what are you selling today?

[Red Lion]

Sold APO/GOOG/AMZN/CPT/MAA in my 401k. I'm still bullish on all of these, but I'm switching this account over to a strategy of selling weekly cash secured put options since it's a tax deferred account. CPT/MAA were relatively small positions. I used the proceeds from these sales to write April 4 put options on GOOG/AMZN and March 28 options on APO. All barely OTM. 

[villainx]

24 minutes ago, Red Lion said:

Sold APO/GOOG/AMZN/CPT/MAA in my 401k. I'm still bullish on all of these, but

 

My first reaction ... great, there goes someone who I trust on the asset managers.  I know you still will share, but buys and sells are pretty powerful indicators.  

 

Otherwise, good luck with your experiment!

[Red Lion]

31 minutes ago, villainx said:

 

My first reaction ... great, there goes someone who I trust on the asset managers.  I know you still will share, but buys and sells are pretty powerful indicators.  

 

Otherwise, good luck with your experiment!

I actually increased my exposure to APO by selling more puts than I sold shares just to be clear. I just want to take advantage of the weekly options premiums to roll these in my tax deferred account. 
 

Still very much bullish long term on APO it’s my largest position. But with market turmoil I can see short term downside and increased volatility (for all the alts) which lets me earn 75% IRR in barely otm options. Also interested in using this strategy with KKR. 

Edited March 27, 2025 by Red Lion

[value_hunter]

38 minutes ago, Red Lion said:

I actually increased my exposure to APO by selling more puts than I sold shares just to be clear. I just want to take advantage of the weekly options premiums to roll these in my tax deferred account. 
 

Still very much bullish long term on APO it’s my largest position. But with market turmoil I can see short term downside and increased volatility (for all the alts) which lets me earn 75% IRR in barely otm options. Also interested in using this strategy with KKR. 

 Why not a covered call? Will it be more efficient? 

[Paarslaars]

Interesting take, I have been out of all the alts (except PAX) since they peaked last year. Wanted to get back in but no cash available and nothing I wanted to sell. Will look at the puts, I have margin available in case I get put.

[Red Lion]

50 minutes ago, value_hunter said:

 Why not a covered call? Will it be more efficient? 

I probably should have started with covered call for APO. I’ve done way more with put selling than covered calls. The idea is to roll these close to expiration or exit with covered calls. Stupid move on my point not to look at this. 

[73 Reds]

4 minutes ago, Red Lion said:

I probably should have started with covered call for APO. I’ve done way more with put selling than covered calls. The idea is to roll these close to expiration or exit with covered calls. Stupid move on my point not to look at this. 

@Red Lion I tried doing this strategy 30 years ago +/-.  The internal conflict was that for stocks I wanted to own and hold it didn't work.  One stock ran away from me to the upside and on another occasion I was put a stock I really didn't want to own that much but the option premiums seemed too good to pass up and the stock remained a dog for several years.  For me the strategy works best with stocks you may like but don't absolutely love and definitely not with any stock you wouldn't want to own for a long time.  But the premiums have to justify the time, work and tax consequences if you are using taxable funds (you did say these were tax-deferred proceeds).  But over time I grew bored with the process and the nickels and dimes, though they can add up, were not worth the trouble.  Since those days the only options I do are short puts to try to enter a position at a specific price in lieu of a limit buy order.

[Red Lion]

3 hours ago, 73 Reds said:

@Red Lion I tried doing this strategy 30 years ago +/-.  The internal conflict was that for stocks I wanted to own and hold it didn't work.  One stock ran away from me to the upside and on another occasion I was put a stock I really didn't want to own that much but the option premiums seemed too good to pass up and the stock remained a dog for several years.  For me the strategy works best with stocks you may like but don't absolutely love and definitely not with any stock you wouldn't want to own for a long time.  But the premiums have to justify the time, work and tax consequences if you are using taxable funds (you did say these were tax-deferred proceeds).  But over time I grew bored with the process and the nickels and dimes, though they can add up, were not worth the trouble.  Since those days the only options I do are short puts to try to enter a position at a specific price in lieu of a limit buy order.

I think it’s probably not worth the effort but I enjoy trading. This is not a huge percent of my net worth. I only have about 10% in retirement accounts.
 

I’ve earned good nominal returns in the past writing weekly puts on margin, but the risk:reward looks way less attractive when paying close to half in taxes on short term gains. 
 

I’m sure switching this strategy to my tax deferred account is a guaranteed way to lose money and get losses I can’t utilize  

[Red Lion]

Rolled my $141 APO puts expiring today to $140 puts expiring 4/4 for a $0.79 credit. 

[no_free_lunch]

Not really selling but not buying any overpriced US tech.  I think there could be issues if the whole world starts to hate the US and the impact that might have on their tech industry.  I used US tech my whole career, it was not that great.  I feel the country rides on the past.   Yes OPENAI is amazing but its now replicated.  I think there will be a reconining.

