Freddie/Fannie Friday – Fat Forclosure Folios Forcasts Further Falls
by Phil - September 17th, 2010 7:56 am
![[FANREO]](http://sg.wsj.net/public/resources/images/MI-BF965_FANREO_NS_20100916200301.gif)
Our zombie GSE’s have now become the Nation’s biggest home sellers.
This could not come at a worse time as winter is always a poor time to sell homes, rates seem to have bottomed and there is no new stimulus (or new jobs, or immigration, or population growth) to spur demand. Yet, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae now own more than 191,000 homes (as of June 30th), which is double where they were last year and they are still taking back homes faster than they can sell them as we move into the peak (we hope!) of the foreclosure cycle.
Once they take homes back, Fannie and Freddie must not only cover the utility bills and property taxes, but they are also relying on thousands of real-estate agents and contractors to rehabilitate homes, mow lawns and clean pools. Fannie took a $13 billion charge during the second quarter just on carrying costs for its properties.
If demand remains weak, Fannie and Freddie could face pressure to take more aggressive steps to hold homes off the market. Fannie, for example, is testing an effort in Chicago where it will rent vacant foreclosures rather than list them for sale. Such a "lease-and-hold" approach could make sense in certain markets where "you believe the supply will take a long time to absorb, but there’s going to be an increase in employment going forward," says Douglas Duncan, chief economist at Fannie Mae.
In yesterday’s post, we discussed the death of the housing market and that brought about a discussion in Member Chat about my February article where I pointed out that the math of home ownership no longer works for many Americans (I also showed 3 different ways you can shave $100,000 in payments off a $200,000 home loan so I do suggest reading it if you haven’t already). Mark McHugh of The Daily Bail has a nice update today where he does the math and contends that "a look behind the numbers shows home ownership to be a poor investment." Barry Rhitholtz found a chart from Reality Bubble Monitor that matches with my contention yesterday (that the US has likely bottomed) but points out that our "boom" economies in Australia and Canada (and China is about the same) have bubbles that are still likely to pop:
As I said yesterday, home prices are all about affordability of mortgages and, should we get into a rising rate environment, we could…
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Goldilocks and the 300,000,000 Bears
by Phil - August 14th, 2010 3:43 am
Talk about feeling outnumbered!
As the guy in Airplane kind of said – "Looks like I pricked the wrong week to get bullish!" Of course, as I often tell people I am neither bullish nor bearish – I’m rangeish – and our range is the 5% band between around Dow 10,200 and S&P 1,070, which takes us as low as Dow 9,690 and S&P 1,016 and as high as Dow 10,710 and S&P 1,123 before I really "flip flop" my positions. Despite the fact that this is the range we predicted last October and is the range we’ve been in (other than a brief trip to 11,200, which we shorted the hell out of) all year – people still seem to find it necessary to call me either bullish or bearish as we navigate the channel.
I suppose I have been HOPEFUL for the month (now heading into day 14) that we will finally make a little progress and establish a higher floor at our usual mid-points while, at the same time, the MSM have decided that we are all going to die. That does make me kind of bullish by comparison doesn’t it? We are mainly in cash and we are well hedged to the downside so, unless we are REALLY heading much, much lower, there is little profit in speculating to the downside, other than our quick trades. As PT Barnum once said:
"A man who is all caution, will never dare to take hold and be successful; and a man who is all boldness, is merely reckless, and must eventually fail. A man may go on "’change" and make fifty, or one hundred thousand dollars in speculating in stocks, at a single operation. But if he has simple boldness without caution, it is mere chance, and what he gains to-day he will lose to-morrow. You must have both the caution and the boldness, to insure success."
Balance is the key to long-term success and we’ve had many conversations about that in Member Chat. Our goal is to be neither bullish or bearish but rather to sell premium to both the bulls and the bears when conditions permit us. As Ravalos said Friday in Member Chat:
"Ever since I became member (actually before I became member I was already following your newsletter for quite some time) I find it hard for me to BUY PREMIUM. Over time, I’ve realized that buying the
…
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Cisco Put Sellers Shout loudest
by Andrew Wilkinson - August 12th, 2010 4:30 pm
Today’s tickers: CSCO, M, SPWRA & LEN
CSCO – Cisco Systems Inc. – A disappointing revenue forecast for the current quarter by computer giant Cisco late on Wednesday spawned more fears about the strength of global demand moving forward. Cisco’s shares fell pretty close to a 52-week low and stand 24% lower than an April peak. Options traffic was extremely hectic at 327,000 contracts. Atypical of a company in the aftermath of its earnings was a rise in implied volatility, which gained more than 10%. What stands out today is the put activity, where we’re noticing a preponderance to write premium. Investors are likely trying to take advantage of as much of a 13% share price decline to $21.00 on Thursday and used options expiring in the September contract to attempt a long entry to the stock. By selling puts at the $20.00 strike for 37 cents, investors are prepared to have stock in Cisco put to them at expiration in the event the stock trades south of the strike price. If not, they retain the premium in full as compensation for providing stock bears with the insurance. Of 12,000 contracts traded at that line, seven out of eight contracts were sold to the bid. The pattern was repeated in less daring fashion at the October $17.50 strike where an investor acted as a willing Cisco buyer through expiration in exchange for a 17 cent premium on 5,000 put options.
