Category: Uncategorized

  • February 2025

    I know ya’ll are itchin’ to get your grubby little eyes on these numbers so we’ll start there.

    My monthly goal is to increase my accounts by 10%. In February I achieved an increase of 16.37% bringing in $1,691 total.

    20 trades with no losses. That’s 2 months and 42 trades in a row with no losses for those who are counting. Don’t worry, there’s some big blunders coming up next month. Stay tuned!

    I’m up 31.76% this year increasing my accounts by $2,905 so far in the year of our Lord 2025.

    Profit and Loss Calendar for February

    Market’s on the fritz thanks to tariffs so you’ll notice I traded small and less often. I find it helpful to try and see my trading as matter of preserving capital instead of increasing it quickly.

    “Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.”
    Proverbs 13:11

    That’s right, it’s my website and I’ll quote whatever I damn well please!

    My Tip-Top Trade

    Here’s a quick breakdown of my favorite trade of the month and once again I owe it to being inspired by someone else. I have a coworker that I convinced to start trading who, through their trading, reminded me I was completely forgetting about just buying and flipping shares and was limiting myself by primarily focusing on options. So with some extra cash in my buying power I bought almost 50 shares of HIMS (Hims & Hers) at $45.75 per share.

    When you start seeing numbers flying all over the screen and those numbers represent real money your emotions can easily get the best of you. When you read about trading you’ll find that a huge portion will actually be discussing the psychology involved and the importance of having a plan.

    Even though my profits were huge I was finding great difficulty in deciding when to sell. On paper it was clear as day it was time. The difficulty came because I wanted to make even more money. That’s embarrassing to admit but you’d be surprised the emotions you go through when things are moving fast. This is why it’s important to have rules and to stick to those rules. If you are at the mercy of your emotions you will not trade well. Life will also prove to be difficult for you.

    “If you wouldn’t pay the current price it’s time to sell.”

    That’s the rule that repeated in my head when I was in peril and I’m very grateful for it. The shares were way overpriced and it was time to sell, it was that simple. I trusted my gut and sold the shares that I bought at $45.75 for $65 for a profit of $935 in 10 days time.

    The next day the stock dropped 25%. The same thing happened the following day. In fact, as of writing this in March the price still hasn’t recovered.

    I try to learn from mistakes. This painting is one of mine that my partner immortalized on a mini canvas. I didn’t sell when I should’ve causing me to be in the trade for weeks longer than I wanted and tying up lots of capital. It was frustrating. Now the painting is by my desk as a tiny reminder. Looks similar to the chart above, eh?

    Kill Your Darlings

    AST Space Mobile (ASTS) has been one of my favorite stocks since I started trading. It’s a satellite company aiming to eliminate all cellular dead zones.

    Over time I was able to slowly buy stock as well as sell Cash Secured Puts in order to acquire 200 shares. Then I started selling Covered Calls against them. By trading options around the underlying stock I was able to drop the average price of my 200 shares from $22 to $17 a share. Neat!

    Since September of last year it has traded in a range between $20 and $25. Up and down, up and down, sideways for months.

    Recognizing something like this you can better time your entries and exits and receive the most premium. I made $906 selling Covered Calls while simply owning the stock would have done nothing for me during the same timeframe.

    But it finally happened where 2 Covered Calls I sold were assigned and I was obligated to sell my 200 shares at $22 each. Meanwhile the stock jumped up to $35 revealing the biggest downside to Covered Calls. But I knew the risks going in and I made a profit in the end.

    The stock has been on a steady downtrend since (currently mid $20’s) and I’ve already made $178 selling Cash Secured Puts in an attempt to buy back into the stock.

    It still stings a little, though.

    Subtracting and Adding Insult to Injury


    What stings a little more is I used the $4,500 in profits to open a position in Robinhood (HOOD). I bought 100 shares at $56.

    I held through an earnings report where the price soared and I gained over $1,000 in profits overnight … except I didn’t do anything but sit on my hands. I assumed the stock would settle down after the huge spike and continue the trend upwards, at which point I would start selling Covered Calls.

