Author Archives: TheAcsMan

Daily Market Update – August 26,  2015  (7:15 AM)

It’s hard to describe the disappointment that accompanied yesterday’s trading, but being entirely surprised should probably not have been one of the things felt during the course of the day.

The final hour, though, was surprising, as you did have to wonder where the selling originated.

The “why” part of the question isn’t too hard to understand, as some may have seen the gain as an opportunity to get just a little more before getting out.

Deep down I thought that there still might be a wave of selling related to the need for mutual funds and ETFs to honor redemption orders. There’s no stated rule that says that they have to do that by flooding the order desks with those market depressing orders all at once and first thing in the morning.

This morning the Chinese stock market, the one that really matters, in Shanghai is again lower, but this time by less than 2%.

I’ve definitely lost track of how much that market has lost in the past 2 weeks or so, but after looking it up, it’s an astonishing 28%, while our own S&P 500 is down about 8% in the same time period.

I guess in a world where everything is relative that should leave you feeling warm and fuzzy, but it doesn’t really feel like that this morning, even as the futures are suggesting that they may just go and erase yesterday’s loss.

It’s still hard to believe that we can talk about yesterday as having been a loss, even though there’s plenty of precedence for this sort of thing after very large losses and early reversals the following morning.

With no positions set to expire this week, partially by design, I’m still looking at any opportunities to roll over any contracts expiring in subsequent weeks, but despite some increases in volatility, the volume has been exceptionally light on both calls and puts.

That just shows that there is absolutely no sense of confidence about what may come next. Not by speculators, not by portfolio hedgers.

Yesterday’s early trading would have been a nice time to try and sell some new option contracts or even consider doing some rollovers, but the liquidity just wasn’t there, as the market’s decline has just been to sudden to get very many to re-align their strategies and implement them.

The sell-off during yesterday’s final hour should do very much to bolster option trader’s confidence today, even as the market is pointing higher. In fact, that early move higher may just send more confusion through the system.

I don’t expect to be doing much for the rest of the week other than to see what else the Chinese government and the People’s Bank of China will attempt to do to calm their markets and control their currency.

For now, whatever they do, we are going to be held captive, although maybe tomorrow’s GDP Report and Jobless Claims will give us reason to focus within for a few brief moments and remember that there’s nothing in our economy that remotely warrants the kind of reaction we have seen in our markets, even though they’ve been comparatively muted compared to a half world away.

Daily Market Update – August 25,  2015  (Close)

WHat do you say about today except to shake your head and wonder why the day couldn’t have ended an hour earlier?

It’s probably senseless to try and describe yesterday’s action and now today may be equally as senseless of a thing to attempt to do.

Whatever it was that caused the 1000 point decline in the first 10 minutes yesterday, somehow it didn’t really frighten away some brave people. 

Lots of those people came out of the woodwork today but may be left wondering what exactly happened.

No one was more surprised than me to be among those adding new positions yesterday morning, but in hindsight it may have seemed premature to have done so as the market ended up the day having done just as badly as it ended the previous week.

Today was probably a good day not to have chased the market unless you were really a very short term trader.

The conventional wisdom is that these kind of plunges, as seen on Monday, are necessary in order to flush sellers out of the system and then you often see a significant bounce higher.

The late Mark Haines of CNBC used to be very calm in the face of these kind of early morning sell-offs that followed a similarly large sell off the previous day because his experience was that was the first step of the climb higher.

That seemed to be the case yesterday, but what was missing yesterday was any sense of frenzied selling, despite the fact that there was a 1000 point decline in those first 10 minutes.

Given how quickly the recovery set in, there had to be the realization that the decline was not something truly based on market forces, but rather the result of sell orders hitting mutual funds on Friday and perhaps some hedge funds calling it quits, in addition to forced margin selling.

Later, another reversal of the initial reversal, something that we may need to get used to, was fairly orderly.

So if you were waiting for a real blow off kind of moment, also called “capitulation,” it hasn’t really shown up yet. What we have been seeing, and this morning’s futures were consistent with that, is the typical kind of out-sized moves in alternating directions that you see in a bear market.

Those moves actually started more than 2 months ago. In fact, people who study this sort of thing will tell you that you don’t even need the alternating component. Simply seeing out-sized moves higher is emblematic of being in a bear market.

Who knows.

This morning came as China’s Shanghai exchange was down another 7%.

I went to bed last night seeing the Shanghai futures trading much lower, but the US futures were picking up strength, which came as a surprise.

The extent of that divergence when waking up this morning was a real surprise, that was widened when the People’s Bank of China announced an easing on its lending and bank reserve requirements.

We’ll see.

So far the attempts to control China’s markets, currency and economy haven’t fared terribly well, but these things are like trying to stop a steaming locomotive. If you remember your basic physics, there’s that concept of “momentum” at play. It takes lots and lots of energy to put the brakes on something with momentum.

