Uncle Bill

Total Rating:
0 / 0

92 Comments

    • Sun Sep 30th 15:15 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Sectors in the Thematic Spotlight
      I get it, you don't have room in this post to tell us what you think is going to happen with those sectors you mentioned. I don't care that you've written about it before -- I want to know what you think of these sectors right now, so I can judge your approach. This article provides no help for those of us seeking alpha. It's just a report of what has happened. No alpha at all.
      View article »
    • Sun Sep 30th 10:23 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Sectors in the Thematic Spotlight
      We can make graphs too, Vinny. "Insight will be gained"? Why did you write this Vinnny? If you believe it's relevant info, why don't you tell us what's going to happen. Are these themes going to continue? Are the groups that have outperfromed going to continue to do so? Why? Without answering these questions, your information is "yesterday's macro news."
      View article »
    • Sun Sep 30th 10:10 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Sector Week-in-Review: Market Takes a Breather
      No alpha help here.
      View article »
    • Sat Sep 29th 11:17 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Options Trader: Friday Outlook
      You recommend an option trade on each of the DJIA stocks, then write "it is logical to short the index in case of emergency." What does that mean? Education and portfolio management? Ongoing hedging strategy? Last time I asked how you do what you do you told me that what you do is for fun. You don't educate, you don't manage a portfolio, you don't have a hedging strategy. In this post you say you sold the DIA puts as soon as they showed a loss. Please educate me as to how getting rid of one side of a long/short trade as soon as the market moves is portfolio management or hedging. And his question still remains -- why the DIA's? Because you arbitrarily decided to trade the Dow stocks because you need something to write about, That's the answer to his question -- there's no reason for choosing these stocks and this index, I just needed something to spew about.
      View article »
    • Thu Sep 27th 11:23 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Understanding Contrarianism and Bubbles
      Your arm must be sore from patting yourself on the back so much.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 26th 11:09 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Options Trader: Plays on Dow Components
      Writing LEAP puts? About 2/3 of option premium is expected to waste away during the last six weeks of an option's life. By selling so far away, you never get the advantage of that premium erosion. Your gain is limited to the amount of the put you've sold, while your loss is limited only by the price of the stock. You're essentially betting on the direction of the stock, and you've capped your upside gain in order to invest more money in the strategy than if you just bought the stocks on margin. If the market falls dramatically one day while you're holding these puts, you'll lose all the money you've made since '02. The best way to avoid this is to sell puts on stocks that already have fallen more than two standard deviations below their mean prices. Also, don't employ this strategy once the market itself has moved more than two standard deviations above its mean price. If the market falls after an extended rise, your short puts will get killed by volatility expansion too. This is a very dangerous strategy in this market environment.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 26th 10:16 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Think Housing's Bad? You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet
      I think these estimates look about right. But isn't there a built-in downside bias to this particular futures market? Who would want to go long the futures, when there are so many other vehicles available to go long the housing market? It seems the only viable use for these futures is to hedge against the underlying (home) you already own, whether it's in a portfolio or you're sitting in it now. Any ideas out there about who wants to take the other side of a short position in housing futures? By the way, Shiller is one of my heroes. "Market Volatility," from the late '80s, is a classic, yet it still reveals many truths about today's market.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 26th 08:26 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Gold Has More To Run, Whatever The Benchmark
      Hey Thomas. The XAU hit two standard deviations above its 90-day mean price -- based on option market expectations -- last Thursday with the index around 172. The index ran from 120, where it was two standard deviations below its 90-day mean price, to 170 in a month. It's pulled back a little since, which indicates to me this is a technical, speculator-supported market rather than a fundamental event. Furthermore, the option implied volatility for XAU is 38 -- one of the highest among sector indexes. This past run equated to a year's worth of performance by the index based on the option implied volatility estimates. And finally, the correlation between the major market indexes and XAU has to be the highest in history. This is a trader's market, and traders should be selling XAU.