    “If you wanna hear God laugh tell him your plans.”

    Very, very silly in hindsight because it’s been on a downtrend ever since and now I’m currently down just shy of $2000. Only once I saw the writing on the wall did I begin selling Calls, which to date has only netted me $168. The only thing that concerns me is the opportunity loss from tying up that much capital and waiting on it’s value to rise again. The market is very down right now and it’s a great time to buy, however this stock is holding most of my equity preventing me from doing so.

    Lessons Learned … again

    I shouldn’t have written covered calls on ASTS after a big drop in price, I should’ve waited for it to rise again. I was impatient and it caused my shares to get called away unnecessarily. But ultimately selling 200 shares at $22 when my cost was $17 while getting paid another $170 in premium ain’t so bad.

    As far as the HOOD trade goes I need to not “marry my shares” and be OK with letting them go. If I would’ve had the same conviction as I did with the HIMS trade I would’ve been smooth sailing by now. When I see something shoot that high that fast I should know that a pull back in price is soon to follow in most cases or freefall in this case.

    I actually set my self back by trying to get the most premium paid to me. Even though I was doing it safely, I was still attempting to speed things up a little. I haven’t lost money, just time by being impatient. But I guess time is money??

    There you have it. I broke and obeyed the same rule and you see the bed that I’m lying in now. I made it myself. Stuck to the rule and profited over $900. Broke the rule and I’m down $2k.

    “Pigs get fat. Hogs get slaughtered”

    Didn’t I say something earlier about learning from mistakes? I got some things right and some things wrong but that’s life, baby. Just gotta do a little better each time and don’t beat yourself up too bad over it. Finding compassion with yourself over your mistakes will ultimately lead you to showing compassion towards others.

    On the bright side even with those blunders I still did pretty well for myself this month while learning some lessons and simultaneously not learning some lessons.

    Finally, here are all my trades for the month.

    Clicking the image will take you to my Theta Gang profile where you can view more details and notes.

    Thanks for stopping by!
    Chris

    PS – If you’d like your own tiny painting check out her Etsy store at Teeny Tiny Paintings. You can even custom order your own shortcomings to be commemorated!

  • January 2025

    Before we get started on my inaugural review be sure to check out this page if you need a simple primer on the different strategies discussed here.

    Recently the market has been uneasy about the car wash of stupidity we’re about to drive through. Now that’s just a cheeky way for me to say the market has not been doing so hot lately, but when you are on the side of selling options you can make money when things trade up, down, and sideways.

    … and slantways, and longways, and backways.

    My monthly goal is to increase my accounts by 10%. In January I achieved 13.27% with around 2/3 of those profits coming from trading options and the other 1/3 from trading stocks.

    Profit and Loss Calendar for January

    22 total trades with no losses and increasing the accounts by $1,214.

    Here’s the play I’m most proud of this month and I’ll break every thing down but first let me just say I owe a lot to the inspiration I get from others in all areas of my life. I find myself constantly inspired by someone’s tenacity and dedication towards their passions. I had been peeping what other positions people were taking in the market when I stumbled upon a series of trades one person was able to pull off so smoothly that I had to give it a whirl.

    Over the course of a few days I would simply pull up their handful of trades, like the ones listed below, and admire them which would lead me to work out how I could replicate it in my trading. Here is what I pulled off.

    Listed first you’ll see I sold 3 consecutive Cash Secured Puts in hopes that the stock price would drop and I would be assigned 100 shares. Although the price rose and I wasn’t assigned the shares I was paid a total of $247 in premium for taking on the obligation. That’s money earned without actually owning any stock!

    After that I decided to perform a Buy/Write where I purchased 100 shares then sold a Covered Call against them. In total I opened 3 Covered Calls agreeing that I would sell my 100 shares if it rose to a certain price by a certain time. It didn’t and in total I was paid $151 in premium while getting to keep my shares. That’s extra money earned just for owning stock!

