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Today's trade is in a computing company we all know. Some might think their best days are behind them, but the price action as of late would indicate otherwise.
And with what feels like a gift of a pullback to get positioned into, we're going for it!
Before I get to today's Options Jam Session, I want to talk about profiting from bearish moves.
Short answer: It's a hell of a lot harder than it looks.
Few people (with the exception of traders holding short positions) hate it when stocks go up. It is human nature to expect stocks to go up. When stocks are going up, everything is "normal." There's no panic. There are no investor lawsuits. There are no board room freak-outs. Everyone is making money, everyone is happy. Carry on.
But when stocks are going down, people get mad. They look for someone to blame. Big shareholders and institutions start looking for malfeasance and an angle to sue the company for fraud. Star employees get frustrated and leave for greener pastures. Customers lose confidence in the company and start exploring other options. Borrowing costs get more expensive. It gets harder to raise capital in the public markets.
Suppose you're watching the evening cable news, reading the New York Times (or newspaper of your choice), or paying attention to your echo chamber on the socials. You'd be right to assume all the economies of the world (both friends and enemies of the U.S.) are staring into the abyss and their stock markets are about to be cut in half.
That's cool if you'd like to live that way. I doubt it'll make you any money, though.
You're smarter than that. This is why you're here. We're not affected by headlines. We follow price.
And the relentless bid in Chinese stocks cannot be ignored.
Regardless of the market environment, a company like Visa will keep printing money.
Considering the vast majority of purchases involve credit cards these days and Visa is a dominant player in the space, Visa takes a small cut every time you swipe or tap your card. Good business to be in!
I'm at the All Star Charts Portfolio Accelerator event in New York City.
One topic I discussed this morning with everyone is a volatility-triggered setup I'm seeing in the iShares Bitcoin ETF $IBIT. We have a short history to work with, but this bears attention.
News over the weekend seems to have spooked investors this morning, particularly in the tech sector. And the effects are spilling out all across the market.
Are investors being a little overly dramatic here?
The bet we're making is YES.
Today's trade is not in a tech stock, just a boring old bank that has been trending higher for over a year now.
In today's Flow Show, Steve Strazza and I discuss what feels like the birth of a new leg higher for this ongoing, but recently struggling bull market.
And while I was lamenting the performance of $AAPL lately, Steve showed me the mirror opposite: $AMZN.
Watch this video to see how we arrived at today's trade, and see the details below:
Here's the Play:
I like buying an $AMZN June 250/300 Bull Call Spread for an approximately $9.65 net debit. This means I'll buy the June 250 calls and sell an equal amount of the 300 calls. And this debit I pay today represents the most I can lose if I'm dead wrong:
A stock featured in a recent Junior Hall of Famers report has triggered an entry today, and it has a lot of room to run.
Earnings are on the horizon, but we'll play this stock with a defined-risk spread that takes a little of the sting out of the options' cost while giving us the ability to participate in upside follow-through should we get it.