Many Opportunities to Profit

I typically narow in on one or two stocks daily to profit from options. I feel it is best to know a stock so good that you recognize patterns that occur with it on a daily basis. I like using JP Morgan, I quit using Alphabet, Verizon is a fun one to make money on daily, Boeing is another one that moves and looks predictable,... I could go on and on. You can make money with options based on news for the day too.

Apple

Apple got a justified downgrade today based on limited device sales moving forward. That only makes sense if their service revenue is based on products that you get free other places and I could go on from there, but the point is Apple was set to open lower and probably fall further today. It failed to move up at open, so it was profitable to buy put options with a strike price of 200. You would have made a nice profit if you sold them when it reached 198. You could have made some money with 200 calls if bought at the bottom and sold when it peaked around 200.34. I did not investigate the options on it, but should have. See my chart to the right.

Boeing

Boeing has continues to have negatice news as a result of the grounding of the 737 Max. If somethinng makes the market negatice, Boeing likes going down with it.

Boeing had some nice movement up from the opening price, but failed to go hgher on the retest which would have been a great opportunity to buy put options. Call options could hav been purchased at the bottom, but it most likely was not going to reach the morning highs like JP Morgan.

I strongly believe and found that holding an options day trade for more than 90 minutes creates a losing position. 

JP Morgan

JP Morgan opened lower from Friday's close. It found a bottom at 112.50 and shot up from there. It came within penny's of break even for the day. If you bought 114 call options when it wsas at 112.50 at .35 and when it made it close to break even, you could have sold for .55 at a nice profit. At that peak, you could have looked for a place to buy 113 put options and wait for it to come close to the morning bottom.

Timing Summary

• Apple
• downside 25 minutes
• upside 1 hour and 20 minutes
• Boeing
• downside 1.3
• JP Morgan
• upside 20 minute
• downsie: from 11:20 to 3:05

Summary

It doesn't take all day to day trade. The key is to recognize when price is going to be spring loaded in one direction or the other, Do not expect it to continue throughout the day. Take profits quickly and do something else for the rest of the day.

Hopefully my blogs show you that there is money to be made with the market, but hopefully you understand there is a level of risk and if you don't time your entry and/or exit points correctly, you may be luck to break even or escape with a small loss.

Be paitent

Take quick action

Prepare to exit quickly if you are wrong

Prepare to exit quickly if you are right

And most important, sign up for a free papertrading account with Think or Swim, ETrade or Schwab. Learn the strategies and don't waste money.

Tail of 2 Days

Please check out my YouTube channel for my audio description of the market this week.  

After the market close on Tuesday, Apple announced a lower revision of

their earnings expectation for the first quarter of 2019. This is crazy since we are about to enter earnings season for fourth quarter of 2018. Regardless it drove the market down hard on Thursday with the exception of Netflix and Verizon.

Apple cited reduced sales in China and the trade war having an impact. I was surprised that Amazon and Alphabet (GOOGL) weren't down more. Amazon just broke below 1500 and Alphabet didn't go below 1022. I felt this was a strong sign.

China's market went up on Friday with the expectation of trade talks sooner than later. It drove the US markets up from open and they rallied more after Fed President Powell spoke with Janet Yellin and Ben Bernanke. The market heard positive news that they are reading the market and inflation is not rising. They don't believe that rates will increase more, but they are all wrong.

Inflation is muted because of the huge drop in oil, gasoline and other commodities. As they rise, they will show in I is real as well as s full employment will drive up the price of goods. The Fed will raise rates as planned 2 to 3 times this year.

With more rate increases, the market will experience more volatility. The

best case for a sustainable rally in the market is from great earnings, larger sales and a trade deal with China. Sales will work themselves out as Americans will experience the largest tax reduction and spend that money.

Trading: Thursday was such a negative day that you could have bought Puts at open or waited for everything to come back near the open price to buy Put Options. Selling at the end of the day was best.

Friday proved to be completely opposite of Thursday and Call Options were the best. I traded QQQ on Thursday and Home Depot on Friday.

