Smells like a short squeeze. Did you see that mess today, right smack in the middle of earnings? Everything was up, even stocks whose companies puked earnings. And how many >1% days does that make it in the past month?
And then those crazy “IP” companies. You wanna talk bubble? I smell a bubble coming and going real fast. I bet there’s another $13 up in PANL before Samsung squashes that one by saying “Meh, don’t really like it. And regular panels are pretty cheap right now. Think I will avoid OLED for another year.” That whole cycle should last all of one week in this market.
All day long I stared at my screen saying “this ain’t right, this ain’t right,” and indeed it wasn’t…to an extent. There was a little fade but not much. I should have stopped saying “this ain’t right” sometime in the morning. Certainly better than saying I will swallow my own cock if the market goes higher. Who says that sort of crap anyway?
And so I struggled. At 33% cash, I was itchy to go full boar bearish (boarish?) and throw everything I had into stupidly OTM Aug puts. The Pseudo-Rational Me stepped in, pulled the bottle from my mouth, and said “Now, now, the last time shorts were squeezed we saw 92 on TNA and 31 on TZA. Big change vs today.” Granted, decay is an issue, but it does put things in perspective. If bulls don’t get their shit in one sock soon, there is a whole lot of pain comin’. I am short TNA from 82 and 86.
Now don’t get me wrong. I love home runs, but I have been burned enough over the past couple of years to take as many bunts and walks as possible. The highest probability home run that I see is a TZA short to zero…or continuous reverse splits, at least. I will say, right here and now, that I plan to set my account aflame with a stupidly OTM put on TZA with the intent of putting and sitting until the thing reverse splits at least once. Therefore, I am dying for the market to puke just so I have a better chance of success shorting TZA to zero. Just so folks have perspective.
And let me tell you, I was very close to letting my last Aug 40 TZA put put. (A noun and a verb. I love this business.) I just don’t trust Congress. We get past this latest bullshit with a deal big enough to set The Fed free for another year or two and I will be all over TZA like a boxer on a toy poodle at the local dog park (I gots pictures…).
So I wait. PRM convinced Me to sit tight, things are still OK and earnings, really, aren’t so hot. Guidance, actually. Whatever. My shorts are in good shape. Point being that now is not the time to burn capital hoping for a market meltdown. Decline from here means the market is my toad.
So I sit on 33% cash, 33% stupidly OTM calls from earlier this year, and 33% sort-of ITM puts mostly comprised of TNA. In the end and given the actions I performed today (nothing), I am simply wasting mental energy. I should just set sell stops and go to the beach.
Instead I will finish the bottle. Gawd, I can’t wait to go long stocks again. Because it worked so well for me before.