Jul 30 2009
2009
CANADIAN
STOCK
TRADES
These are the trades I did following the March 2009
Decline
Return To Canadian Stocks
Index
A
stock market decline like that seen from Sept 2008 through
into March 3 2009 are rare events. A decline that large
usually is followed by a enormous run-up. It's a rare chance
to purchase stock, hold it for a few months without covered
call writing.
Naked
Puts and Covered Calls work well, but in a rapidly advancing market
I believe buying and holding stocks for a short period is best. The
last market rapid advance was in Feb 2003. Opportunities such as
these come only once in a while. When they do it is not the time for
covered calls, but a time to buy and hold for short period.
Here are the indicators I followed which seemed to point to
a market up turn after the March 3 decline.
Vectorvest did not call a market up, but did indicate that
the market appeared itching for a rally. The MTR timing
model (www.mtrig.com)
on March 13 2009 gave a Market Up signal. There were other
indicators as well.
In
November 2008 Laszlo Birinyi called an S&P bottom at around
750. In January he reiterated his position and again on
March 3 he said the market was extremely oversold. However
one thing that did catch me was that all three times he
indicated that all the usual technical models were not
reliable this time, down. Here is what he said:
“A
few things caught our eye. One was that we started to have
some very bad days in November (2008) but the market still
recovered. On Dec. 5 (2008), the unemployment news was
really terrible and yet the market recovered that day, with
the S&P closing up 3.7%. To us, those are signs of a
positive market where people are starting to look beyond the
bad news.”
He also indicated that the
greatest decline in a bear market are at the end of the bear
decline at around 70%. He then named some companies he
liked, including GE, with a dividend yield then of 8% on the
common stock. I have found Laszlo Birinyi to be very
accurate on many of his calls. I watched Louis Rukeyser on
Wall Street Week and Laszlo was on often and sometimes he
would be the host when Louis was away. I really miss that
show. Today almost all the financial shows are like watching
entertainment tonight.
The next indicator was the
number of naked puts I had written for Jan and Feb. They had
all expired worthless. This is unusual for me if we are in a
bear market. Normally on so many positions I will be
assigned at least 5 when we are in a declining market.
However Jan and Feb I was not assigned at all. This told me
that the decline could be reaching a climax and the
Bollinger band by Mar 3 was at its narrowest. The last time
this had happened to me was in Nov 2002 to Feb 2003 when the
market was still being called a bear market. In Feb 2003 I
had gone in and bought stocks and then worked with a stop
loss, but I did not sell CC’s at that time. This was another
reason to buy the stocks I did.
While it is true that the
10-20-30 rule did not give a buy signal in early March, the
10-20-30 rule
(click to review 10-20-30 strategy) did show that the 10 day SMA was turning up
and volume was picking up after the plunge around March 3
2009. Also I use the 10-20-30 rule primarily to buy and
sell naked puts not so much for stocks although I do plot it
before buying stocks. This 10 day SMA (Simple Moving
Average) was turning up on all
the stocks I follow, not just a handful. This told me a
trend change could indeed be happening.
As well the bearish
indicator was at an all time high. The number of bearish
analysts was more than 70%, normally a sure sign to me that
we are going to see a reversal. Also the PE ratio on
the S&P was below 12X, and dividend yields were very high.
Bank of Montreal in Canada was paying over 10% on the
dividend. Royal Bank was at 9%. In fact all the large
Canadian Banks had unbelievable dividend yields. At 10% on
Bank of Montreal, you could buy it and tuck it away for
years – which I did. The dividend alone would pay you to
hold the stock. The last 15 bear markets had seen a PE of no
lower than 10.8 on the S&P. I felt that buying when I did,
made sense as I saw little more downside, but if there was I
believed I would be able to sell CC’s against my stock
purchases.
Last was the VIX. If you
look at the VIX chart, you can see that the climax in
volatility was actually in October 2008 not March 2009, and
from there is had continued to decline. On October 20 the
VIX hit a high of 89.3, but on March 3rd it only
hit a high just above 52. The trend in the VIX was down.
This told me that the sellers were getting tired. Just like
the rally since March, the VIX had continued to decline
throughout the rally. You can see it in the premiums of
options, that continued to decline. Right now (March 13
2009) I think the VIX could work its way to 20, which is
where it was last August 26 2008.
Here are the stocks I
bought in March 2009 and sold in May - July 2009. After selling,
I returned to my usual strategy of covered calls and naked
puts. At the time of selling I felt that the stocks were fairly valued and returned the funds to my covered call
portfolio.
Date
Stock & Symbol
Action
Capital Invested (includes
Commission)
Profit/Loss
Return
Mar 10 09
ROYAL BANK OF
CANADA RY
2000 Shares
Purchased @ 30.10
$60,207.00
Apr 21 09
ROYAL BANK
Dividend 2000 X
.50
$1000.00
Jul 23 09
ROYAL BANK
Dividend 2000 X .50
$1000.00
Jul 30 09
ROYAL BANK OF
CANADA RY
2000 Shares
Sold @ 51.00
$102,193.00
$41,986.00
69%
Mar 12 09
CIBC (BANK) CM
2000 Shares
Purchased @ 42.10
$84,207.00
Mar 25 09
CIBC
Dividend 2000 X
.87
$1740.00
Jun 25 09
CIBC
Dividend 2000 X
.87
$1740.00
Jun 29 09
CIBC (BANK) CM
2000 Shares
Sold @ 65.00
$129,993.00
$45,786.00
54%
Mar 23 09
QUADRA MINING QUA
3000 Shares Purchased @ 5.40
$16,207.00
Jul 24 09
QUADRA MINING QUA
3000 Shares Sold @ 10.00
$29,993.00
$13,786.00
85%
Mar 10 09
TALISMAN (OIL)
TLM
1000 Shares
Purchased @ 12.35
$12,357.00
May 27 09
TALISMAN (OIL)
TLM
1000 Shares
Sold @ 18.00
$17,993.00
$5636.00
45%
Jul 09
Total Dividends earned
Earned on above positions
$5480.00
Total Capital Invested: $172,978.00
Total Dividends Earned: $5480.00
Capital Gain: $101,558.00
Total Capital Available: $280,016.00
Return: 61.87%