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Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
9:05am (EST)
Futures are pointing towards a HUGE open this morning after strong earnings results from Intel (INTC, $20.49) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM, $45.66).
JPMorgan Chase easily beat Wall Street’s expectations, after reporting a profit of $3.6 billion for the quarter. Although the company said loan losses are still high and are likely to remain elevated for some time, the results were jaw-dropping.
JPMorgan said it earned 82 cents a share, up from 9 cents a share in the same quarter a year ago, but they beat estimates by 30 cents, folks! Wall Street was expecting the company to earn 52 cents a share. Wow! Shares are up $2 to $47.66 in early trading.
Of course, Intel also beat Wall Street’s estimates and we have been on this story like grass on dirt. We sent out a News Flash last night alerting our subscribers of the after-hours jump and it looks as though those gains are going to hold. In pre-market trading, shares are up 93 cents, to $21.42.
Ahead of the bell, Dow futures are up 109, or 1.1%, to 9,918. The S&P 500 futures are higher by 15, or 1.5%, to 1,084, while the Nasdaq 100 futures are surging by 25, or 1.4%, to 1,751. All aboard!
Gold continues to set record highs. This morning, the yellow metal hit a high of $1,072 an ounce. Oil is above $75 a barrel for the first time in a year.
Current subscribers can check the Members Area for more detailed instructions on how to play Intel from here on out. Many of you should have made well over 100% on the trades and some of you might reach returns of up to 200%! As always, your comments are always welcomed so send us a line if you cashed out on this huge monster!
Tags: Intel, JPMorgan Chase, options blog, options mentoring, options track record, options trade picks Posted in Company Commentary, Earnings, Hot Stocks, Market Analysis, Market Commentary, Option Trades, Rick's Account | Comments Off
Tuesday, October 13th, 2009
1:00pm (EST)
The bulls are trying to get the market higher today after starting off the session behind the 8-ball. They are doing a pretty good job as they did get the market into positive territory but we have since slipped once again. The Dow opened lower and traded to a low of 9,815 (down 70) but has rebounded off the session lows. Currently, the Dow is down 13 points to 9,872.
We have a mixed bag with the Financial stocks. The credit card companies are doing well…American Express (AXP, $35.39, up $0.31), Mastercard (MA, $216.78, up $0.78) and Visa (V, $74.47, up $0.77) are up while Bank of America (BAC, $17.80, down $0.23), JPMorgan Chase (JPM, $45.23, down $0.83) and Goldman Sachs (GS, $186.32, down $3.80) are slightly lower.
Of course, the big news today is Intel’s (INTC, $20.61, up $0.21) earnings after the bell. The stock has held up rather well today and there is heavy volume in the option pits. By the look of things, the action is pricing in a 5%-10% move in the stock and there is a bullish tone being set. However, Intel will need to beat on earnings AND revenue, in my opinion, for us to move higher.
Current Subscribers are up 60% on one of our Intel trades and can check the Members Area for the updates…oh, Imax (IMAX, $10.16, up $0.11) has set a 52-week high of $10.25 today and continues to reward our patience.
Tags: American Express, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Imax, Intel, JPMorgan Chase, MasterCard, option picks, options trading blog Posted in Hot Stocks | Comments Off
Monday, October 12th, 2009
8:30am (EST)
The bulls took the ball and ran with it as the market headed higher throughout the week and finished strong on a number of positive developments. Things got rolling on Monday when the Dow popped 113 which was followed up with a 132 point gain on Tuesday. By the close of Friday the Dow added another 78 to finish at 9,864, up 377 points, or 4%, for the week.
Alcoa (AA, $14.24, down $0.11) kicked off 3Q earnings season with better-than-expected earnings and actually made a profit as Wall Street was expecting a loss for the quarter. This week we really get things rolling as quite a few of the Financial companies will be reporting. The banks have reported solid back-to-back quarters and we will need to see more of the same or there could be a slight sell-off in the sector.
