Warren Buffett’s Secret to Making 100% a Year
by Phil - February 26th, 2011 10:51 am
I love the Berkshire Hathaway annual report!
Especially Warren Buffett’s letter to shareholders. The report gives us a great view of the overall economy from a man who has his finger in every pot and his letter to investors gives us a very good insight as to how things are going in the various sectors his operations cover. Most importantly, what I have learned in my own 40 years or reading Mr. Buffett’s reports (my Grandfather was a shareholder) is what should shape any long-term investing strategy: Patience and performance.
I often preach to members the joys of letting gains compound and our $25,000-$100,000 virtual Portfolio, which is currently at $27,531 (up 10%) after 4 weeks, is an exercise in how to quickly compound small gains over the course of a year. Primarily, we try to follow Warren Buffett’s Number One Rule of Investing, which is: Don’t Lose Money. Buffett’s Rule #2 is: See Rule #1 and like us, it’s not that nothing Warren Buffett ever buys loses money – it’s just that he doesn’t ever buy things he isn’t willing to stick with UNTIL they make money. Sure we take a few losses along the road but, by being selective in our entries, we don’t discard stocks that we carefully selected just because the market temporarily disagrees with our valuations.
In our $25,000 virtual Portfolio, it’s only been a month so we’ve only closed our winners so far and they were SPWRA with a 100% gain (these are option trades), INTC with a 40% gain, NFLX with a 42% gain, EDZ with a 75% gain, XLF with a 15% gain, VIX with a 50% gain, USO with a 53% gain and XLE with a 5% gain. In 19 trading day we have made 28 virtual portfolio moves (counting each leg) and, as I said, netted a 10% return to date. Interestingly, we’ve been playing it very cautious as we still have over $18,000 of virtual cash on the sidelines, hoping for a sign to get a little more aggressive next week.
How, you may wonder, are we going to get to $100,000 by December with just $27,531 in February? THAT is the lesson Warren Buffett has to give us and that lesson is COMPOUNDING RETURNS! Since 1965, Berkshire Hathaway has returned an overall gain of 490,409% to it’s shareholders. $10,000 handed…
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DiggTechnical Thursday – The Needle and the Damage Done
by Phil - February 24th, 2011 6:33 am
I’ve seen the needle
and the damage done
A little part of it in everyone
But every junkie’s
like a settin’ sun. - Neil Young
Come on Bennie, give us another hit!
We’re hurting man, we need the good stuff. The markets love to get high and, just when we thought the trip was never going to end – we crash hard! Big Ben and his Central Banking buddies fed our commodity addiction with a flow of easy money and the speculators got so hooked that they have now overdosed and the price of commodities is now killing the host (the Global Economy).
Gee, who could have ever seen that coming?
Oh yeah, right, it was me. Well, very good then… I guess. There’s nothing like a good correction to make some fast money. In yesterday’s post (and Tuesday’s) I mentioned our TZA and EDZ hedges and thank goodness we dumped XLE as they flew back to $78 on the oil madness (more on that later). In yesterday morning’s Alert to Members we added IWM $83 puts at $3 and they finished the day at $3.93 (up 31%) but we were done with them earlier as we flipped bullish when they pulled back to $3.75 and grabbed the IWM weekly $80 calls at 1:03 at .66 and we flipped out of those at .93 (up 40%) for a nice, quick gain.
We also lost .20 on an SSO trade, trying to catch one more bear wave that didn’t come but, on the whole – Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeee! This is the best ride EVER!!! We love a volatile market, especially when it gooses the VIX (something we were also long on) as that gives us better and better prices for the options we sell to suckers who think they are smarter than the market. Yes, we buy them too – but look how fast we dump them. Options are great for momentum trading and for controlled leverage but the REAL MONEY is made BEING THE HOUSE – not the gambler and what we really love to do is SELL options, not buy them.
When the VIX is low, selling options is much less fun but, when the VIX goes up, so does the amount of money people will pay us…
Just Another Manic Monday – Stagflation Official in China
by Phil - December 13th, 2010 8:14 am
Wheeee, everything must be great!
We are crushing our levels as the market flies ever higher. Our 11,500 target on the Dow looks sure to be tested and we’re already flipping bullish with our "Breakout Defense" trades, in which our goal is to make 5,000% in 5 trades or less. We are not ashamed to jump on the bullish bandwagon – if they are giving away money, we’ll stand in line with everyone else, only we’ll take a larger share – thank you very much. We certainly know how to use leverage just like a Bankster – we have a spread and we’re not afraid to use it!
Speaking of Banksters, the must-read article of the weekend is the NY Times piece that goes into surprising details of secret bank meetings that are regularly held in NY where the Gang of 12 (just 9 of them) do their best to manipulate the derivatives market, influence regulations and regulators and, of course, crush their competition. The article even goes so far as to name my old friends at ICE as possibly maybe having something to do with these shenanigans and I am SHOCKED at these allegations as the good people at ICE were so good about telling me how I had things all wrong when I made similar statements last year (which I now legally know cannot be proven and therefore must not be true).