    After this I sold all 100 shares at a $30 profit because my sentiment had changed and I wanted to lock in my profits. I made $428 in total when it was all said and done.

    Easy-peasy.

    The beauty is any of the above strategies can work alone or you can make them dance together. You can just buy and sell stock. You can just focus on cash secured puts. You can put all your energy into finding proven, blue-chip companies with a strong dividend and writing covered calls against shares that you own using the premium collected to buy even more shares. It’s why they’re called options.

    Lastly I’ll leave you with the full list of my trades for the month.

    Clicking the image will take you to my Theta Gang profile where you can view more details and notes.

    Handstanding on the shoulders of giants

    I wouldn’t know most things were possible unless someone did them first and was willing to share that knowledge and experience. Take Roger Bannister beating the 4 minute mile, for example. For decades all thought this was impossible but once the record was broken by one person suddenly thousands were able to follow suit around the world. So I keep a look out for my own Roger Bannisters.

    I work best by building on the work of others, not coming up with completely new discoveries. I’m OK with that. I like getting fired up by other people’s achievements. I’ll take that over the alternative.

    So get on out there and find your own inspiration in whatever it is that you’re up to. Stare at it. Ponder it. Let it marinate in your subconscious. Show it to your co-workers who don’t care.

  • Options Explained Gently

    My goal on this page is to give you a brief explanation of the strategies you’ll mostly see me using on this site. If you are brand new to the stock market most people would suggest dipping your toe in with buying and holding ETFs for long periods of time. I started that way and I would agree with them.

    What I will be discussing is the next natural progression – the trading of stock options. I have 3 or 4 strategies that I stick to and only focus on a handful of stocks at a time while maintaining a small watchlist. This keeps me focused and my trading simple and mostly passive. I don’t like being on my phone.

    My bag of tricks

    When I sell option contracts they provide me the obligation to buy or sell stocks in 100 unit increments at an agreed-upon price by a given date. Put in simpler terms, I’ll buy/sell this if it’s X price by X date.

    Options give you leverage allowing you to control a lot more for a lot less. The trade off is they carry greater risks than the classic buy-and-hold method because option contracts expire making it crucial that you are correct by a certain date.

    When it comes to selling options it’s easiest to think of it like car insurance. We pay a premium every month in the event that something bad happens while simultaneously praying that it doesn’t. Whether an accident occurs or not the insurance company gets paid a premium and the price of that premium is based on the risks involved. Higher risks = higher premiums.

    You’re selling contracts then waiting for the value of those contracts to decrease so you can buy them back at a lower price.

    Really trying to drive it home here. Buy Low, Sell High.

    If the probability that the stock price will be at the strike price of your contract by the expiration date decreases, so does the value of your contract.

    I sell Puts on red days and I sell Covered Calls on green days. You get paid a premium on day 1 of writing a new contract. The goal is to keep as much of that premium as possible. In most cases I close the trade when I reach 50% profit and never let the contract expire. So if I’m paid a $50 premium I only aim to keep $25 of that. This means I will buy back the same contract I sold to close it for $25 before it expires. This allows me to sell several contracts in the same amount of time, catching all of the fluctuations, and taking risks off the table sooner. Things do not go up or down in a straight line. The longer you’re in a trade the longer you’re risking something going against you that’s out of your control. Any time I’ve broken the 50% rule in the past I’ve regretted it.

    Combining the first two strategies below together creates what is called “The Wheel Strategy”. You sell puts until you are assigned the shares. Then you sell calls until they get called away while collecting premium at every step. By reinvesting those premiums you lower your average cost down.

    Now onto the strategies…

    Selling Puts

    When selling puts you profit when the stock price goes up.

    I only sell puts on stocks that I wouldn’t mind owning. This opens a new contract that says, “OK, the current price is $10 a share. If the stock is $9 by the time the contract expires I agree to buy 100 shares at that price at $9 each. But for taking on that obligation you have to pay me a premium of $50 right up front.” This means the stock can go up and down and all over but as long as it’s above the $9 strike price by expiration I don’t have to buy it and I keep the $50 premium. You will then be required to set aside the collateral to own 100 shares of the stock in the account.

