OK, squeezed out of Apple this morning for a 380% net return.

An Analyst (it always cracks me up how appropriately that term describes most of them) Shaw Wu downgraded the stock today on valuation concerns. Apparently it was OK, last year when it was at 180 but not now. I refuse to get on a soapbox here on my view of Analysts, but your smart so you can figure out what it is.

Here is the squeeze we got out of Apple for the trades to close the positions. This is why you have your orders in before the market opens if you are bailing out. Especially when the stock drops like a rock as it did today.

5 Contracts of APVGK- July 155 Calls sold @ $23.00= $11,500 - Commissions of $14.95 = Net $11,485.05

The ROI as I mentioned before not computable as we had no money in this trade. (more…)

Going to put in sell orders tomorrow on the 5 contracts of the APVGK’s.

Also going to sell all 39 contracts of the APVGRs that are still in the portfolio. Nope, I did not look at these today so I did not have a chance to get out at $5.20 …whoops, my bad.

Also, if you look back at the either or scenario, we could have gotten either 16 if we took out are original investment or 39 if we played up. Well, I went with the played up version….I really need to watch my portfolio a bit closer… So, if these get sold tomorrow on the original $6,000 investment, they should bring in right around $31,000 or $12,880 on the 16 contracts that I discussed. So, not too bad aye? (more…)

=$

Apple pushed past 161 today. Not really a big surprise for anyone keeping up with my trades here. The July 155 Calls APVGK are now bid at $17.50. So the 5 we have free and clear are now worth $8,750. Since we originally purchased 10 contracts for $6,000 and then sold 5 contracts for $6,000 and got all of our equity back, we are now holding these contracts with a ZERO cost basis. The questions is, what is our ROI?…..Exactly…like in the movie “The Toy Story” to infinity and beyond!

Our Apple July 190 Calls APVGR are now at $4.65. I have to go back and look at the trades but I think I might have sold half of them at $5.20. We got into those at $2.60 so we are fine there. I am going to put an order in to sell them all for $5.20 so that I can get into a different play. (more…)

= $

In the trade last week with Apple where instead of just buying stock naked i.e. without dressing it and taking care of it by dressing it with a Call, we purchased 100 shares of Apple and then immediately sold the call on it. These were both market orders using zero buying techniques that anyone could do, even a monkey like me!

Now a day after we did this the stock dropped. Has this ever happened to you before? Of course it has if you have been investing for any length of time.

But if you had purchased the stock naked, your investment would be down about $4 Bucks a share now since it is trading around$149. Ouch….

Guess what? We are still smiling! Because we sold our July 170 Call on our stock, we put $8.25 per share in our pocket that we could go buy monkey food with. I do get hungry you know.

Even though Apple is down, we are still up $4.25 on the trade versus being down $4. That is an $8.25% difference. Can you say holy smokes Mr. Monkey?

We took care of our stock and dressed it and it is now taking care of us because we took care of it. Do you see why doing covered Calls in many ways is much safer and more profitable than just buying the stock?

I have some videos in the works that will explain the Why, What, and How of dressing your portfolio to make it safer and get much higher returns than you my have thought possible.

Andrew Anderson …AKA =  I Am An Investor Monkey

UPDATE 10:14 AM, April 8: Plugged In Numbers At Bottom Of This Story- Here is another play for Apple. Meant to get this out yesterday but got too tied up so here it is.

It is a covered Call play. Now a lot of you have heard of this, and a lot may not have.

But it is the only way that I will buy an individual stock. It is just something else that you want to add to you bag of tricks.

Ok, so we are going to buy 100 shares of Apple, and since I am writing this on Monday..whoops. at 1:30 AM so it is now Tuesday, but before the market opens I will use the closing numbers for trade.

Going to use the closing prices on these - AAPL 155.89 So let us say we shell out about $15,600 total to make it easy on me.. Therefore, we have $156 as a cost basis. Now of course our goal is always 21.5% ROI per year. (more…)

This is an example of a No Brainer Trade. If I was to have sold today, I could have netted 33% since Friday or made $2,000 on the 10 contracts I purchased on Friday.

When I get some time, I will show you how to do this on a regular basis and I will show you how truly easy it is to do with the right information and why options in many cases are FAR LESS risky than purchasing stocks. And NO I am not going to sell these yet.

Nothing fundamentally has changed since I posted this trade on Friday. When playing with Options, you make a plan and stick with it. Keep your eye on the bullseye. Trades like these are why I just laugh at the experts that tell you that you have to have a diversified portfolio and yet never mention using options in your portfolio.

Personally in my mind if they do not mention them they are charlatans. If they do not mention them, their advice most of the time is rubbish for sure.

Normally I would have probably purchased 30 contracts and sold the Puts Short on top of that. If so I would be up I think $60,000 today on the trade and no I would not be selling yet….Hmmm.. have to go look at the Puts and see where they ended. Anyway, that is not for everyone of whereas all of you are capable of purchasing Calls.

I will also show why if you own individual stocks you should consider selling Covered Calls on them.  I just looked at what the CBOE has as far as an explanation for what a Covered Call is  and honestly it sucks.   I will throw together a short video on what they are soon.

Sometimes you just need to put some eggs in one basket and watch it carefully and then know when to run with it and take them out. But these chicks are not ready to hatch yet no matter how fast they are growing. Let us be patient and see just how big they get. I think you will be surprised.

To find out what a Call, Put, and Options are Click Here to go the the Chicago Board Options Exchange. They have some great training and information and a Virtual Account that allows you to play with stocks and options. Got to love it! If I can back date the trades I have done I will use it to show you what is going on!

Getting Good At “It”

So maybe you have dabbled with different kinds of investments, say stocks, bonds, options, even Real Estate. But the big questions is, have you gotten good at any of them?

I know we are often taught to work at making our weaknesses better but, what if instead you concentrated on making what you are really good at even better? You know, if you are really good at stock picking, just concentrate of getting even better at it, become great at it. The same goes with any of the investment mediums.

If you are wondering at the wisdom of this, take a look at Tiger Woods. Does he put most of his effort into learning how to play tennis or does he put the vast majority of his time into Golf?  What do you think of his results?

I think of this every time I hear about balanced portfolio funds. Why would you have a good chunk of funds in Bonds and Stocks at the same time when 90% of the time when one is doing well, the other is going to be doing the opposite?

This is a recipe for mediocre returns before you even put the investments in the oven. Moreover, to even further mix metaphors, that is just what I want in a meal. I want to start with a recipe for a meal that I know is never going to be better then OK. No, thank you, no!

That is not to say that you cannot have more than one type of investment or spread risk. However, how about if you get really good at one type of investment on a consistent basis and then move on to another type?

This does not mean that you have your broker do this for you. You need to get involved as well.

In addition, the next time you speak with your broker, ask him or her if she is worth over a million dollar and did she make it trading whatever she might be recommending you do? If not, why are you listening to her?

Anyway, just some food for thought. I think that I am going to go back to my recipes for comfort food this week.

The Play Of The Day

With Coal as high as it is, might be a good time to play it short. It has shot up around 40% recently and the winter will not last forever.