That’s exactly what economies have. Lots of momentum and typically very slow to respond to external forces.

With a couple of new positions opened yesterday and the market moving higher for most of the day,I would have loved any opportunity to sell more calls, but with the move higher comes a drop in volatility. Yesterday, in looking for call sales opportunities the prevailing picture was that of a dumb struck options market. The moves were so sudden and pronounced that there were very, very few bids, so sellers were there to sell, but no one was there to buy. Not even offering a ceremonial bid that could offer some room for negotiation.

Now we’ll see how or if that changes tomorrow, because it sure didn’t change today..

Daily Market Update – August 25,  2015  (8:15 AM)

It’s probably senseless to try and describe yesterday’s action.

Whatever it was that caused the 1000 point decline in the first 10 minutes, somehow it didn’t really frighten away some brave people.

No one was more surprised than me to be among those adding new positions yesterday morning, but in hindsight it may have seemed premature to have done so as the market ended up the day having done just as badly as it ended the previous week.

The conventional wisdom is that these kind of plunges are necessary in order to flush sellers out of the system and then you often see a significant bounce higher.

The late Mark Haines of CNBC used to be very calm in the face of these kind of early morning sell-offs that followed a similarly large sell off the previous day because his experience was that was the first step of the climb higher.

That seemed to be the case yesterday, but what was missing yesterday was any sense of frenzied selling, despite the fact that there was a 1000 point decline in those first 10 minutes.

Given how quickly the recovery set in, there had to be the realization that the decline was not something truly based on market forces, but rather the result of sell orders hitting mutual funds on Friday and perhaps some hedge funds calling it quits, in addition to forced margin selling.

Later, another reversal of the initial reversal, something that we may need to get used to, was fairly orderly.

So if you were waiting for a real blow off kind of moment, also called “capitulation,” it hasn’t really shown up yet. What we have been seeing, and this morning’s futures are consistent with that, is the typical kind of out-sized moves in alternating directions that you see in a bear market.

Those moves actually started more than 2 months ago. In fact, people who study this sort of thing will tell you that you don’t even need the alternating component. Simply seeing out-sized moves higher is emblematic of being in a bear market.

Who knows.

This morning comes as China’s Shanghai exchange was down another 7%.

I went to bed last night seeing the Shanghai futures trading much lower, but the US futures were picking up strength, which came as a surprise.

The extent of that divergence when waking up tghis morning was a real surprise, that was widened when the People’s Bank of China announced an easing on its lending and bank reserve requirements.

We’ll see.

So far the attempts to control China’s markets, currency and economy haven’t fared terribly well, but these things are like trying to stop a steaming locomotive. If you remember your basic physics, there’s that concept of “momentum” at play. It takes lots and lots of energy to put the brakes on something with momentum.

That’s exactly what economies have. Lots of momentum and typically very slow to respond to external forces.

With a couple of new positions opened yesterday and the market moving higher, I would love any opportunity to sell more calls, but with the move higher comes a drop in volatility. Yesterday, in looking for call sales opportunities the prevailing picture was that of a dumb struck options market. The moves were so sudden and pronounced that there were very, very few bids, so sellers were there to sell, but no one was there to bu
y. Not even offering a ceremonial bid that could offer some room for negotiation.

We’ll see how or if that changes today.

Daily Market Update – August 25,  2015  (8:15 AM)

It’s probably senseless to try and describe yesterday’s action.

Whatever it was that caused the 1000 point decline in the first 10 minutes, somehow it didn’t really frighten away some brave people.

No one was more surprised than me to be among those adding new positions yesterday morning, but in hindsight it may have seemed premature to have done so as the market ended up the day having done just as badly as it ended the previous week.

The conventional wisdom is that these kind of plunges are necessary in order to flush sellers out of the system and then you often see a significant bounce higher.

The late Mark Haines of CNBC used to be very calm in the face of these kind of early morning sell-offs that followed a similarly large sell off the previous day because his experience was that was the first step of the climb higher.

That seemed to be the case yesterday, but what was missing yesterday was any sense of frenzied selling, despite the fact that there was a 1000 point decline in those first 10 minutes.

Given how quickly the recovery set in, there had to be the realization that the decline was not something truly based on market forces, but rather the result of sell orders hitting mutual funds on Friday and perhaps some hedge funds calling it quits, in addition to forced margin selling.

Later, another reversal of the initial reversal, something that we may need to get used to, was fairly orderly.

So if you were waiting for a real blow off kind of moment, also called “capitulation,” it hasn’t really shown up yet. What we have been seeing, and this morning’s futures are consistent with that, is the typical kind of out-sized moves in alternating directions that you see in a bear market.

Those moves actually started more than 2 months ago. In fact, people who study this sort of thing will tell you that you don’t even need the alternating component. Simply seeing out-sized moves higher is emblematic of being in a bear market.

