backtothebeach

The A to B share ratio, historically slightly above 1500, has recently stayed around 1515 to 1520, but has risen to 1550-1560 currently. There may be a good reason for this, but I kind of suspect that it is demand from Japan that is pushing the A shares up temporarily. Interesting pair trade if you are comfortable with the risk of the spread widening even further.

All 3 hours of the recent CNBC interview are now on Squawkpod.

Amazing! Also sending a signal how important Japan has become for him. And Greg Abel is tagging along and learning. Feeling pretty good about Berkshire right now.

Thinking the same. The way this was immediately plastered all over mainstream media, CNN, The Guardian, etc. Kind of suspicious.

A ton of people bought META, check out page 312 of this thread... https://thecobf.com/forum/topic/8494-what-are-you-buying-today/page/312/ Admirable that you have the skills, patience and conviction to make that edge work. Tough to do.

Quite the cheery consensus on Nintendo here. The last two times I remember such consensus were BABA when Munger first bought and META when it first dropped to the low 200s. BABA is still in the toilet, and META is back to that level. Keeping buying with conviction like Parsad worked with META, with BABA not so much. Not saying Nintendo will share the same fate, but I get weary when everybody announces buying the same stock.

0 ?

"Fuck your puts, fuck your calls, J Powell has you by the balls. God bless my money printer." LOL

Update on this trade, which by the way some people call "Poor man's covered call": Despite not going optimally, because AI dropped quickly and did not move and stay close to $30 except for a very short moment (that I did not time well), I was able to sell $1.93 of additional premium in the last 7 weeks and the cost basis is now $12.22. Still more than 21 months to go and no upside risk.

Man you are nimble ... respect.

Makes sense, thanks!

I noticed that AMZN and GOOG had a great week up 10+%, and META and NFLX are not far behind. Hmm. Just a short term sector rotation or a sign of a shift, (large) investors looking past the current banking problems and a possible recession?

There is definitely after hours risk with options. Let us know how it goes ... The usual cutoff for brokers to inform the OCC about option exercise is 5:30pm. However there may be a grey area, where under special circumstances it can be even later (from https://www.finra.org/rules-guidance/rulebooks/finra-rules/2360) (vii) Members may effect or amend exercise decisions for standardized equity options after the exercise cut-off time (but prior to expiration) under the following circumstances: a. in order to remedy mistakes or errors made in good faith; b. to take appropriate action as the result of a failure to reconcile unmatched option transactions; or c. where extraordinary circumstances restricted a customer's or member's ability to inform the respective member of such decisions (or a member's ability to receive such decisions) by the cut-off time. The burden of establishing an exception for a proprietary or customer account of a member rests solely on the member seeking to rely on such exception.

Raising rates until something breaks ... mission accomplished.

Sure, just a pro Ukrainian group, nothing to do with governments ...

Tempted to make the pilgrimage for the first time this year...

Thank you, great compilations! I've also been looking for a quote, I think it was an annual meeting, someone in the audience asked a question to the tune of "As a below average investor, what should I do to invest/accumulate wealth", and Charlie anwered something like "As a below average investor, find an above average investor to manage your money for you".

I find options fascinating and a great way to distract myself so I don't trade or mess around with long term holdings too much. I should note that in general I see the options market as quite efficient, where an options chain is usually a balanced matrix of risk and reward in relation to the underlying, and small inefficiencies are masked by the bid-ask spread. As such, novice questions like "what is the best options strategy to consistently make money" or "are iron condors superior to butterflies" are useless. That said, every now and then I see something that looks like prices are a bit out of whack due to supply and demand. Combined with a lightly held opinion about the underlying, there can be promising setups. For example: In January 2021 during the GME short squeeze, and also later with AMC, my lightly held opinion was that it would take a long time for these stocks to fall back to where the squeeze started (GME < $20). Hypes don't end that quickly. Yet the short term $20 puts traded at crazy IVs of 600-900% and could relatively safely be shorted for $0.50 - $1. When combining options, I tend towards calendar or diagonal spreads. These can often be adjusted over time by rolling the short options up, down and out in time. Here is a diagonal spread I did today which I think is promising, and has a lot of time to work out: Long AI Jan17'25 strike 15 call @ 16.80, IV around 80% Short AI Feb17'23 strike 30 call @ 2.65, IV around 210% Net cost $14.15 before commissions. Thesis: With almost 2 years of runway I should be able to sell short calls over and over again to whittle away at my cost basis. My lightly held opinion is that AI stock will continue to be volatile enough between $20 and $40 to make this profitable. The risk of this trade is to the downside, if the stock drops quickly and stagnates there without a lot of volatility, it will not work out. Important: No upside risk, if the stock goes to $1000 tomorrow, the spread is worth at least $15.

Not at a TV series… but man, MrBeast is slowly becoming a legend: More than 350M views:

Yeah, I’ve never been much into horror movies, but getting older it seems I’ve gotten more sensitive. Especially travel related stuff, like the Netflix series, “The serpent”, which is not even horror, but hits close to home. In 1990 I flew to Jakarta, Indonesia, arriving when it was already dark, and at the airport followed some guy looking for travelers that needed accommodation. Together with some other backpackers we entered a van, taking us to some room in downtown Jakarta, where we slept on mattresses thrown on the floor in a bare, carpeted room. I think for a moment in the van, I had the thought “what if they are criminals”, but I quickly pushed it away lol. All good, nothing happened. Thinking of it, at the time we had no cell phone or electronics except a pocket camera, no credit cards, little cash, just traveller checks. Different times.

I haven't looked into it, maybe I should. I am already with IB LLC (the U.S. branch) since I am based in the Americas, so it could be an issue.

Whoaa! Love it.

Usually the option contracts are adjusted, and you have the right to buy 100 shares of the old company plus shares of the spinco at the spin off ratio. The contracts also get a new ticker symbol and become quite illiquid.

“The S&P 500 closed today at 3999 points, barely above it’s 200 day moving average, but below the psychologically important level of 4000. If it can break through 4000 in the near future, we may be seeing the beginning of an uptrend. However, the round number level of 4000, combined with the 200 day moving average, may also serve as strong resistance, and if the index fails to push through, we may see further declines.” I just wrote that. I think I have a future as a financial pundit.

I have a Wise card, but it is limiting ATM cash withdrawals and does not reimburse the fees. So the Schwab card, if it is available for non-US residents would really be nice as a travel card.