Condor Options

If  you’re not sure what our overall net portfolio position is right now, you’re not alone. With all the adjustments and overlapping trades, it’s not easy to sort out what goes with what when looking at a position statement, and I’ve received a few e-mails from members asking for help.

So before we go any further with our trading, here’s a strike-by-strike tally of our open positions:

+1 SPY Nov 138 call
+1 SPY Nov 135 call
–3 SPY Nov 133 calls
–1 SPY Nov 132 call
–1 SPY Nov 125 put
–4 SPY Nov 119 puts
+3 SPY Nov 113 puts

+2 SPY Dec 137 calls
+2 SPY Dec 119 puts

Note that the number of contracts given is per base-position unit traded. So, for example, if you initially entered the Nov/Dec 119/125/133/137 double-diagonal at four contracts per leg, that would be two units and you’d want to see twice the number of contracts shown above at each strike. (That is, of course, if you want to be aligned with the newsletter portfolio…we’re not financial advisers, and nothing published here or on any of our other sites is intended as a recommendation to buy or sell any security. We just show you how we trade; how you use that information is entirely your decision.)

After three or four trades in a cycle, the Calendar Options strategy focuses on managing risk at the portfolio level more than the individual trades—but the purpose of the newsletter is educational, after all, so here are the individual “positions” that make up our current portfolio of open trades:

• Long SPY Nov/Dec 119/125/133/137 Double-Diagonal × 2
• Long SPY Nov 113/119/126 Put Butterfly × 1
• Short SPY Nov 113/119/132/138 Iron Condor × 1
• Short SPY Nov 113/119/133/135 Iron Condor × 1

As of this posting, it looks like we’ll be making yet another trade this afternoon.