Crazy Start to 2019

I didn't see any reason why the market opened so low, but it was a good day to go long. I bought Call Options on QQQ, Netflix and Boeing at the end of the day. It is interesting that most of stocks had the same looking chart. I did sell my Calls on Netflix and QQQ at the number 2 spot instead of 3.

I bought Boeing on 2 different occasions. I sold the first set at the right time, but I should have set my limit higher for the second time as I knew it was not going to close in the negative for the day.

I am glad that I sell my positions every day because the bomb was dropped by Apple driving the market down after the market closed today.

Day After Christmas Boom

What a day! The market opened higher and most stocks retraced to Monday's lows

before taking off higher. I made a profit higher than what I lost on Monday, but failed to wait for the right time to buy and I sold around noon instead of expecting the run to last the whole day which is typical for Wednesday off of an over sold condition.

I didn't trade Alphabet (GOOGL) today, but I did use it for reference as it was one of the only stocks that did not go down to retest Monday's lows. I bought call options on Boeing, Tesla and Netflix on the way down. I was down bad by the time it changed and went higher. I ended up selling everything around 12:30 pm and missed out on the other half of the gains for the day. I made charts on each company below.

I would expect to see more upward movement on Thursday with some pull back for the second half of the day and it should give back half of today's gain. I hope I am wrong, but I will trade carefully tomorrow. Check out my market commentary below along with my favorite pick for 2019.

Turmoil to Profit in the Market... and Tesla

Everything opened lower this morning with the exception to Verizon and McDonald's who reported their third quarter earnings and were awesome. The huge drop was a carry over from the down Asian and European Markets. From open, everything went up for the first 20 minutes before retesting the downside. Most stocks dipped slightly lower than where they opened, but once they hit that retest point, everything went up.

You certainly could have profited by buying anything except Catepiller and profited today, but you would have been best to wait for that retest of the bottom. Buying Call Options on Apple and Netflix were very good to profit especially if you held them until the end of the day. Alphabet (GOOGL) and Amazon had great movement, but because they report earnings on Thursday, their options are too expensive to mess with.

Tesla options got very expensive from open because the company has elected to move up their earnings report to Wednesday which is a week earlier than scheduled and 2 weeks before normal. Obviously they must have good news to move up the earnings report like this as we expect them to produce the company's first profitable quarter in a long time. There was news today that notable short sellers have gone long on Tesla stating their new Model 3 is going to put them over the top.

I am very disappointed because I had 2 weekly Call Options with a 260 strike price that I closed out yesterday afternoon. Those 2 options would have been worth 3700 each by the end of Tuesday. If Tesla produces a huge profit, I would expect the company to trade up to 420 by the end of the week.

Something interesting happened today when Verizon reported earnings. Most stocks that move up before earnings announcement typically sell off the next day even when they beat their earnings report. Verizon has been steadily going up for the past month. After the earnings announcement, not only did the stock move up, but it continued going higher after the market opened. That has not happened since July of 2017. Since the 2nd quarter earnings announcement of 2017, every report has beat expectations but the stock reversed it's premarket gains to actually trade lower.

Apple was the first company to have this kind of positive stock movement after beating their numbers on the second quarter of 2018. McDonald's today had similar movement. This is completely different from Netflix which traded down every day since their earnings announcement until today. This trend appears to be reversing with bell weather companies like Apple, Verizon and McDonld's. On Wednesday before the market opens we will get Boeing and AT&T earnings. Boeing will be is expected to be awesome and AT&T won't. I would expect the market to be mixed on Wednesday with some late day upward movement.

Upward movement is expected when Amazon and Alphabet report earnings this week. Both companies are around 200 points off their all time high that was established 3 months ago. What will be interesting is if they move up after earnings, open the following day higher and if they can keep those gains and move higher to get closer to their all time highs. FANG companies tend to sell off after reaching a huge increase. They were making new highs the past couple of quarters post earnings, so this feels different. 

Friday's Sick Market Movement

After going down sharply on Wednesday and further on Thursday, the markets opened higher on
Friday. The peak came quickly and the market reversed almost all of the gains by 1pm when they reversed to go higher. JP Morgan and other banks reported before the market open and the big banks beat their earnings estimates. JP Morgan opened higher above 110 and sold off below Thursdays low to break under 106 before bouncing to go higher after 2pm. I expected this as it appears to be a common theme with JP Morgan.