M – Macy’s Inc. – Despite its upbeat predictions for the remainder of the year when it topped earnings predictions on Wednesday, shares in Macy’s are caught in an otherwise weaker environment for retailers. Its shares are 1.2% lower at $20.26. Nevertheless one option investor took advantage of the current bout of weakness by targeting a call spread that will expire after next quarter’s earnings have been announced in November. The bullish play involved 20,000 call options spread evenly between the $21.00 and $24.00 strikes implying a maximum gain of $3.00 less the cost of today’s trade, which nets to 91 cents. The maximum gain of $2.09 would only occur in the event that shares in Macy’s rose 18.5% from present although on a simple breakeven basis the investor needs Macy’s shares to gain 5.5%.
SPWRA – SunPower Corp. – A chunk of 20,000 put options was traded on SunPower earlier at the far-dated January 2012 expiration. Time and sales…
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Pessimist Plants Put Spread on Comerica Inc.
by Andrew Wilkinson - August 6th, 2010 4:08 pm
Today’s tickers: CMA, CSCO, ATHN, FIG, CYD, CROX & NUAN
CMA – Comerica Inc. – The financial services firm’s shares declined as much as 4.8% today to touch down at an intraday low of $36.38. One options investor expecting Comerica’s shares to continue to head south ahead of October expiration purchased a plain-vanilla debit put spread. Shares are currently down 3.65% on the day to arrive at $36.82 just before 2:45 pm ET. The bearish player purchased 5,000 puts at the October $36 strike for an average premium of $2.05 per contract, and sold the same number of puts at the lower October $30 strike for an average premium of $0.50 apiece. The net cost of buying the spread amounts to $1.55 per contract. Thus, the investor responsible for initiating the transaction is poised to profit should CMA’s shares fall another 6.4% from the current price of $36.82 to trade below the effective breakeven point at $34.45 by expiration day. Maximum potential profits of $4.45 per contract pad the investor’s wallet if Comerica’s shares plummet 18.5% to slip beneath $30.00 by expiration in October. The surge in demand for options on the stock helped lift the overall reading of options implied volatility on CMA 9.1% to 34.00% this afternoon.
CSCO – Cisco Systems, Inc. – Wary options players are scooping up put options on the maker of switches and routers today with shares of the underlying stock trading lower by 0.95% to stand at $23.94 in late afternoon trading. Investors expecting to see Cisco’s shares decline following the firm’s fourth-quarter earnings report, scheduled for release after the closing bell on August 11, opted to purchase weekly put options expiring on August 13. Traders bought approximately 6,800 put options at the August $23 strike for an average premium of $0.26 apiece. Put buyers make money as long as Cisco’s shares fall another 5.00% from the current price of $23.94 to trade below the average breakeven point to the downside at $22.74 by expiration day.
ATHN – Athena Health, Inc. – Shares of the provider of Internet-based business services for physician practices fell as much as 4.00% today to an intraday low of $25.18. Today’s low point in ATHN shares marks an 11.025% decline in the price of the underlying stock since Monday when shares touched an intraday high of $28.30. Athena Health appeared on our scanners today after one bearish options…
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Which Way Wednesday – Topping or Popping?
by Phil - July 14th, 2010 8:14 am
Wheee, what a ride!
We only had one trade idea for Members all day Monday and that was the DIA $103 calls for .52 from the 9:46 Alert. It is extremely rare that we only have one trade in a day but there really wasn’t anything for us to do as we had been BUYBUYBUYing all last week so there was nothing to do but watch. The calls finished yesterday at $1.12 for a nice 115% gain in 24 hours but we took the money and ran at 10:04 on a spike up to $1.25 because it’s too close to expirations to mess around. They actually topped out at $1.55 near the close but - better safe than sorry. Anyway, we replaced them with IWM calls later in the day and those doubled up and we were out at the close – again, it just doesn’t pay to be greedy.
It’s fun to day trade options on expiration weeks because the premiums go way down and we get fantastic leverage. Our longer-term trades turned mixed for the first time in 2 weeks (we had been 100% bullish) and we went from one to a dozen trade ideas a day as we used DXD for an overall hedge and took bullish positions on AAPL (2), GOOG (2), INTC, T, TZA (which is really a bearish position) and bearish positions on DIA (2) and MA. Of course ALL of our bullish plays were hedged already so the mix was a real indication of how exhausted the rally was starting to look.