And thank goodness that the commodity and derivatives clearinghouse that was founded by Big Banks and is controlled by Big Banks cannot be proven to be operating in favor of Big Banks because we wouldn’t want to think that the Big Banks had some preferential treatment (beyond the access to the discount window and the TARP money and the POMO money, etc.) – that would just be unAmerican. By unAmerican, I mean the old America that they write about in the Declaration of Independence and the original Constitution, of course – not the Corporate Kleptocracy this country has developed into. Under the new guidelines, leveraging your influence and having the government rob the people to increase your profits on which you don’t pay taxes is the very definition of patriotism, isn’t it?
Ah well… As I said last Monday, this is really Somebody Else’s Problem because we are in "get it while the gettin’s good…
Presenting The TVIX: A Double Leveraged VIX ETF
by ilene - November 22nd, 2010 12:13 pm
Courtesy of Tyler Durden: Presenting The TVIX: A Double Leveraged VIX ETF
Ever feel like this market just does not provide enough unique and suicidal ways for you to lose your hard stolen money within nanoseconds of trade execution? Never fear – here comes the TVIX, a levered third derivative bet on volatility: simply said, the TVIX will be the world’s first double leveraged VIX ETF. According to the ETF creator, VelocityShares, "the TVIX and TVIZ ETNs allow traders to manage daily trading risks using a 2x leveraged view on the S&P VIX Short-Term Futures™ Index and S&P 500 VIX Mid-Term Futures™ Index, respectively, while the XIV and ZIV ETNs enable traders to manage daily trading risks using an inverse position on the direction of the volatility indices. The indices were created by Standard & Poor’s Financial Services LLC, a division of the McGraw Hill-Companies, Inc." Then again, why not just call these what they are: a novel way (brought to you via the synthetic CDO legacy product known as ETFs) to lose money with a 99.999% guarantee. As always, we wonder why anyone would trade this product, when, with much better odds, one would at least get comped in Vegas…
Here is the full product suite about to launched by Credit Suisse.
One has to love the fine print:
The ETNs, and in particular the 2x Long ETNs, are intended to be trading tools for sophisticated investors to manage daily trading risks. They are designed to achieve their stated investment objectives on a daily basis, but their performance over longer periods of time can differ significantly from their stated daily objectives. Investors should actively and frequently monitor their investments in the ETNs. Although we intend to list the ETNs on NYSE Arca, a trading market for the ETNs may not develop.
In this case, and as in everything else related to the market, our advice is stay away from these synthetic contraptions which are merely CDOs (and now CDOs cubed) for public consumption. On the other hand, we can’t wait for someone to finally release an ETF or any other mechanism, that allows for the simple shorting of GM stock.
Forecasting the S&P500 using the VIX
by Chart School - September 20th, 2010 3:45 pm
Forecasting the S&P500 using the VIX
Courtesy of Rohan at Data Diary
McClellan Financial Publications had an interesting analysis last week (here) that looked at “Tracking the VIX response to Price Moves” in the S&P500. A key conclusion of the analysis was that divergences between the two indexes can signal turning points in the S&P500.
The concept seemed a good one – worthy of further investigation.
However, rather than asking how the VIX responds to changes in the S&P500, we turned it around and asked how does the VIX anticipate changes in the S&P500. Perhaps it’s the same question – as who knows which leads which. In any event, it seemed easier to understand a model that mapped the S&P500 as implied by movements in the VIX.
So following are the charts of the actual S&P500 and that implied by movements in the VIX starting from 1Oct09:
Our results are broadly similar. Three key divergences between the VIX derived S&P500 and the actual price were identified that did indeed precede changes in price direction. At price extremes, there arose a disconnect between the behaviour of option traders and the broader equity market.
Most unhelpfully, the seeming catalyst for McClennan’s article – that we may currently be witnessing another divergence developing was not really confirmed. Though it’d be fair to conclude that the derived S&P500 chart has all the hallmarks of a market undergoing a topping process. We’ll watch this indicator with interest to see how things develop from here.
Epilogue:
Note that correlation changes over time and, not unsurprisingly, falls the longer the period under consideration. So that the correlation is ~74% for the period 2004 to today, rising to 79% from Jan08, and is 85% for the last year. As with most time series analysis, the start date will have an impact on results.
