Well Puts

What a week. It always comes down so much faster than it goes up. You have to be willing to accept these draw-downs and be prepared to make trade adjustments as the markets warrant.

I made two adjustments this week to re-balance my inventory and avoid too many assignments. I like to spread these adjustments out over time in case the market can find support. I only want to make the adjustment if it is absolutely necessary.

On 1/27 I rolled the IAMGOLD Corp. (IAG) puts I wrote forward and down to March 12.50. I decided to take a loss on this as it was breaking down so quickly and the next support was in the 12.50-13.00 area which will also be the 200-day MA.

IAG-Daily

On 1/29 I rolled the SmartHeat (HEAT) puts forward to March and down to the 10 strike. I took a small loss on the HEAT adjustment. There is trendline support near 10.80.

HEAT-Daily

Sell to open HEAT February 12.50 puts.

SmartHeat, Inc. engages in the manufacture and sale of plate heat exchangers (PHEs) and packages, thermometer testing devices, and heat usage calculators in the People’s Republic of China.

I mentioned the other day that HEAT was on my watch-list. I was planning on more of a pullback before making this trade but this morning’s action made me enter the trade.

HEAT pulled back to the 38.2% retracement level on an hourly chart and has a rising 50 and 100 day SMA. I decided to go with the $12.50 strike which is also pretty solid support on the daily chart.

HEAT Daily

I’m having a bit of a tough time finding anything suitable to fill my February inventory. The silver miners are looking pretty good – notably PAAS, SLW, SSRI, SVM, MVG, HL. The silver miners would have been timed better if the puts were written last week, but it was a busy week for me and I missed it. I still think the trade could be done on a few of these. I like PAAS and I’ve done well with that one in the past.

I’m also watching apparel stores like ANF and CHS. I sold some puts on AEO about a week ago and that trade has been working out. Some other miscellaneous stocks include CIG and HEAT. The chart for CIG is almost perfect but the 17.50 strike is too close to the money. HEAT might be a good trade later this week or next week.

No trades today. I’m feeling rushed today and I feel like I need to write some puts – not the right mindset to be in when I’m logged into my brokerage account.