      http/impliedrisk.blogs...
      View article »
    • Mon Sep 24th 20:29 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Volatility of Broad-Based ETFs
      The Law of Large Numbers tells you that the volatility of a broad-based ETF will be less than the averaged volatility of its members. That's because not all elements of the index will reach extremes at the same time. Take the Dow Jones Industrial Average, for example: The Diamonds Trust, which tracks the DJIA, closed yesterday with an option implied volatility of 18. On the same day, the lowest option implied volatility of any of the 30 members of the index was 19 from Proctor & Gamble (PG). DuPont (DD) was 22, UTX was 23 and Disney (DIS) was 25. The rest were higher. The answer to your customer's question is that broad-based ETFs are less volatile than their components. As for Geoff's assertion that "sector ETFs will often be as volatile or more volatile than a substantial fraction of individual stocks," I'd like to see some proof. Take Gold/Silver (XAU). It's loaded with speculators, and it carries an implied volatility of 38. Implied volatilities for it's two main components -- Barrick (ABX) is 36 and Newmont (NEM) is 32. The smaller companies in the index carry higher implied volatilities. That's because right now the index is moving higher. When the index is moving down, all of the component's implied volatilities will be higher than the index. For more information about how the understanding of implied volatility can help you trade the market, check me out at
      http:/impliedrisk.blog... Thanks.
      View article »
    • Fri Sep 21st 11:38 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Fed Cut and Housing Markets
      Sure the price rise was "theirs to begin with." All they had to do was sell thier house and move into a rental. Then when prices drop, take that money from your overpriced house and buy a new one at a cheaper level. That way, you'd be taking advantage of pie-in-the-sky appraisals rather than complaining about them.
      View article »
    • Thu Sep 20th 08:41 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Fed's Loose Monetary Policy Crushes the Dollar
      How is this Seeking Alpha? You don't take a position, you just report old news. Dollar is at an all-time low, stock market is just off its all-time high. What should we do? Is the dollar going to rally while the stock market sinks? Has that ever happened? The market hasn't cared about a weak dollar to date -- is it suddenly going to start paying attention if the dollar drops lower? Answering any of these questions in an intelligent fashion might add to my Alpha. Otherwise, quit wasting my time.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 19th 16:16 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Mean Reversion and Cheap Financial Stocks
      Mark, where's the mean these stocks are reverting to? Is that as far as they'll go, back to the mean? Also, how do you figure your standard deviation and your mean? Finally, did you think these stocks would revert to the mean back in June? I'm interested in your approach -- this looks like good stuff.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 19th 11:44 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Bernanke Just Lost A Lot Of My Respect
      Gold/Silver (XAU) has gone from around 120 to around 170 -- an all-time high -- in about a month. Right now, option implied volatility is at 40, another all-time high. Implied volatility usually drops when issues move higher, but not this time. That's because there are more speculators in the gold arena than anywhere else. Finally, correlation between the stock market and gold is incredibly high. I like gold stocks, too, but not at these levels. This is a trader's market, not the place you flee to avoid risk.
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 19th 11:01 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Charting the Market's Response To Yesterday's Rate Cut
      I think it's just the chart. It looks like volatility is lower back in the day because the index was around 500. With the index at 1000, movements on the chart would appear to be twice as large even if the volatility stayed the same. It's all about the scale of the chart. Wonder what it would look like if the top scale on the left side was 30, or the top scale on the right was 3,000. That''s why I asked what the charts mean. But I think Bespoke can't tell us because they manage money, and they have a fiduciary responsibility to determine if thier advice is appropriate for each client. Am I right?
      View article »
    • Wed Sep 19th 07:57 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Charting the Market's Response To Yesterday's Rate Cut
      Pretty charts. What's it mean for the market?
      View article »
Loading...
Symbols:
Authors:
Quick Links:
Contribute an Article Become a Seeking Alpha Contributor

Transcripts

More Transcripts»