    In the above example the stock price was above the strike price by expiration. This means I get to keep the $50 premium and my collateral is released back to me.

    If the stock price is at or below $9 by expiration date you are assigned 100 shares. You must now hope that the dip in price is only temporary and not based on a big, scary event. If bad news comes out about the stock and it drops all the way to $4 you’re still under obligation to buy it at $9 or close the contract out for a large loss. So you must really want to own the stocks you’re dealing with while trying to use some technical analysis to help narrow down the best times to sell these contracts.

    Below is an example from today. By watching a few indicators I was able to make a highly probable guess that the price was going to rise. I waited until the price rose above the 50 day moving average, pulled back to re-test that moving average, and finally I took on the trade once was there was confirmation that it was going to bounce off that moving average upward.

    In an attempt to get the most premium paid to me I sell puts on days when the stock is doing very poorly, say, a drop around 5% or so. The premium on selling puts is higher when the price is going down because demand for those contracts increases. So in the same way that the car insurance company collects a higher premium for covering a teenager in a sports car, I collect the most premium for covering a stock when things are volatile and risky.

    Usually the idea is to avoid getting assigned the shares and keep the premium or to purchase a stock you want to own at a price lower than the current market price. When you do finally get assigned 100 shares you can deploy the bizarro brother…

    Covered Calls

    Now that you’ve bought low its time to sell high! Covered Calls allow you to generate income on stocks you own while giving you downside protection if the stock drops in price. To continue with the above example we’re now saying, “Ok, I got these stocks I just purchased at $9. If they are $10 by the time the contract expires I agree to sell 100 of them at that price. But to take on that obligation you have to pay me an $80 premium.”

    As pictured above, if the stock price is below the $10 strike price by expiration I get to keep my shares and the $80 premium. If the price of the stock is above the strike price at expiration then I sell 100 shares at $10 a piece while also keeping the $80 premium.

    The biggest downside here is that some fantastic news comes out about the stock and it shoots up to $20 a share. You will still be obligated to sell 100 shares at $10 unless you choose to buy back the contract and close it at a loss in order to keep them. Ultimately with these strategies, though, there are defined risks going in so there are no surprises. Only pick prices you’re comfortable buying or selling shares at.

    Below is a Covered Call that I sold today. By looking at volume and the RSI Indicator at the very bottom I could make an educated guess that the stock was currently overbought and due for a pull back in price soon. Covered Calls make money when there is a pull back in price so you profit even when the stock you own goes down. They’re hedging instruments, after all.

    I sold the covered call at a high premium while the stock price was rising. I bought it back a few hours later at a lower price once the stock price went down. The option contract I sold was worth more when everyone thought the price was going to continue to go up. Now every one isn’t so sure so they’re not willing to pay as much making that option contract worth less. I profited on this change in sentiment by buying something back at a lower price than what I sold for.

    Sometimes I skip selling puts and perform what’s called a Buy/Write. Meaning that on a day the stock is performing well I buy 100 shares then immediately sell a Covered Call against those shares. I honestly prefer this method as I personally feel better owning the shares in most cases, even if it’s only for a week or two.

    Swing Trading

    This is just buying shares of stock without the use of options and waiting for the price to go up. I will do this after a big drop in price on a solid company or when I believe a large swing upward is coming. This strategy is overall less risky because there is not a date that you need to be correct by. It requires more capital because it does not give you the leverage that options have. These trades are only meant to last a few days to a week.

    And Last But Least –

    Buying Calls

    On occasion I will buy a Long Call or “LEAP” but honestly these are way more risky and they’ve burned me the most so I’m choosing not to go into detail about them here. They can be used as a stock replacement and they will pop up from time to time in my monthly reviews where I may attempt to justify my use of them. Buying options, as opposed to selling options, carries much more risk so you won’t see me doing much of it. When I do I make sure I purchase a contract with many months (sometimes years) until expiration so that I have plenty of time to be correct. When you buy options you have to spend money. When you sell options you are paid money. Guess which one I prefer.