Too much, too fast was the watchword for Tuesday as we were already up 5% for the week so we expected a gap fill back to the open (didn’t come yet) before we get serious about taking out our levels (Dow 10,290, S&P 1,102, Nas 2,257, NYSE 6,930 and RUT 651). We expected good news from INTC (we did a bullish ratio spread aimed at $22) and now we’ll see if it’s good enough to get the Nas up to 2,257 but it was the NYSE that worried us yesterday as they were close but no cigar at our 6,930 target.
Gap filling would be nice and normal and would take us back to test Dow 10,200, S&P 1,075, Nas 2,200, NYSE 6,800 and Russell 620. If we can show a little support there and consolidate for the next run, we’ll be in pretty good shape to continue this run but FIRST we have to test them WITHOUT everyone freaking out and…
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9 Fabulous Dow Plays Plus A Chip Shot (Members Only)
by Phil - July 7th, 2010 7:24 am
We were discussing what to invest in in a terrible market this morning in Member Chat.
I thought it would be handy to add this post to our Buy List because 9 of my 10 picks below are Dow components and there are very easy ways to hedge our Dow purchases against disaster so it will be a good opportunity to construct a self-contained portfolio filled with dividend-paying stocks that are suitable for a long-term retirement account that we can buy using our discount strategy.
Let’s say we allocate $5,000 to each of these positions and we intend to buy $2,500 in the first round and hold $2,500 on the side in cash, in case the Dow does fall more than 20% and the majority of our stocks are put to us in a second round. In the below list, XOM and WMT are more expensive but others are less so you can buy 100 of the big boys (price-wise) and see what’s left or allocate a double helping for those two, so you’d be buying 100 shares for about $4,000 a block (after our discount) and hold back $4,000 on those two.
This is acceptable because we do have $50K in cash sitting around and A) We don’t really believe the Dow is falling below 8,000 B) When the stock is put to us our margin requirement will only be about $25K (assuming 50% margin for stocks held) as our short puts will be gone C) We will have a disaster hedge. On all of these plays, the upside is at least 25% so that’s also our built-in cushion, all the way to Dow 7,307 so we really only need our protection to kick in below 8,000.
Aside from our weekend 500% DXD disaster hedge, which is perfect to cover this group, we can do a very simple, margin-free hedge like the DIA 2012 $95/80 bear call spread for $5.50, which pays $15 if the Dow is below 8,000 in Jan 2012. So $5,500 put into this play returns $15,000, offering us an additional 20% downside protection, now down to Dow 5,845. If that seems silly to you (it does to me) then a $2,500 hedge that gives us an additional 10% downside protection would seem to be plenty.
Once we have that hedge in place, we can aim to make it free by selling puts. To make up $2,500 over 18…
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Bank of America Bear Cleans Up
by Andrew Wilkinson - May 28th, 2010 5:41 pm
Today’s tickers: BAC, FXY, VALE, ATPG, CAT, EBAY, CSCO, KG, NE & AGN
BAC – Bank of America Corp. – Activity in out-of-the-money call options on Bank of America in the first half of the trading session appears to be the work of an investor taking profits on the closing purchase of a previously established bearish short call position. BAC’s shares surrendered 1.85% today to stand at $15.88 as of 2:45 pm (ET). It looks like the investor originally sold 20,500 calls at the November $24 strike for an average premium of $0.37 per contract back on April 28, 2010, when shares of the underlying stock were trading at a volume-weighted average price of $17.73 each. In the past four weeks since the initial sale of the calls, Bank of America’s shares declined 12.12% down to the current price of $15.88. The call seller was properly positioned to benefit from share price erosion, and today was able to buy back the same call options for just $0.10 apiece. Thus, the closing purchase of the calls yields net profits of $0.27 per contract to the responsible party.
FXY – CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Index Fund – A sizeable debit call spread enacted on the FXY, an exchange-traded fund designed to reflect the price of the Japanese Yen, indicates one options strategist is expecting shares of the underlying fund to rally sharply by expiration in January 2011. Shares of the fund are currently up 0.18% at $109.14 as of 1:52 pm (ET). The investor purchased 8,709 calls at the January 2011 $110 strike for a premium of $4.40 apiece, and sold the same number of calls at the higher January 2011 $125 strike for $1.00 in premium each. The net cost of the transaction amounts to $3.40 per contract, thus dictating a breakeven price – above which profits start to accumulate – of $113.40. Shares of the FXY must rally at least 3.90% from the current value of $109.14 before the responsible party starts to make money. Maximum potential profits of $11.60 per contract are available to the spread trader if shares jump 14.53% from the current value of the fund to $125.00 in the next eight months to expiration. It does not appear the fund’s share price has ever exceeded the current 52-week high of $115.40, attained back on November 30, 2009.