In backtesting though the analysis retained its value. For example, there was a significant divergence between the VIX derived S&P500 and the actual S&P500 index around the March 2009 lows. The longer term data set is as follows- note the relative performance through 2007:
VOLATILITY REVERTING TO THE MEAN
by Chart School - September 3rd, 2010 10:20 pm
VOLATILITY REVERTING TO THE MEAN
Courtesy of Surly Trader
It is fortunate that I wrote my previous article about stagnant volatility the day before a strong ISM number came out which created a robust equity rally and a precipitous decline in implied volatility. The VIX has decline nearly 15% this week. VIX futures have fallen rapidly across the curve, but if this rally can be sustaining it seems that the futures have a long way to fall:
The front part of the curve fell quickly along with the VIX, but the months further out remain stubbornly high
The gap between the VIX Index and the 2nd month of VIX futures is at 6.86%, which is just off the absolute 6 year high of 7.46% established on August 6th. This gap cannot persist forever:
The gap has to narrow, one way or the other
If the equity markets are able to hold onto their ground, then this looks like a great time to bet on a decline in VIX futures by shorting the October and months further out on the curve (over 32% for Jan 2011?!). If instead we believe that September and October are going to be rotten months, then it would be wise to make a pairs trade through a delta hedged long option straddle in the S&P 500 along with a short position in the VIX futures.
Troubling Tuesday – Bears and Bears and Bears, Oh My!
by Phil - August 31st, 2010 7:32 am
Fear is the mind killer,
Fear is the little death
That brings total Oblivion
I will permit my fear to pass
Over me and through me
And where it has gone
I will turn the inner eye
Nothing will be there
Only I will remain."
That is the Bene Gesserit incantation for bravery from Frank Herbert’s "Dune," one of my favorite books. When the markets turn nasty on us it is time to get analytical, not emotional and we need to let our fear pass over us as we step back and evaluate the situation with fresh eyes, and a calm mind.
Above is a chart of our major indexes and their year-to-date performance. As we tested our -5% lines last week, we added a fresh round of Disaster Hedges, a series of trade ideas that can make 500% or more if the market falls further and in an afternoon Alert to Members yesterday, we added another SDS hedge with a 400% upside. Having some high-reward hedges in your virtual portfolio allows you to set aside just 2% to protect your entire virtual portfolio against a 10% drop in the markets. 10% is A LOT for the markets to fall and, of course, now that they have brakes on the market, we can always add more hedges along the way down. Should the market fall "just" 5%, we STILL make 10% on our hedges and that nets our virtual portfolio (in this example) UP 5% on a 5% drop in the market. If our bullish plays were also hedged with covers – then so much the better!
Most importantly, having a balanced virtual portfolio with hedges allows you to play the market WITHOUT FEAR. Warren Buffett famously advises investors to "Be greedy when others are fearful" and our own PSW Rule #1 is "Always sell into the initial excitement," which doesn’t mean always buy but we look for opportunities to sell fear (naked puts) on a dip, the same way we sell our own positions into spikes up that we consider overdone.
In last week’s "Disaster" article, I wondered if we were in the panic/capitulation part of the above chart and,…
Market Slide has Japanese Tracker Options Active
by Option Review - August 11th, 2010 4:34 pm
Today’s tickers: EWJ, VIX, BP & AMT
EWJ – iShares MSCI Japan Index – Since the middle of May, shares in the Japanese market tracker have lunged between a peak at $10.00 and $9.15 creating a neat trading range. With an overnight confidence in global stocks hitting the fan and a capitulation to a 15-year high for the yen, the EWJ has pretty much fallen from the top to smack bang in the middle of that same range in just three days. One option traders appears to be translating more of the same by selling that same strangle combination expiring in January. It’s one of several strategies emerging today where this expiration contract was used to play out various views. The $9.00/$10.00 strangle appears to have been sold for a premium totaling 60 cents, which gives this investor plenty of wiggle room in the event that boom or bust just happens to prevail. The strategy works nicely if by expiration the share price continues its predictable oscillation allowing the premium seller to hold on in entirety. If, however, shares edge lower the investor has to dig in his pocket assuming a break below $8.40 or beyond $10.60. Option implied volatility on the options jumped by around 25% to 20% on Wednesday.
VIX – CBOE Volatility index – Futures on the underlying VIX index are higher by 10% in the August contract and 6% in September, where the index is currently predicted to rise to 29.15. Further maturities have gained to a lesser degree in price as the entire volatility curve adjusts upwards to what some investors interpret today as an increased fear over the health of the U.S. economy. The November VIX future reflects only one third of the gain of the front month contract and stands at 30.40. The S&P 500 index is at its worst point of the day having tumbled by 2.5%. one investor appears to be moving expectations for market weakness out further into the early winter months through use of an options combination that will benefit if another summer market rout for stocks forces the volatility curve to blows higher still. The investor appears to have sold September call options on the VIX at the 45 strike for 75 cents and gone long of the same strike using the November expiration at $1.20 per contract. Around 10,000 contracts changed hands in the spread. The investor…
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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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