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What are you buying today?


LowIQinvestor

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Boilermaker,

 

I just hope that you - some day in the future - will share your experience over time with these kind of trades here on CoBF. I bet it'll be educational!

 

John,

 

Nothing profound about what I am doing.

 

I am a LTBH investor.

 

First, I use writing puts to enter positions. All my current positions were entered that way. It gives me the discipline to wait for my price. I don’t have that patience with just limit orders. Besides I get paid while waiting to be exercised, probably why I am more patient, and it lowers my basis by the put premium. A criticism would be not acquiring a position because you don’t get put to. This has only happened to me once. I wanted to acquire some MCD at $50 and was never put to. So, I missed out on a three-bagger so far.

 

Secondly, I use puts to do some trading. Usually stocks I already own and at prices I would not mind if I were put to. 80% of my positions are written when the expiration is a few days to about a month out. For the other 20% the expiration is 1-2 months out when I write the put. I am selling insurance and collecting very nice premiums, but unlike insurance, if I have to pay a claim I end up with a stock I don’t mind owning at the price I am put to.

 

Third, it is also a way to be margined in the sense if I would be exercised on all my outstanding puts I would be on margin. From 2008-2016, if I were put to on all my outstanding puts, I would have been around 25% on margin. I only ended up slightly on margin a couple times and by writing covered calls (equivalent to writing a put) I was quickly off of margin. Since about January, I have been writing puts where I would be just slightly on margin if put to on everything. Currently I am short puts on BRKB with strike prices of 200, 205, 207.50, and 210; BK with strike prices of 50; WFC with strike prices of 54; BAC with strike prices of 29, 29.50, and 30; and GILD with strike prices of 70.

 

Fourth, I also like to write puts to play risk arbitrage. For instance, when BRK was acquiring BNI I was writing at-the-money puts on BNI. If I outright bought BNI, I would have to wait till the acquisition closed to know my return. By writing puts I was setting the date when my play would be completed and what my return would be. I then followed an expiration with writing more puts. I did this till BRK closed on BNI.

 

Mike

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Boilermaker,

 

I just hope that you - some day in the future - will share your experience over time with these kind of trades here on CoBF. I bet it'll be educational!

 

John,

 

Nothing profound about what I am doing.

 

I am a LTBH investor.

 

First, I use writing puts to enter positions. All my current positions were entered that way. It gives me the discipline to wait for my price. I don’t have that patience with just limit orders. Besides I get paid while waiting to be exercised, probably why I am more patient, and it lowers my basis by the put premium. A criticism would be not acquiring a position because you don’t get put to. This has only happened to me once. I wanted to acquire some MCD at $50 and was never put to. So, I missed out on a three-bagger so far.

 

Secondly, I use puts to do some trading. Usually stocks I already own and at prices I would not mind if I were put to. 80% of my positions are written when the expiration is a few days to about a month out. For the other 20% the expiration is 1-2 months out when I write the put. I am selling insurance and collecting very nice premiums, but unlike insurance, if I have to pay a claim I end up with a stock I don’t mind owning at the price I am put to.

 

Third, it is also a way to be margined in the sense if I would be exercised on all my outstanding puts I would be on margin. From 2008-2016, if I were put to on all my outstanding puts, I would have been around 25% on margin. I only ended up slightly on margin a couple times and by writing covered calls (equivalent to writing a put) I was quickly off of margin. Since about January, I have been writing puts where I would be just slightly on margin if put to on everything. Currently I am short puts on BRKB with strike prices of 200, 205, 207.50, and 210; BK with strike prices of 50; WFC with strike prices of 54; BAC with strike prices of 29, 29.50, and 30; and GILD with strike prices of 70.

 

Fourth, I also like to write puts to play risk arbitrage. For instance, when BRK was acquiring BNI I was writing at-the-money puts on BNI. If I outright bought BNI, I would have to wait till the acquisition closed to know my return. By writing puts I was setting the date when my play would be completed and what my return would be. I then followed an expiration with writing more puts. I did this till BRK closed on BNI.

 

Mike

 

How long have you been following this approach?

 

Are there any other circumstances where it was detrimental?

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Are there any other circumstances where it was detrimental?

 

Not boiler, but in early 2009, I tried to get into FDX when it was at $39 for a long term buy and hold, but I decided to get into it by selling a weekly put to try to pick up $1 extra or something. The stock ended up bouncing to $45 before the put expired, so I didn't get assigned the shares.

 

I never actually purchased any of it, so that decision turned out poorly.

 

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Boilermaker,

 

I just hope that you - some day in the future - will share your experience over time with these kind of trades here on CoBF. I bet it'll be educational!

 

John,

 

Nothing profound about what I am doing.

 

I am a LTBH investor.

 

First, I use writing puts to enter positions. All my current positions were entered that way. It gives me the discipline to wait for my price. I don’t have that patience with just limit orders. Besides I get paid while waiting to be exercised, probably why I am more patient, and it lowers my basis by the put premium. A criticism would be not acquiring a position because you don’t get put to. This has only happened to me once. I wanted to acquire some MCD at $50 and was never put to. So, I missed out on a three-bagger so far.

 

Secondly, I use puts to do some trading. Usually stocks I already own and at prices I would not mind if I were put to. 80% of my positions are written when the expiration is a few days to about a month out. For the other 20% the expiration is 1-2 months out when I write the put. I am selling insurance and collecting very nice premiums, but unlike insurance, if I have to pay a claim I end up with a stock I don’t mind owning at the price I am put to.