VALE – Vale S.A. – Shares of the world’s largest…
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Emerging Markets Bear With Butterfly Wings Dominates EEM Puts In Afternoon Trading
by Andrew Wilkinson - May 24th, 2010 4:32 pm
Today’s tickers: EEM, ETFC, CVA, CSCO, CMCSK, XLI, CATM, AXL & ASML
EEM – iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Index ETF – An enormous bearish put butterfly spread comprised of 240,000 put options cast a gloomy shadow over the emerging markets fund late in afternoon trading. Shares of the EEM, an exchange-traded fund designed to provide investment results that correspond to the price and yield performance of the MSCI Emerging Markets Index – an index created to measure equity market performance in the global emerging markets, are down 0.35% at $37.21 as of 3:30 pm (ET). The massive bearish transaction on the fund suggests one big player is bracing for a potential 19% pullback in the price of the underlying shares by June expiration. The butterfly spread spans the June $25/$30/$35 strikes, with 60,000 puts picked up at the June $25 strike for a premium of $0.11 each [wing 1] and another 60,000 puts purchased at the higher June $35 strike for a premium of $0.88 apiece [wing 2]. The body of the butterfly involved the sale of 120,000 puts at the central June $30 strike for a premium of $0.27 a-pop. The net cost of the spread amounts to $0.45 per contract. The EEM’s shares must slip beneath the upper breakeven price of $34.55 before the investor starts to make money ahead of June expiration. Maximum available profits of $4.55 per contract pad the investor’s wallet if shares of the underlying fund fall 19.35% from the current price to settle at $30.00 at expiration. Shares of the EEM last traded below $34.55 back on August 19, 2009, and touched a 52-week low of $30.12 back on June 23, 2009. The investor responsible for the giant transaction only ever risks losing $0.45 per contract, but stands ready to amass more than 10 times that amount – $4.55 per contract – if shares nose-dive down to $30.00 ahead of expiration day next month.
ETFC – E*Trade Financial Corp. – A massive three-legged options combination play initiated on financial services firm, E*Trade Financial Corp., suggests one investor sees shares of the provider of online brokerage services trading within a narrow range through expiration in January 2011. ETFC shares are up 2.05% at $1.49 as of 2:30 pm (ET). The big options player initiated a sold strangle, selling 30,000 calls at the January 2011 $2.0 strike for $0.21 apiece and shedding 30,000 puts at…
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Homebuilders ETF Bull Ditches Massive Call Position in the Nick of Time
by Andrew Wilkinson - May 7th, 2010 5:07 pm
Today’s tickers: XHB, XLV, SHW, CSCO, AMR, DD & FRX
XHB – SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF – It looks like one big options player threw in the towel on a massive bullish stance involving XHB call contracts today as shares of the underlying fund surrendered 2% to stand at $17.31 as of 1:00 pm (ET). The investor appears to have purchased roughly 50,000 calls at the January 2011 $22.5 strike for an average premium of $0.60 apiece back on April 22, 2010, when shares of the fund were trading at a volume-weighted average price of $19.04. Just four days after the purchase of the call contracts, the homebuilders fund’s share price touched a new 52-week high of $20.00. With the benefit of hindsight, it’s clear the trader would have been better off ditching the calls back on April 26, 2010. However, it seems the investor decided to sell the calls today – perhaps fearing the fund’s shares are only heading lower – for an average premium of $0.66 apiece to take in average net profits of $0.06 per contract. Again, with our hindsight coming in at a perfect 20/20, the trader made the right decision to sell the calls this morning because shares of the XHB are now down 3.1% to $17.11 as of 1:15 pm (ET), and the calls may now be sold for just $0.57 per contract. Waiting just a couple of hours more to sell the calls today would have resulted in a net loss rather than a net gain to the trader.
XLV – Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund – Shares of the XLV, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the price and yield performance of the Health Care Select Sector of the S&P 500 Index, are trading 0.90% lower at $29.85 as of 12:35 pm (ET). Options traders populating the fund today are mostly placing bearish bets that shares of the underlying fund are set to decline ahead of May expiration. However, there was some notable contrarian activity in May contract calls, as well. Pessimistic players bracing for continued share price erosion picked up roughly 5,400 puts at the now in-the-money May $30 strike for an average premium of $0.56 apiece. Put buyers at this strike price make money if the XLV’s share price slips beneath the average breakeven point to the downside at $29.44 by expiration day. Buying interest continued at the more bearish…
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
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