There are more bank earnings in the following week as we will hear from Bank of America and Goldman Sachs. The difference is JP Morgan will move up after open and sell off for most of the day. I would expect it to retest the low from Friday by Wednesday. On the right is my chart from Friday on JP Morgan. I did not expect to see it fall as far as it did and would have taken profits early and been happy. I don't know why I didn't follow through with this trade.

Alphabet (GOOGL) closed on Thursday at 1090 and opened Friday at 1119. It peaked early to 1122 and moved down from there. In past Friday, when it moves down, it doesn't appear to change directions to move back up. Friday was similar to the prior Friday when it moved down and changed direction at 1pm. I did buy a Put Option, but at the wrong time. I
keep telling myself that I need to wait for the retest of a lower upward movement before buying the Put. If I had, I could have tripled my profit. Instead I bought too early and sold too late to suffer a slight loss which obviously is not a profit.

I did draw up a chart showing the upward movement for the last couple of hours of the day, but I would not recommend that as it is too risky trading options on the day of expiration. It might be a good time to get options for the next week. I would not recommend holding options for the next week as I expect a retest of the low before moving up. That is exactly what happened as Alphabet moved down to 1099 before moving back up to 1120 on Monday. It did fall off after coming back up to 1120 which looks more like another double top to signal more downward movement.

I think more downward movement might be coming very soon as Netflix reports on Tuesday afternoon. It was just announced a few days ago that Netflix is not bringing back Iron Fist for a 3rd season after ending the 2nd with a cliff hanger. Last quarter Netflix dropped hard after not increasing subscribers as much as the market expected. I think that might continue as Netflix recently stopped Apple from taking a share of subscription revenue by removing the subscription opportunity from the Apple Store. For users that were paying for Netflix through Apple, I am sure it is not that big of a deal to switch over to pay Netflix directly. The main question is how long will it take for those subscribers to change over. I think their revenue will increase for the quarter, but subscriber growth will not occur and force the market to try to sell off Netflix again. When Netflix sells off, it takes Facebook, Amazon, and Alphabet with it.

After Netflix earnings, it will either go up or go down. If it opens up on Wednesday, I would expect to see an early peak followed by a sell half of the difference. If it opens down, I would expect more downside with a reverse on Thursday from a much lower base. Therefore, I would like to buy a Put Option on Netflix Wednesday morning regardless of where it opens.

Market Update to Trends

The Dow finally hit a new high this past week on strength from Boeing and JP Morgan without help from Apple. Since Boeing was at $337 it has rallied to $372 which is only a few points away from its all time high. JP Morgan rallied within pennies of it's all time high established earlier this year on the back of a strong 10 year Treasury Note rate above 3%. This week everything is going to be tested if the Fed raises the Fed Funds Rate on Wednesday. If that rate goes up, everything will come down for the next day with a reversal happening mid day on Thurday.

It might be surprising that Apple is not participating in the rally especially since they just introduced the most innovative technology to come to wearables with their new watch being FDA approved to perform electrocardiograms. Those who still have a iPhone with a button will probably upgrade in the next few months so Apple's future looks pretty strong and even stronger as everything is funneled to their service business. I see Apple setting up to be a huge long term play although I would never own a Apple product because I feel Samsung is far superior. 

So what is going on with FANG? Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Alphabet all appear to be in trading patterns for the next couple of weeks. Facebook is floating between 158 and 165 and may trend further down after reporting earnings despite having no debt. Amazon passed a trillion in market cap and came down from there to trade in a range. I feel it is still over priced and we might get something funky from their earnings to show that they are not growing subscribers and earnings slow down. Netflix domination in subscribers will not be affected by other companies trying to take market share as Disney is not close. Alphabet's Google appears to be the beneficiary of problems with Facebook although you would not be able to tell it by the stock price. 

