06/17 MNX Iron Butterfly

I started the trade Yesterday, it is looking good. I love the fact the P&L has already covered the commissions and spreads to enter the position.

06/17 RUT 30-Day Condor

Trade is in good shape, it has been on for just 3 days, but in may ways, this is GREAT news! :)

06/17 SPY Double Diagonal

P&L is getting better all the time on the trade, still very much in the center of the cone, approaching my time-limit for exiting the position. I am decided to exit a good ammount of contracts on these trades with 2 weeks, 2 and 1/2 max.

06/17 DIA Iron Butterfly (day-by-day review)

My most important realization on this trade is that I have to improve how I adjust the position. As I mentioned earlier in the blog, the fact I have an intra-day trading background has not helped me here with this income position. I'm leaving my income trades alone, unless they get to some really critical points. One way or another, this trade was adjusted sooo many times, and still lived to tell the tale, great leasson learned and I really liked the strategy.

The biggest issue was the position's size, I adjusted too many times and ended up paying all my profits in commissions. When I exited the trade, I was up about 5%, all that went to close the trade, and it finished at B/E.

Started: 05/19/09
Finished: 06/16/09
Duration: about 1 month
ROI: -0.68%

05/19/09

05/20/09

05/21/09 - Adjustment mistake (neutralized delta by too much)

05/22/09

05/26/09 - Right back at the center

05/27/09

05/28/09 - Back in profits

05/29/09 - DIA Gave it a rest

06/01/09 - Fully hedged *again*

06/02/09 - Adjusted by moving call spreads up

06/03/09 - Recovery in P&L

06/04/09 - Added long CALL (likely to be unecessary)

06/05/09 - Avoided hedging with futures pointing up at opening (good call)

06/08/09 - Adjusted when DIA moved up, not necessary

06/09/09- Increasing profits

06/10/09- Adjusted down-side, finished day leaning negative deltas

06/11/09- Got whipsawed intra-day, became frustrated by profits evading

06/12/09- Back in the green

06/15/09- Slowly exiting (at this point, commissions were a heavy burden)

06/16/09- Closed trade (Profits evaporated due to closing commissions and execution)

06/17 Pre-opening game plan

I have 3 open positions, they are pretty much in the middle, so all I have to do for Today is to set a few alerts. I have alerts within 1 st. deviation up or down for RUT, SPY and MNX. These are the only trade vehichles I have.

My plan for Today is to backtest the MNX iron Butterfly as per Dan Harvey's guidelines. I'll be also watching a few of his mentoring sessions.