Okay.. my head hurts from today’s action.  Luckily, my hedges kicked in.  Something tells me Monday’s going to be a big day, one way or another.

Yesterday’s action consisted of 2 contracts sold for a profit of $268.  I think the contracts I sold were WFR.  Probably.  Yeah I’m almost sure.

Today’s action?  Well after the wild swings and rumormongering, I decided to take a big chunk of profits off the table, even if their trends hadn’t broken.  This may or may not play out in my favor but if the Fed is bailing out FRE and FNM, I don’t care to take chances on the short side with financials.

Today’s action consisted of 10 contracts sold:  Remaining LM contracts, remaining WFR contracts, and my entire TIF lot.   I may re-enter TIF Monday or Tuesday but I’m not entirely sure yet.  I had a decent gain on TIF and since I’d prefer to have the cash on hand I’ll take the profits.  No reason not to take profits, right?

Profits for today:  $1,229.  That’s right, I took $1,229 from the market today.  And yes, my account once again has hit a new high.

In all honesty, I think the past two-three weeks has been fairly easy to trade.  If this continues, I should hit 10k by the end of the month.  However, a couple of things to note.  First, I think the run on the financial sector’s done for now.  If the Fed is bailing out FRE and FNM, I’m expecting a modest rally in the XLF.  Second, my risk has remained the same since I went on this winning streak.  According to the rules I have in place, I should be trading about twice the position size per position with the run up in my account.  That being said, I haven’t increased my risk due to the fact that we are in a bear market.  I’ve been so delta negative I was not about to risk losing everything.  The new risk rules will go into effect at the start of August.  Just gotta make sure I haven’t lost my account by then!

So for now, I’m running at a reduced position size for the rest of the month.  I’m currently 2:1 short with some DIA/SPY puts in place as a hedge.  The Investing Adventures’ account is now at a new high.  Total return on investment since I started last year is about 62.5%.  It can be done.  You can survive in the stock market!

I’m off to Pittsburgh Monday for a conference.  I’ll be bored trading over there.  Enjoy the weekend!

Another rough day in the markets and yet another new high for my portfolio.  The portfolio is now up over 20% from the start of my trading, well off the 50% losses I was experiencing only a couple of weeks ago.  Today’s closing trades included profits in XL, LM, CY, and SINA with losses in HRB.  HRB hit my generous stop of $22 and so I’m out with my max loss.  The winners combined for a total of $1500 in profits.

Today’s Profits / Losses:  +$1219.00

Contracts traded:  17

*** New Portfolio Highs ***

Although my portfolio has hit its highs, my current risk allocation will remain unchanged until the end of the month.  I need to make sure my new trading plan is working and that this run on the new highs isn’t based on sheer luck.  I am expecting some writedowns in the next couple of days which will damper the fun a bit but nothing ever goes straight up or straight down.

They weren’t kidding when they said markets generally close higher the first day of the 2nd half of the year.  I was rather disappointed at the bounce this afternoon.  It felt more forced than anything else.  In any event, I went ahead and lightened my put positions a bit by selling off a third of the financials I held.  I currently have 1 contract of XL and LM remaining.  I also sold off a contract from my CY puts.  The bounce, while it didn’t feel well, still didn’t leave a great taste in my mouth.  If anything, I can always reload tomorrow.

Profits/Losses Today:  +$664.00

*** New Account High! ***

Today looked to be a fairly mild day until about 15 minutes before the close where everything began to tank.  I’ve been running a fairly heavy negative delta portfolio so I benefited quite a bit from the last minute sell off.  I went ahead and trimmed my positions in XL and LM by a contract each, reducing my negative delta by about 120 points.  I still own 2 contracts of XL and LM and expect both to continue their downward spiral along with the rest of the financial group.

Total Profits / Loss:  $336.50

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