    Do what now?

    I will be the first to tell you that I am NOT a fast learner. It took me many months to wrap my head around these things and I still have much to learn so don’t feel discouraged if it doesn’t make sense on the first readthrough. The vastness of information can almost feel overwhelming when starting something new, especially when you’re in a hurry to be good at it. Just ask my 13 other hobbies.

    That’s all for now and I will get into what factors I look for when entering or exiting trades in future posts. Feel free to leave any questions or comments below.

    If you’d like further info on any of these strategies check out Investopedia for a plethora of knowledge and less silliness.

  • Let’s Get Ready To Fumble!

    A brief history of me and why I’ve decided to buy a website and talk to myself on it. I lived a large portion of my life with very loose rules and mostly concerned only about myself. I was living my dream as a professional brewer when it became glaringly obvious to me that I was not heading in the right direction, I was not living up to my full potential, and was becoming increasingly unhappy. This also made a lot of other people unhappy.

    A tale as old as time.
    A tale as old as time.

    I was also involved in an accident while brewing that left me with a PTSD diagnosis which shook things up a little. Since I gave up drinking in October 2021 my life has taken on a whole new direction and purpose and I owe a lot of that to discipline. I’ve found freedom in it. I started gardening and working at a plant nursery, became vegetarian, and began a daily practice of yoga, meditation, and learning a second language. Although I’ve been a runner for over 10 years I now have a commitment of at least one run a week to keep me from backsliding.

    Now trust me I know how all that sounds and I want to fight me, too. I’m not preaching that my path is the path to take. I had it put to me this way once…

    People tend to spend a lot of energy digging many different holes all over the place, spending a little time here and there attempting to find a source of water flowing somewhere beneath to fill their well.

    Ask me how I know.

    What many fail to realize is that it doesn’t necessarily matter where you dig the hole. It’s the dedication and time spent digging the same hole that reveals that there’s a source of water flowing beneath everything.

    Discipline has paved the way for many wonderful things to enter into my life. On top of every thing else I was also able to start a mobile art studio for kids with my lovely partner last year. In the past the notion that I would start a business would seem unfathomable to me. The peace that I’m able to cultivate within myself and around me thanks to these practices leads me to weaving what I learn from them into everything that I do.

    “How you do anything is how you do everything.”

    My kids love this one.

    My ultimate goal with this site is to show and discuss the progress of my humble trading accounts. I hope that you are able to witness what I, a certified dingus, am able to accomplish as well as my failures and it will, perhaps, inspire you to start your own journey.

    I began my adventures in the stock market a little under a year ago. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in trading and in life and I’m a better person because of it. I’m keen to talk and laugh about these experiences and perhaps help others avoid similar pitfalls. It’s helpful for working out my thoughts and as an added, unforeseen bonus I began trading more responsibly when I made my positions public.

    I have separate journals for different aspects of my life and I’ve found the ability to track and critique my results has allowed me to recognize my strengths and weaknesses in these areas. It’s challenging to be aware of the progress you’ve made without having the data to refer back to. This can lead to ungratefulness – a grave sin.

    Now admittedly it can be awkward to talk about money though it is connected to nearly everything we do and the driving force behind a lot of our actions and our stresses. I do not want to give off the impression that I have or want lots of money and that the stock market is the answer to your problems. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. I will say, though, that taking an interest and some responsibility in your management of money will likely steer you to a more successful path. We’re here to be useful, not happy. Money is a tool, its not the end goal. It is more important to acknowledge that everything you have was given to you and it is better to live life with an open hand. Accept what is given and freely give.

    So there is my intro in all its glory. For now my only plan is to post my monthly trading results, review them, and discuss them. We’ll see what unfolds from there.

    I do appreaciate you stopping by,
    Chris

    thearthivegnv.com
    givedirectly.org