Who knows.

This morning comes as China’s Shanghai exchange was down another 7%.

I went to bed last night seeing the Shanghai futures trading much lower, but the US futures were picking up strength, which came as a surprise.

The extent of that divergence when waking up tghis morning was a real surprise, that was widened when the People’s Bank of China announced an easing on its lending and bank reserve requirements.

We’ll see.

So far the attempts to control China’s markets, currency and economy haven’t fared terribly well, but these things are like trying to stop a steaming locomotive. If you remember your basic physics, there’s that concept of “momentum” at play. It takes lots and lots of energy to put the brakes on something with momentum.

That’s exactly what economies have. Lots of momentum and typically very slow to respond to external forces.

With a couple of new positions opened yesterday and the market moving higher, I would love any opportunity to sell more calls, but with the move higher comes a drop in volatility. Yesterday, in looking for call sales opportunities the prevailing picture was that of a dumb struck options market. The moves were so sudden and pronounced that there were very, very few bids, so sellers were there to sell, but no one was there to bu
y. Not even offering a ceremonial bid that could offer some room for negotiation.

We’ll see how or if that changes today.

Daily Market Update – August 24,  2015  (Close)

Last night when looking at the thinly traded US futures, things were looking pretty bleak as the overseas futures were again pointing much lower.

However, the last time I looked before going to bed the tone had changed considerably as the US futures were down only 95 points.

Based on the way Friday had closed, with a loss of more than 500 points on the DJIA and accelerating at that, a mere 95 points would have felt like a rally.

This morning that picture was again totally different. The picture facing us this morning reflected the fact that the Shanghai market essentially had an entire correction in a single trading session, having gone down just shy of 10%, although not to the same degree.

Japan followed and the European markets aren’t being left too far behind.

Our own futures, now with trading less thin in the morning session was rapidly deteriorating and within 10 minutes of the opening bell the DJIA was down just over 1000 points.

None of what we are seeing on our shores reflects anything on our shores, but that doesn’t matter for now.

Yesterday;’s decision by China to allow the nation’s pension funds invest in stocks may have had one intent, but it sent an entirely different message.

That message was one of desperation and exasperation and when the Chinese government gets to the point that it feels as if it is being backed up against a wall, everyone needs to be very cautious.

A cash strapped China can have very powerful impact on us if they decide they need to get out of their immense Treasury holdings, which are now trading at below 2% for the 10 Year. That represents a 25% decline in rates at a time when everyone was banking on rising rates, although at the same time widespread selling by China could send those rates much higher again.

Then, add Saudi Arabia into that picture as oil falls even more this morning and is now below $40/barrel. Even Saudi Arabia may begin to have a need for cash soon.

This morning the futures were trading nearly 700 points lower and the S&P 500 was on track to join the DJIA in official correction territory if the futures trading losses would have persisted into the trading session.

They did. Then they didn’t and then they did again to finish the day.

Some of these individual stock price drops that have been seen and were being seen in the morning’s futures trading were really stunning. They are the kind that we really haven’t seen in 7 years, as it’s hard to imagine companies such as Apple and others being down 25% in such a short time frame.

There’s very little to do in the face of that kind of selling.

The one thing to look for is any opportunity to take advantage of should be increasing option premiums and the use of out of the money strikes. That was actually a good combination in 2008 and early 2009, as it was again in the latter half of 2011.

Volatility, while so very significantly higher over the past 2 weeks is still afar cry from 2008, 2009 or even 2011, but the search for those premium opportunities can at least begin to take place.

There are no positions set to expire this week and that was partially by design as last weeks rollovers specifically sought to buy some time as the market was already deteriorating. Seeing this morning’s sharp decline the first thought is that more time should have been bought.

While I didn’t plan on being one of those brave ones to try and figure out where the market’s bottom will be, I surprised myself with 2 new positions added this morning. I thought tha today’s focus
would be on where income generation can be found to try and offset the broadly distributed declines.

At least there was one of those, as well.

The one positive note this morning was that, if on heavy volume, it may have represented a “blow off” kind of selling that is very often followed by a bounce higher.

That bounce higher came and did so very emphatically, but had no staying power, as there may have been lots of mutual fund and ETF redemptions that still needed to be dealt with.

The late in the day sell off will undoubtedly leave a hangover for tomorrow as there were very likely an additional wave of sell orders hitting mutual funds as the market came to its close.

If that’s the case, the question will again fall to China to see what its next step will be and then back to the FOMC to see whether it begins to look at the loss of wealth experienced over this summer in deciding what to do regarding interest rates.

For now, the only hope may be that whoever has cash overseas may begin to look to the United States as their safety haven and flee with whatever cash they have to our shores to at least inject some buying.

While people are divided over the issue of immigration, right now most everyone would welcome foreign cash on our shores, even if caked in white powder.