Tech was also hot as the Nasdaq and S&P 500 both gained 4.5% for the week. The Naz finished at 2,139, up 91 points, while the S&P 500 added 46 and settled at 1,071.
International Business Machines (IBM, $125.93, up $3.64) finally broke through a heavy wall of resistance and I have been talking about what a huge event this would be. The October 125 calls (IBMJE, $2.90, up $1.75) zoomed 150% on Friday and opened at $1.30. The October 130 calls (IBMJF, $0.84, up $0.57) soared over 200% and opened for three dimes.
The stock could make a run to $130 which represents another area of resistance and an ALL-TIME high for the stock. The company reports earnings on Thursday and they have been knocking the cover off the ball all year. Somewhere I can hear the Allman Brother’s singing “you’re my blue sky, you’re my sunny day”…
As you know, I have been making the call for Dow 10,000 since early summer and have been the bull’s biggest cheerleader since March when we started going long the market when everybody was still selling. We used longer-term options to see the forest through the trees and we were well rewarded.
If the news this week is good, the Dow may well pass 10,000 for the first time in over a year. What? You think it’s a coincidence that IBM, Intel (INTC, $20.17, up $0.29), Cisco Systems (CSCO, $24.03, $0.36) and Apple (AAPL, $190.47, up $1.20) are all approaching 52-week highs…
Earnings will be big this week but we will also have some economic reports that we will need to monitor. The Federal Reserve will release their meeting minutes from their September 22-23 gathering and Wall Street likes to look for the devil in the details. The minutes will be out Wednesday and could give us clues about the Fed’s plans for pulling back on its stimulus measures, including near-zero interest rates.
The Commerce Department will report Retail Sales for September and Business Inventories for August, on Wednesday as well. Other key reports will be the Consumer Price Index on Thursday and a preliminary reading on Consumer Sentiment will come out on Friday.
As we head to press, Dow futures are up 43 to 9,850. Subscribers, check the Members Area this morning for the trade updates.
Tags: Alcoa, Cisco Systems, IBM, Intel, momentum options, momentum options trading, Momentum stocks, option trade picks, options track record Posted in Earnings, Financial Stocks, Market Analysis, Market Commentary, Option Trades, Sectors | Comments Off
Thursday, October 8th, 2009
1:00pm (EST)
The bulls are resuming their climb towards Dow 10,000 after getting positive earnings from Alcoa (AA, $14.54, up $0.34) and a couple of better-than-expected economic reports. The Dow added nearly 250 points on Monday and Tuesday and took a breather yesterday as it lost 6 points. Currently, the Dow is up 93 to 9,818 while the S&P 500 is up 12 points to 1,070. The Nasdaq is chipping in with a 27 point rally and is at 2,139.
The Labor Department reported that new claims for jobless benefits fell to 521,000 last week, down from 554,000 the previous week and better than Wall Street had expected. The bulls found added momentum in this report because it was the lowest level since early January.
Retail stocks are rolling as retailers saw their first sales gains in more than a year last month. The sector showed an increase of 0.1% for September, compared with a 1% drop a year ago. I don’t see what the big deal is but a number of stocks are benefitting as a result.
Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF, $35.14, up $2.48) is up nearly 8% and we just closed a short-side trade that netted us nearly 30%. The stock is now at the “top” of its recent trading range so it remains to been seen if it breaks resistance here and heads up to $40 or falls back to $30. We may have to look at this one again next week…
I also wanted to talk about using cheap out-of-the-money options and earnings. Most of our trades aren’t based around earnings but they come up every three months so you have to work around them. Most options “experts” will tell you to leave these types of plays alone but if you have a solid trading plan, one that consistently produces profits, then it is cool to throw a little loose change on some speculative trades.
I had mentioned a couple of Alcoa options yesterday that weren’t in the Members Area because I didn’t know which way Alcoa would be reporting. The Street was expecting a loss but I had pointed out that there was 3x more call buying than put buying heading into Alcoa’s earnings report.