Alphabet (GOOGL) along with FANG is in a trading range. Netflix is trading between 350 and 372 while Alphabet is trading between 1160 and 1195. For the past couple of weeks we have seen Alphabet close around 1190 only to drop 15 to 20 points on Friday and a little further on Monday. Tuesday's have been up and Wednesday's have started down near the low for the week that was established in the last week but moving up for the rest of the day on Wednesday and Thursday only to fall again on Friday. This is almost identical to what happened last year when Alphabet was trading between 918 and 942. Last year it broke out higher 2 weeks before earnings as it passed the prior high and shot higher after the earnings for the 3rd quarter were announced. 

This brings me my next blog as to what happened with the 4th quarter earnings, the first half of 2018 and the Trump policies. 

Upward Moving Market

Tesla appeared to have bottomed last week after their newly hired accountant left and Apple appeared to have a short term bottom last Thursday as it did not go below 217. This presented a huge opportunity to capitalize on this movement back up. I don't believe that Apple will react positively to the new iPhone announcement on Wednesday, but you could have made some nice profits from Thursday to Tuesday with Call Options. Apple could go higher and pass it's all time high recently established, but think it will be resistance first.

I took advantage of Boeing opening on Tuesday below 340 as it went to 337 and bounced off of it. Boeing moved up to 346 which made for nice profits in one day on Call Options.

Alphabet (GOOGL) opened lower Tuesday and dropped to 1166 where it bounced off and moved up to 1188 very quickly in the first hour of trading. Alphabet moved down while Amazon continued moving up. Alphabet bounced off 1180 to go higher and touched 1190. Those were 2 nice movements that could be profitable as this is what I call an up week for technology stocks as last week was down. 

Tesla Bottom

I failed to mention movement in Tesla on Friday. It was announced that

Tesla's newly hired accountant resigned Friday morning which drove the stock down big and it went down to 252 shortly after the market opened Friday morning. It rebounded quick and it was a positive sign when it did not go lower than 260 after the upward movement. This was a sign that the bottom was formed and it should be positive next week. It opened higher on Monday, dipped down some before going higher by the end of the day. I would expect to see Tesla's stock to return to the 300 mark this week as it closed today at $285.50.

Home Depot and Roku ran up more today and everything else appeared down except for canapy stocks that regained more than what they lost on Friday. FANG all opened higher and dipped lower throughout the decade. Apple is 10 points off the high and came down below 218 as I expected  Of the big tech companies, Facebook appeared to be the only one to hold most of the gain today.

Boeing was down a good amount today  I believe that it was sold off a little too much and expect if it should make it below 338 it will shoot much higher.

Friday Tariff Flustered Market

The August jobs report came in a little softer than what the market was looking for as everything went down after it was released before the market opened. Most everything moved up during the day until around 1pm when Trump announced more tariffs on China. Everything immediately sank to the lows of the day and most rebounded from there with the exception of Apple. In the last half hour of trading it was announced that the tariffs will affect Apple more than expected which knocked 3 points off Apple. I expected Apple to move down before moving higher. I don't think it is done moving down as it should get below 218 before taking off to new highs next month.

Boeing was doing well this week until Friday when it went down after the jobs report. It bottomed for the day after the tariff announcement as it moved up from there. Verizon got a downgrade earlier this week that appears to be wrong as it dropped a point and made it up in a day. Verizon is a stock to hold and unfortunately not one to use with options unless it had sharp movement in one direction and expects to bounce.

EA was down and looked to have bottomed at 111 where it bounced. Today it moved sharply higher to 116 before giving back a point. Based on where it fell from based on a delay of a new game and the new games that have been released between Madden, NBA Live and this weekend's Overwatch turnament, EA should move up further by Monday and possibly for the rest of the week. I would expect it to hit somewhere between 118 and 122 by Tuesday if not Monday. I bought 115 Calls for September 14 when it was at 114 on Friday.

Facebook appears to have bounced off 160 and I would expect to see it move higher next week but may come back to retest that base if they have any negative news. I would expect positive news regarding Instagram advertising coming very soon and push Facebook above 180 in the next month. Twitter on the other hand may be close to a bottom and should bounce from this current level of $30/share, but unlike Facebook, Twitter doesn't have an additional platform to use as a wildcard like Facebook.

