Thursday, November 14, 2024
With interest rates moving higher, so are bond yields. However, bond funds still aren’t that exciting from a yield perspective. For instance, iShares 7-10 Year Treasury Bond ETF (IEF) has a dividend yield of only 1.5%. One way to boost the cash flow from popular bond funds like IEF is to sell calls against the […]
A massive options trade occurred last week in iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (HYG). HYG is a massively popular high yield bond fund that also has a very active options chain. A put spread was recently sold on HYG with over 150,000 contracts per leg. This trade is likely meant to boost “yield” […]
It’s easy to get sucked into the next “trading indicator” or “market moving software.” During a raging bull market… all these things are fun toys. But, we’re not in a raging bull market anymore. The days of the Federal Reserve raining free money onto America seems to be ending for now. Meaning, you can’t approach […]
The rate of home purchases has slowed dramatically. Since the start of the year, mortgage rates have doubled from around 3% to more than 6%. The affordability of homes has plummeted, as have sales. Yet individuals and families still have to live somewhere, so slowing home sales will benefit companies with residential rentals. Here are […]
The current state of the global semiconductor industry can be described by the famous opening words of Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” The global chip supply crunch triggered by the pandemic is likely to be drag on for the next two […]
As expected, the Federal Reserve (Fed) raised rates in it June 15th meeting. Until then, the assumption was that the Fed would incrementally increase rates by 50 basis points (bps) at the next handful of meetings. However, after the hot consumer price index (CPI) number the week prior, the Fed was pushed into a more […]
Based on a large options trade in the Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLF), it appears a well-capitalized trader believes that financial stocks may move sideways for the remainder of the year. The trader possibly sold a 5,000-lot strangle in January XLF options. A strangle involves selling a call above and a put below the […]
Once you are able to determine where unusual options activity is occurring, the next step is looking at the time and sales list. This is the granular trade information, where you can sort the list and look at what the biggest trades have been, and what caused the underlying instrument to show up on your […]
Athletic footwear has come a long way from the humble “tennis shoes” of decades ago. Now, this footwear has become the norm, with the enduring popularity of athleisure. That’s why the Kantar BrandZ Most Valuable Global Brands 2021 ranking showed that apparel brands saw some of their fastest brand value growth in 2021, as shoppers […]
Novice traders treat bull and bear markets the same. “I just trade like a bull market in reverse!” It’s 100% not that simple. Bull markets tend to move steadily up… bear markets are incredibly volatile. You’ll see stocks drop 50%… pop 30% in 2 weeks… only to drop again. That’s not to say you can’t […]