The October 14 calls (AAJN, $0.84, up $0.08) were at 63 cents yesterday in the 1pm update and hit a high of $1.20 this morning…almost a free double that market was giving us…
Anyway, those are the types of returns these types of option trades can provide but you have to be in-and-out. I thought Alcoa would miss earnings (like Wall Street was predicting) but the momentum in this stock was apparent all week.
We have one of these types of trades going with Intel (INTC, $19.92, up $0.17) right now. Subscribers, check the Members Area for the 1pm update on this trade and the Pepsico (PEP, $60.13, down $1.04) trade.
Tags: Abercrombie & Fitch, Alcoa, Intel, momentum plays, Momentum stocks, option picks, options track record Posted in Earnings, Financial Stocks, Hot Stocks, Market Analysis, Market Commentary, Oil | Comments Off
Friday, August 28th, 2009
2:00pm (EST)
The Dow is struggling after starting off the morning in the green. Intel (INTC, $20.25, up $0.78) got the ball rolling after the company raised its sales forecast for the current quarter from $8.9 billion to $9.2 billion and Dell (DELL, $16.08, up $0.43) came in with better-than-expected earnings. However, all the major indexes are now lower as the Dow has fallen 65 points and is currently trading at 9,515. The Nasdaq has slipped 6 points to 2,021 while the S&P 500 is down 5 to 1,025.
We added the Citigroup (C, $5.20, up $0.15) call options this morning and there are a few other names I like and don’t like.
As far as specific stocks, make sure you close the AIG (AIG, $49.81, up $1.97) call options today. The stock hit a high of $55.90 this morning which represented the perfect opportunity to sell the September 35 calls (IKGII, $15.80, up $1.70) which printed $21.00 today. Incredible. I’ve got another strangle option trade in the works for Sunday night and AIG has proven the kind returns that can made with strangles
DryShips (DRYS, $6.05, down $0.19) couldn’t carry the momentum from yesterday so there was no day trade.
I’ll be back Sunday night with the updates.
Rick@MomentumOptionsTrading.com
Tags: AIG, c, Citigroup, Dell, drys, IKG, INTC, Intel, options trading strategies Posted in Company Commentary, Financial Stocks, Market Analysis, Option Trades | No Comments »
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Dow Eyes 10,000
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
9:05am (EST)
Futures are pointing towards a HUGE open this morning after strong earnings results from Intel (INTC, $20.49) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM, $45.66).
JPMorgan Chase easily beat Wall Street’s expectations, after reporting a profit of $3.6 billion for the quarter. Although the company said loan losses are still high and are likely to remain elevated for some time, the results were jaw-dropping.
JPMorgan said it earned 82 cents a share, up from 9 cents a share in the same quarter a year ago, but they beat estimates by 30 cents, folks! Wall Street was expecting the company to earn 52 cents a share. Wow! Shares are up $2 to $47.66 in early trading.
Of course, Intel also beat Wall Street’s estimates and we have been on this story like grass on dirt. We sent out a News Flash last night alerting our subscribers of the after-hours jump and it looks as though those gains are going to hold. In pre-market trading, shares are up 93 cents, to $21.42.
Ahead of the bell, Dow futures are up 109, or 1.1%, to 9,918. The S&P 500 futures are higher by 15, or 1.5%, to 1,084, while the Nasdaq 100 futures are surging by 25, or 1.4%, to 1,751. All aboard!
Gold continues to set record highs. This morning, the yellow metal hit a high of $1,072 an ounce. Oil is above $75 a barrel for the first time in a year.
Current subscribers can check the Members Area for more detailed instructions on how to play Intel from here on out. Many of you should have made well over 100% on the trades and some of you might reach returns of up to 200%! As always, your comments are always welcomed so send us a line if you cashed out on this huge monster!
Tags: Intel, JPMorgan Chase, options blog, options mentoring, options track record, options trade picks
Posted in Company Commentary, Earnings, Hot Stocks, Market Analysis, Market Commentary, Option Trades, Rick's Account | Comments Off