On to my day trade... Alphabet appeared to have bottomed yesterday as it didn't go past the bottom. It was a learning lesson as you don't expect it to reverse until you see a bottom has formed. You should never attempt to time the bottom as it will be obvious if it is to bounce. I mention this because Thursday I was early to buy a Call Option as I expected it to bounce higher, but should have waited and could have bought at a better price. I sold at a loss because it was going down further and did not have proof that it was reversing. If I did not sell that Call Option earlier, I could have sold it for a profit by the end of the day because it moved up above 1180 as that was the strike price that I bought when it was around 1173.

Now I will reference my 1 and 5 minute chart numbers with the following descriptions:

1. It might have been better that I did not make that kind of profit on that one Call
   
   Option on Alphabet on Thursday because I might have held it to be higher on Friday. Higher is where Alphabet moved after if opened below 1170. 
2. Based on how it appeared to be done moving down on Thursday, I waited for a sign that it was going up and bought 2 1175 Call Options when it was close to 1175. 
3. It appeared to stop moving up when it got to 1189 and I got out of my Calls as it moved down from there.
4. Based on the upward movement 2 weeks ago, it appeared that Alphabet dropped to 1183 where it closed on Thursday and would move much higher than the prior day high of 1189. I mentioned 2 weeks ago that this is dangerous to expect that to happen as it doesn't happen like that too often especially on Fridays. I lost a little of my gains on attempting to relive 2 weeks ago miss. As a learning lesson, there is not enough movement downward to expect upward movement unless the stochastic indicated that it bottomed with little price movement downward. I sold that call for a loss when I saw it move further downward below 1181. 
5. From the tariff news, Alphabet moved down 10 points very quickly and
   
   appeared to want to bounce off that which it did. Based on my belief that it is going to move up for the next week since the bottom was formed on Thursday, I thought this might be a great opportunity for a bounce. Unfortunately option prices are priced higher on movement upward than when it settles even if higher on the last day of the option contract. 
6. It did move back to 1181 which is 10 points off that tariff low. Once again, I bought a little late or early and sold early as I did not trust it to move up higher. 

Next week I would expect to see Alphabet to move higher and probably back to 1260, but don't know that I would care to hold any options over night next week as more tariff news or regulation movement from Washington could push tech to open lower before moving higher. 

Tech Hit Hard While Dow Jones Moved Up

Micron led chip stocks lower as Amazon, Facebook and Alphabet went lower also. They dropped lower than yesterday, but appeared to have bounced off the bottom and I would expect a strong move up by next week. Home Depot and Boeing moved up as they seem to catch all of the money that was leaving tech. In the afternoon it appeared that money returned to tech as the big Dow Jones stocks sold off a little in the afternoon.

There were some big moves down that I expect to see a reversal in the next week.

• Alphabet (GOOGL) was 1269 last Thursday and today's low was 1263
• Amazon was 2050 2 days ago and hit 1945 today.
• Apple was at almost at 230 and was under 223 today.
• Facebook was 177 last Thursday and today 160.
• Micron was over 51 last Thursday and today was 44.

Micron appears to be the lowest cost of all of them with a Price to Earnings ratio under 5. Apple has proved to have a strong following since Warren Buffet investing in them so I don't know that it will drop further. These could go lower with more tariff talk over the next few days, but lately we have seen moves up despite tariff talks. If there were going to be a drop due to tariffs I don't believe that we would see as much upward movement in Boeing and Home Depot.

Alphabet is what I like to trade options due to the great movement. I found today's chart was similar to yesterday's, but looked to be the opposite from last Thursday. It appears to be a sign that tech is reversing as Netflix got an upgrade before the market opened. Nonetheless GOOGL moved sharply down from open and bounced off 1163, then moved up and quickly dropped to 1165 where it gained footing and moved above 1183.

On Friday I would expect to see a small movement down followed by strong upward movement for Friday. It could move down on Monday ,but I would expect to see large upward movement on Tuesday if we don't get it on Monday.

September Trading Down

Markets were closed in the United States for Labor Day on Monday. On Tuesday Amazon opened to another new high with news on entering the India market to compete with Flipkart. Amazon became the 2nd company to one trillion dollars in market capitalization. Boeing bottomed early today at 339.50 and went up 7 from there. AMD was up over 10% today as excitement is moving towards AMD and away from Intel. I find this funny when Apple computers ,Chromebooks and Windows tablets use Intel processors.

