Oct 24th

I need to be careful what I write here. I seems Goldman is reading over my shoulders.
Just yesterday, we "upgraded" :) (NDAQ) to  a buy and what do I read this morning;

"Goldman Sachs adds KeyCorp and Nasdaq to their vaunted Conviction Buy List"

Thanks you Goldman for the endorsement.

As for waking up this morning. The first thing I saw was an email on the drop in Asian. You picture yourself in a submarine and the XO shouting "Dive, Dive, Dive". Lucky enough for us we are getting closer to the bottom. Another 440 point in the Rut and we can't go any further.

My currency trades are working nicely. As you can see the USD/JPY broken out of that intermediate consolidation, paying me more than handsomely. Sadly enough I had closed the EUR/USD expecting the (partly) retracement big down move. So I missed the drop from 127 to 124.

As for the Nov trades I reduced risk again by closing (profitably) the strangle on (MSFT) - small profits (350). The main focus here is reduce risk. Closing the strangle takes away the obligation to load the boat with more MSFT at 23. I am sure closing this trade will be one of my biggest regrets in 5 years time, but we live today. I resold the 19/22 strangle for $2.04 this time just a two lot and sold 3 23 calls for $1.

I spent part of the day listening to an analyst meeting on (CHK) I am very impressed with their numbers and business. Don't load the boat but do consider a small buy for the long term portfolio. Analyst seem to think they need to sell some leasehold and are questioning if in this market it is doable. Management is very convinced that it will be no problem - Listening to the 2 hour! discussion my bet is with management. But then I own them in my Nov trade so I could be wearing pink glasses. To reduce risk wait for a close above $24.- or start building a position by selling some puts. Agian with the usual warning on sell naked puts not being a trading strategy but an investment strategy. Let's now wait for Goldman to repeat my call on Monday morning :)

Enjoy the weekend