 

Third, it is also a way to be margined in the sense if I would be exercised on all my outstanding puts I would be on margin. From 2008-2016, if I were put to on all my outstanding puts, I would have been around 25% on margin. I only ended up slightly on margin a couple times and by writing covered calls (equivalent to writing a put) I was quickly off of margin. Since about January, I have been writing puts where I would be just slightly on margin if put to on everything. Currently I am short puts on BRKB with strike prices of 200, 205, 207.50, and 210; BK with strike prices of 50; WFC with strike prices of 54; BAC with strike prices of 29, 29.50, and 30; and GILD with strike prices of 70.

 

Fourth, I also like to write puts to play risk arbitrage. For instance, when BRK was acquiring BNI I was writing at-the-money puts on BNI. If I outright bought BNI, I would have to wait till the acquisition closed to know my return. By writing puts I was setting the date when my play would be completed and what my return would be. I then followed an expiration with writing more puts. I did this till BRK closed on BNI.

 

Mike

 

How long have you been following this approach?

 

Are there any other circumstances where it was detrimental?

 

I have been doing this for 20 years.

 

The only other thing detrimental is making a mistake in valuing a stock, no different than if you were valuing the stock to outright purchase. Actually, writing a put is a little more conservative than outright purchase at the strike price because your basis is lowered by the option premium.

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Are there any other circumstances where it was detrimental?

 

Not boiler, but in early 2009, I tried to get into FDX when it was at $39 for a long term buy and hold, but I decided to get into it by selling a weekly put to try to pick up $1 extra or something. The stock ended up bouncing to $45 before the put expired, so I didn't get assigned the shares.

 

I never actually purchased any of it, so that decision turned out poorly.

 

Yes that will happen. But for me I more than make up for that occasional miss, which for me so far has only been once in 20 years, by the put premiums I collect from expired positions and the lower basis on stock purchases from the decipline writing puts gives me to wait for a better price.

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Boiler,

 

Can you share what happened in 2008/2009?  I guess you got put to on a lot of positions?

 

I was. I had positions in BRKB, BA, WFC, BAC, ADP, JNJ, SBUX, PG, MMM, ITW, BDK, and NKE that were below the prices at which I was put to. I held till they came back. I never went on margin in the 2008/2009 time frame. It was after the market started coming back that I got aggressive writing puts and I got slightly on margin a couple of times.

 

The only ones I still own are BRKB, WFC, and BAC, which are my three largest holdings with BRKB being about 40% of my portfolio.

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Any comments on how things would have worked out differently if you were to hold cash and waited for lower prices than the shares you were put to?

 

The wait part is the same for writing puts or buying positions outright. It is always better waiting for lower prices!

 

What about the premiums that you collected while you wait versus the lower prices that you would've got??

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Any comments on how things would have worked out differently if you were to hold cash and waited for lower prices than the shares you were put to?

 

The wait part is the same for writing puts or buying positions outright. It is always better waiting for lower prices!

 

What about the premiums that you collected while you wait versus the lower prices that you would've got??

 

I would not have gotten lower prices. Once I determine where I want to buy a stock it doesn't matter if I write a put at that strike price or put a limit order to buy the stock at that strike price. I own the stock either way at about the same basis.

 

Edit: I didn't know the market was going lower. I was getting put to at prices that I thought were good values, which they eventually were. So if I was going to buy the stock through a limit order I would have done it at the same price as I was being put to.

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Any comments on how things would have worked out differently if you were to hold cash and waited for lower prices than the shares you were put to?

 

The wait part is the same for writing puts or buying positions outright. It is always better waiting for lower prices!

 

What about the premiums that you collected while you wait versus the lower prices that you would've got??

 

I would not have gotten lower prices. Once I determine where I want to buy a stock it doesn't matter if I write a put at that strike price or put a limit order to buy the stock at that strike price. I own the stock either way at about the same basis.

 

Edit: I didn't know the market was going lower. I was getting put to at prices that I thought were good values, which they eventually were. So if I was going to buy the stock through a limit order I would have done it at the same price as I was being put to.

 

There was a fund that blew up around the 2008/2009 time frame.  I think the key difference between you and that fund is that you viewed your position size as the amount that you would be put to as the total margin was only 25% at its peak.  He had written puts that were 2-3x his fund's exposure.  When he got put to in 2008/2009 and the positions subsequently decline, he was basically carried out on a stretcher. 

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Any comments on how things would have worked out differently if you were to hold cash and waited for lower prices than the shares you were put to?

 

The wait part is the same for writing puts or buying positions outright. It is always better waiting for lower prices!

 

What about the premiums that you collected while you wait versus the lower prices that you would've got??

 

I would not have gotten lower prices. Once I determine where I want to buy a stock it doesn't matter if I write a put at that strike price or put a limit order to buy the stock at that strike price. I own the stock either way at about the same basis.

 

Edit: I didn't know the market was going lower. I was getting put to at prices that I thought were good values, which they eventually were. So if I was going to buy the stock through a limit order I would have done it at the same price as I was being put to.

 

There was a fund that blew up around the 2008/2009 time frame.  I think the key difference between you and that fund is that you viewed your position size as the amount that you would be put to as the total margin was only 25% at its peak.  He had written puts that were 2-3x his fund's exposure.  When he got put to in 2008/2009 and the positions subsequently decline, he was basically carried out on a stretcher.

 

Even though my exposure was 25%, I was never more than about 5% on margin and by writing covered calls I was able to get off of margin.

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On the topic of this Thread, I bought some FDX and TOL today. I also added a bit of NXPI. TOL trades for 1.05x tangible book, If I see this correctly. I think that actually lower than during the financial crisis when they were making losses.

 

I am also tempted buying some FCAU or EXOR Holding stock.

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