Retail stocks moved up as predicted today with Best Buy moving back above 80 and Home Depot moved sharply up within 2 points of it's all time high established back in January. Apple moved up a little which was nice to see as Samsung announced that they will be releasing a foldable phone this year. In the past Apple would drop on any competition news. Apple has shown a negative impact from iPhone announcements and that day is coming soon.

Alphabet (GOOGL) continued to sell off on Tuesday as it opened lower than Friday's close. In the first few minutes it went up from 1222 to 1228 and went down from there. Alphabet appeared to find a bottom at 1211 as it bounced off and moved up to 1221 before back peddling the rest of the day and found a new bottom at 1209.

Hindsight is 20/20 and I actually missed my exit point as it was found on the 1 minute chart which I had on my screen next to the 5 minute chart. As I indicated in my 1 minute chart and in past blogs that you should look for movements of approximately 10 points when trading Alphabet. Tomorrow is a new day with Facebook and Twitter testifying for Congress with Google being left out because Congress wanted a higher up instead of their qualified representative. I would expect to see some sort of positive news before the market opens for Alphabet where it will open 10 points higher and fall from there as the testifying begins.

Thursday and Friday Market Movement

This past week was a busy week for the end of August. Amazon is still moving to new highs along with Apple despite Netflix cutting off the Apple Store's cut of Netflix subscriptions. There are still more tariff talks as we ironed out a deal with Mexico, Canada is pushing for a deal next. Tesla has continued to move down as Elon Musk has left the headlines and other auto manufacturers are entering the electric auto space. 

Alphabet (GOOGL) had a nice move up this past week. It peaked out around 1269 which was a surprise that it went up on Thursday given that it started the day down. It fell back to 1260, came back up to 1266 and was in free fall mode until 2pm on Friday. I bought 3 1260 Puts on when it was at 1265 and sold it too soon at 1258. If I sold them on Friday at the low of 1225, I would have multiplied my money by 7. 

So that sounds good and you might say let's do that the next time it goes up. Typically Alphabet has a great week ending with a fall in the last day and a half. The next week it starts down with a bottom found on Monday. The bottom is retested on Tuesday and again on Wednesday. By 2pm on Wednesday the bottom is in and you could feel comfortable buying Calls for the end of the week. If the move is huge on Thursday without a pull back, Friday could be a similar sell off day. If Friday is an up day, buy Call options for the next week. If it is not an up day, buy Call options near the bottom at the end of the day.

Given how much Apple has run and their new iPhone announcement, I would expect to see it pull back some before moving higher. I am looking for it to come down to 222 before buying Call Options a week or two out.

Profit from Ups and Downs of the Market

I have not posted anything in a week as I tried a different method to trade that didn't work. I felt that Alphabet (GOOGL) came off of the bottom last Friday and was going up starting Monday. It went up to 1224 and down from there. It didn't go as low as Friday's low of 1204, but did have a nice run up. I decided to hold on my options for a couple of days because I felt that it was going to 1240 and would open higher by 10 on its way.

Tuesday came and it ran up to 1232 and fell from there never to return until today. When it ran up to its peak on Tuesday, the S&P 500 index was about to pass the all time high from January. Alphabet's indicators were at the very top for over a half hour which indicates that it would probably go down. I expected a small drop followed by a push higher. I was wrong. As Tuesday ended, everything fell going into the close with the Trump associates guilty rulings.

On Wednesday Alphabet opened around 1215, ran up to 1226 and fell to 1218 never passing 1223 in the afternoon. I sold my Call Options that I held since Monday for slightly less than I bought them for although the stock price was 10 higher than when I bought the options. This is why I don't like holding options over night and you should expect to have them sold in less than 45 minutes unless holding on to longer dated options.

If I had not been tied up with the Alphabet options I would have taken advantage of lower cost options for stocks that came off of a recent peak that were due to go higher for example:

• Spotify was 194, came down to 185 and today is back above 191.
• Roku was near 60, came down to 55, now back to 62
• Apple was near 218 on Friday, came down to 214, and now back to 216.