[Red Lion]

Sold KKR $112 puts expiring 4/4. 

[Castanza]

2 hours ago, no_free_lunch said:

Not really selling but not buying any overpriced US tech.  I think there could be issues if the whole world starts to hate the US and the impact that might have on their tech industry.  I used US tech my whole career, it was not that great.  I feel the country rides on the past.   Yes OPENAI is amazing but its now replicated.  I think there will be a reconining.

 

Which ones do you think are expensive and why? I mean 18x for (GOOGL) and 23x for (META) does not scream expensive to me. 

[no_free_lunch]

23 minutes ago, Castanza said:

 

Which ones do you think are expensive and why? I mean 18x for (GOOGL) and 23x for (META) does not scream expensive to me. 

Nvidia and tesla pop to mind. Everything has to go right.

 

Also the trade stuff is going to start to have an impact and there are other options than the US which i now deem unreliable.

[Castanza]

1 hour ago, no_free_lunch said:

Nvidia and tesla pop to mind. Everything has to go right.

 

Also the trade stuff is going to start to have an impact and there are other options than the US which i now deem unreliable.

 

Okay those are two of the worst offenders. You can argue about valuation of Nvidia, but who can replace them near term? Tesla certainly has issues with Chinese auto manufacturers so I agree there. But when you get to GOOGL, MSFT, META, AMZN who replaces them? Are European nations going to cozy up with China? Is ASML going to cut the US off and flip to being a supplier of China? Will TSMC back out of building new chip plants in the US and instead align with EU or China? That would seem pretty hypocritical to align with China when you're lambasting the US for "Aligning with Russia" (which is highly debatable). DeepSeek is an interesting development, but in AI a rising tide lifts all boats. Remember AI has it's roots with American companies. Europe could absolutely inflict some damage on American Tech giants if it wants, but there is no reason to believe (yet) that there is a long term threat to them. I think emotions are running high and this is a very dynamic situation. To replace the datacenter infrastructure alone take a TON of capital and TIME. Trump is absolutely mucking stuff up, but when his time is up 4 years I think relations will be repaired. If I was handed a punchcard for investing I'm not sure I would be punching anything the next few years. 

[coffeecaninvestor]

I made a mistake sizing my bet on RTO (too large to fast). It took a few weeks of writing in my journal reflecting about it to realize it was impacting my day to day thoughts in a negative way. So I sold it down at ~7-8% loss to a much more moderate allocation. 

 

 

Edited March 31, 2025 by coffeecaninvestor

[LC]

1 hour ago, coffeecaninvestor said:

I made a mistake sizing my bet on RTO (too large to fast). It took a few weeks of writing in my journal reflecting about it to realize it was impacting my day to day thoughts in a negative way. So I sold it down at ~7-8% loss to a much more moderate allocation. 

 

How large did you size it initially?

 

This is a very large, mature business - will take time to integrate and for positive developments to slowly trickle in. I have it sized at ~3.5% currently.

 

The way I see it - there will be points to add on the way up, assuming the terminix integration goes well. Assuming the bull case, I would add 3-4x on the way up, up to a maybe 10% position.

 

And if management is not able to restructure the business, should be able to exit the position without much of an overall portfolio impact.

[KPO]

Sold almost 10% of my covid era FRFHF

[coffeecaninvestor]

1 hour ago, LC said:

 

How large did you size it initially?

 

This is a very large, mature business - will take time to integrate and for positive developments to slowly trickle in. I have it sized at ~3.5% currently.

 

The way I see it - there will be points to add on the way up, assuming the terminix integration goes well. Assuming the bull case, I would add 3-4x on the way up, up to a maybe 10% position.

 

And if management is not able to restructure the business, should be able to exit the position without much of an overall portfolio impact.

I had 3 purchases, and it ended up being 15% of my networth.

 

I like the stock still the sale was purely just a way to get it so I can look at things clearly again. 

 

I have always struggled to average in. Then end up regretting it. Apparently I need to learn the lesson again. 

[Red Lion]

Rolled my APO $139 4/4 short puts to $138 4/11 for a $0.60 credit. 

[formthirteen]

Sold NKE call options earlier this week after realizing I'm a fool.

[formthirteen]

Will be selling BRK and PM to raise some cash. I can always get in again later, right?

[Spekulatius]

Trimmed ABEV, ELV a bit and sold some

PM

[Red Lion]

Sold BTI to raise cash for a big add to OWL. Probably too soon. 

[tede02]

I'm not selling anything but it's interesting to see perceived safe-havens like utilities, BRK and even gold decline today. Yesterday, they were holding up in the classical sense. Today seems more like a "sell everything" kind of day.

[longlake95]

I think it's a positive sign BRK is being sold off. The stock renters piled into BRK the past 3-4 months, as a place to hide. Now they are selling, maybe smelling a bottom, to deploy into more torquey names. Not to say that's the right move. we'll see. 

Edited April 4, 2025 by longlake95