Nvidia fell last Friday from the disappointing earnings report due to only receiving $18 million instead of $100 million from crypto currency mining. It tried to recover Friday before falling back to the after hours low of 242. This week it has run up to an all time high of 269. This is a stock that is strong, but streaky. I have tried to trade options on it before with such small success.

Tesla might have turned a corner as "the most shorted stock in the history of the market" according to Elon Musk. The reports of Musk health concerns drove Tesla's stock down from 305 to 283 in premarket trading on Monday. It opened around 290 and finished the day at 308. From there it has moved up to 327, but has stayed around 321. Tesla has positive news for deliveries and negative news about a car hitting an object then catching on fire. This week it is stayed consistent.

Outside the initial movement in the morning, there is not a lot of movement as it appears that the market is waiting for something. Tariff news is increasing with more planned tariffs on China and anticipation for a meeting with the leaders of China to work out a trade agreement. One thing is sure is it could take an hour for a stock to peak and in 20 minutes go back to where it started. 

Day trading this market can still make a lot of money as long as you know your stock. Alphabet (GOOGL) typically moves 10 to 12 from the prior close or the morning open. It goes up and down that far. Home Depot, Best Buy and Apple have moved 2 to 4 points in either direction each day. With the stagnate market this feels similar to a type of bear market beginning. As we come to the end of the 2nd quarter earning reports, we might see more of the same. Maybe not as Amazon came close to hitting another all time high this morning. 

Amazon and Apple Go Higher and then...

Amazon and Apple went broke out to new highs this morning while Netflix opened lower due to the CFO leaving the company. Netflix did rise with the rest of FANG before coming down with FANG for the rest of the day after 11am. Tesla opened higher and traded down until it reversed when it got around 350/share. I believe Tesla will move up this week, but find it hard to believe that the company will go private at $420/share. I think $400 is more likely to be the go private price, but either way it is higher than where it is at and is why I will hold a small amount of shares in my portfolio.

Alphabet (GOOGL) opened up, came back to 1252 in the first couple of minutes and that is where I bought my Call Option and sold just after 10:30am for a nice profit. It came down to 1252 where I bought another Call Option with a higher 10 strike price and ended up selling it when it didn't appear that Alphabet was going much past 1254. It did trade down for the afternoon. Tomorrow might be similar to today. I like taking my profit when it goes up about 12 higher than where it starts when it starts flat. See my chart:

Friday Pull Back to Profit

Amazon and other tech companies were up big this week and today was not much different than other Friday's where they would give back some of the gains for the week. Alphabet (GOOGL) ended slightly lower than where it ended last week. I would expect more give back on Monday.

LEARNING LESSON: On a down day, take your profit and look for another opportunity to take a profit in the same direction. Don't get excited about it changing directions completely as that doesn't happen often and many times it just returns to where it starts.




Tesla had some after hours movement Thursday from news that the board will pursue hiring a financial analyst to determine the valuation of the company to move the process forward for Elon Musk desire to make Tesla private. By open Friday it gave back the after hour gains and then some, but did charge higher and ultimately ended the day even.

LEARNING LESSON: Try to avoid after hours momentum as it can be reversed the next day and is often wrong. Instead look to buy at the best price during open trading market hours.

Example: Sunrun was driven down below $12/share after reporting earnings Thursday afternoon. It finished after hours trading around $12.67. It fell to $11.80 after open Friday morning and moved up nicely a dollar from there. This stock is loved by solar customers and employees of Sunrun and the numbers were good except for the earnings per share which was due to an accounting change. If the numbers look good and the price action is not, look to see if there is poor guidance given on the conference call. If it is clear then it is obvious that the after hours traders are wrong and you will get a rebound the next day. Macy's is a perfect example of this after their first quarter earnings call.

Apple opened lower today and moved up quickly. This appears to be a common theme as they stay closing above the trillion dollar amount of $207.,7.

Tariffs are working so well that... Who knows what will happen next week. Home Depot, Walmart, Macy's and other retail companies are reporting next week. Happy trading.

Profiting From Options in Boeing, Apple, Alphabet and Tesla

Yesterday's run up in Tesla was huge but as I mentioned yesterday, if Elon Musk does not follow through, he will go to jail. I will follow up up on that in a separate blog later. Boeing was affected by more tariff talks this morning with China imposing more tariffs on US goods. It opened down, came up momentarily and that is where to buy a Put Option today.

Tesla opened lower, ran up quickly and then sold off from the 382 area. Tesla has a tendency of moving one direction and switching during the day. Here is the chart.

Apple opened below 107 so that is where you look for a bottom. The bottom was in around 105.30 and from there you should buy a 205 Call Option to hold or just make a quick profit if the expiration is for this week. You definitely would have made some good money with it.

Alphabet (GOOGL) was also a great way to make a profit from Call Options today. With Alphabet I have found that you wait to find the initial direction and buy an option for that direction when it comes back to the starting point. I saw it ran up to 1258 and come down to 1252 in the first couple of minutes. To me it appeared to go up, but I waited as it went up again and came back to 1256 where I bought 2 Call Options. When going up, I expect it to go around 12-14 points higher. With that in mind you can set a sell limit order and it should get hit typically around twice of what you paid for it.

Today Amazon hit a new high. I would expect Alphabet and Amazon to be higher tomorrow, but will wait for tomorrow to find out what is going on.

I showed 4 different stocks to make money on options, but I would recommend only using one or two at most when shirt term trading. 

Tesla Crazy, Market Movers to Profit

International markets have been down and were up last night which our markets took off from open. Apple moved down below 207 and Sonos moved below 19/share. Alphabet (GOOGL) opened higher and continued higher to 1265. When it opened above the 1249 mark it was a signal that it was going higher. It went to 1265, came back to 1256, back up and back down to finish at 1255. There was a definite trading pattern it followed today and the 2nd path was easier to read.

Tesla was trading around 342 when it suddenly shot up with news of Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund investment of $2 billion along with a Tweet by Elon Musk saying that he wants to take the company private at $420/share. Trading stopped at 2:45pm for an hour due to pending news. Musk later Tweeted that funding is secured pending a shareholder vote.

Elon Musk of Tesla is backing himself into a corner. By Tweeting his intention to take Tesla private to bust short sellers might blow up in his face. At this point he will have to make it fully public that they will purchase shares back at $420/share or go to jail for market manipulation. If he gets goes to jail, Tesla will go to zero. Buying a long dated option might be a good idea but could also turn to crap.

The real story will come out in the next couple of days and it will go up to $420 or will go down past $300/share.

Profit From a Mostly Positive Day in the Market

The Nasdaq finished the day up which makes 5 in a row lead by Facebook, Apple and Amazon. Facebook opened higher and ran up for 6 today. That makes 20 points since I said it was a screaming buy at 166.50 after earnings.

Apple had a morning dip that created a buying opportunity for those who had not got in yet you could have bought it today for 207.55. It ran up for a new high today and would have been nice for someone buying Call Options a week or two out.

Alphabet (GOOGL) is in a trading range as I mentioned last week. It closes Friday on an up swing at 1238 and opened today at 1242 pointing down. I bought Put Options near open and should have sold them on the first dip at 9:45am for the best profit of 3 points. That was the maximum price for the 1230 Put Options even though it dipped to 1230 and change a little after 11am. At that point it was time to reverse direction as Alphabet would go positive for a moment a little after 1pm. I bought 1240 Call Options a little early and sold a little early too. I was still profitable  but I could have made twice as much.

I am looking for more downward movement on Tuesday and a recovery to begin late Wednesday afternoon. That doesn't mean that I will trade that way as I will read the market and what happens. We will probably hear something funky from President Trump that will create a huge movement in both directions one day this week as usual. 

Slow Day to Profit

Apple opened down some and went upwards not staying below the trillion dollar level for long. Sonos continued to go up today and pulled back some. Arlo broke off from Netgear with a successful IPO today with similar trading to Sonos yesterday. Most of FANG was down today and made some recovery towards the close today.

Alphabet (GOOGL) opened around 1246 and traded down to 1233 by 9:50am, came back to 1243 and fell down to 1229. It bounced off but wasn't much of a bounce for a positive trade up using options for the rest of the day.