Alright, we’ve got some traction into the close today and AAPL after weeks(!!!) of lagging the DJIA actually got finally ahead of it. AAPL actually performed 6x stronger than DJIA (forget the Beta as that’s more of the overall volatility gauge than performance gauge).
So what are your votes on what will the MMs pin it to this Friday? 240, 250 or 260??? We have one more market moving event this week (Friday’s GDP numbers), which is slowing money to come back to the markets and we have contradicting Sep 1st Apple Media event that encourages people to put money back into AAPL.
In addition markets, same as AAPL are getting to the way oversold levels (DIA, DJIA are around 12% on stochastic) and we’ve definitely seen doji today on both DJIA/DIA and AAPL indicating that fall is slowing down and both are stepping on breaks.
My impression is we could see a rally tomorrow morning, possibly allowing AAPL to run close to 250 and then in last hour before the close we’ll see probably some kind of pullback/selloff as some investors will be probably taking out some money before the Friday’s 8:30AM ET GDP report. Then Friday is total toss coin where if data are negative we could see intraday selloff/pullback hopefully followed by rally as a lot of the bad news already seem to be priced in. Or we’ll see negative, but not too negative GDP numbers in which case markets could rise. (any positive GDP numbers would cause a riot 
)
So.., without further ado, I am voting this week’s pin to be 250, with slight chance of 260 in case GDP numbers are not too terrible.
mikeinmontreal 7:14 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
240. Bad numbers today, bad numbers tomorrow. I will be buying into the event. Average down on my Jan 11 calls and buy more Jan 12 calls. Then out after earnings. I’m doing what nolav did in July. Or maybe not; who knows.
caruso2323 9:24 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
I have no clue as to how weekly options relate to the monthly one …
But here is my take on the monthly one based on chart trending :
- The Upper line right now stands at 273 with a projected approx 277.50 by the 17 th of Sep
- The Lower line right now stands at 247.50 with a projected approx 252.50 by the 17 th of Sep
So my newbie median approach, i am suggesting 265 as being the maximum pain a a date close too opex … Hmmm that sounds optimistic, too good to be true … lol ! …
Oh well … Please feel free to correct me and educate me
….
caruso2323 9:29 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
I’d say that next week’s pin would be 250 in case we get stuck at 245 by tomorrow …
carlmuck 9:45 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
If we can bridge Tuesday’s gap (get up to Monday’s close of 245.37) I think we’ll see strength to just under 250 tomorrow (assuming an in-line GDP number of 1.4%). I had hoped that the pre-market action would give us enough momentum to bridge the gap in the first 15 minutes of trading. We didn’t get that, so I think we’ve got work to do to break up.
Also the BMO report this morning to “don’t expect too much” I think is dampening the excitement we got yesterday afternoon.
carlmuck 9:47 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@carlmuck
Doh!, just looked at the numbers and not the chart. Looks like we just touched the Monday close on the open today, but no momentum (did peek to 245.50) maybe after we clear all those that were limiting on the monday close, we can catch a bid…
carlmuck 10:01 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@carlmuck
I really need to finish my coffee before I start posting …
Monday’s close was 245.80, with an intraday low of 245.25. Still haven’t closed the gap…
caruso2323 10:16 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@carlmuck
I expected resistance in the 245.50-245.70 range at the open …
We merely touched 245.50 and as usual upgaps get filled within the first 30 minutes or so…
AAPL needs to consolidate in the 244.80-245.40 before it breaks through the 245.50-245.80 resistance range …
caruso2323 10:32 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
Oops As I was posting this, we touched 245.70…
And the consolidation range so far seems to be in a healthier consolidation range of 245.20-245.60
What is bullish though is the MACD break-out on the 30 minutes chart… Which bodes well for a forthcoming run-up to 248.40, assuming we break through intermediate secondary resistance levels
mikeinmontreal 11:25 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
I think opex is today.
carlmuck 11:33 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@mikeinmontreal
What’s opex?
RattyUK 11:37 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
Options Expiry and isn’t that tomorrow?
carlmuck 11:47 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@rattyuk
Sept. options expire on the 18th, August options expired last week. Not sure if he’s talking about weekly options, but I don’t even worry about them.
RattyUK 11:55 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@carlmuck
Save that they appear to be used to pin Apple every week nowadays. Or at least it feels like that.
carlmuck 12:27 pm on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
@rattyuk
I agree it does look like it:
6/28 – 246.94
7/05 – 259.62
7/12 – 249.90
7/19 – 259.94
7/26 – 257.25
8/02 – 260.09
8/09 – 249.10
8/16 – 249.64
RattyUK 11:38 am on August 26, 2010 529 days ago Reply
Damn hit the page break but it was in response to carlmuck.
nolavabo 5:42 pm on August 26, 2010 528 days ago Reply
A quick glance over the last 2 months shows that most of the time AAPL is being pinned to the nearest round number relative to the Wednesday closing price.
Unfortunately that makes it $240 for this week.
I have no position in AAPL. I will be testing the above theory next week by buying calls or puts.
Further examination shows that the largest moves tend to occur on Monday or Tuesday, then Wednesday less, Thursday less again and Friday the least. All of this agrees with / reinforces the above theory.
caruso2323 7:39 pm on August 26, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@nolavabo
Interesting theory backed up with decent data …
1) How long have weekly options been traded ? Never heard about them … Only monthly
2) I hope that if GDP is bad I hope they manage to pin it to 240… lol
caruso2323 8:24 pm on August 26, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@nolavabo
Funny … The last AH transaction is this :
19:58 $ 240 300
LOL
nolavabo 9:39 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
Caruso, I don’t know exactly how long weekly options have been trading, but not less than 10 weeks and not more than 4 months.
I noticed that about 6 months ago, my broker stopped describing (e.g.) a call as AAPL JUL 260 C, and started calling it AAPL 07212010 260 C. I thought it stupid at the time, but then I started noticing AAPL 07212010 260 C and AAPL 07282010 260 C at the same time, and realised that weekly options had started.
caruso2323 10:49 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@nolavabo
I must say that I am impressed by your analysis and conclusions… Today’s action appears to support your thesis…
What I may add to your thesis is that on Fridays not only they may be bound at Wednesdays close but also to expect about $5 spread between the highest high and the lowest low, whatever that high turns out to be and and that low turns out to be as well…
In general, I have observed that spreads vary by odd numbers : 3, 5 , and 7 …
I will double-check your thesis and my spread theory aver thw week-end …
Thanks for sharing !
conshmillo 10:27 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
Alright, GDP out of the way, Bernanke speech out of the way, now gimme my AAPL 250!
Bought some SEP 100 DIA on that early morning drop @1.90
conshmillo 10:39 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
All I want today is to “250 pin big ass hedge fund” to beat crap out of “240 pin big ass hedge fund”.
caruso2323 11:05 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@conshmillo
240 big ass hedge fund has been having the upper hand over the 250 pin big ass, over the last 2 months according to nolav’s observations … I tend to think that most big ass hedge funds are coordinating their game, they suck each other dick…
The only way the reverse could happen, assuming they are not sucking each other dick, is if large institutions put big orders up to 250 … That would show up on volumes … By 10:30 I thnk that there was some 8M … Which is twice the anemic volume we have been getting… Let’s see if it dries out like in the past 20 days !
caruso2323 11:30 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@conshmillo
I think neither your 250 pin big ass hedge fund, nor nolav’s 240 pin big ass hedge fund will win … I think that it is my 245 pin big ass hedge fund shall win… lol … But it sounds like it may need as much as a +300 DIJA to get this LITTLE rise in AAPL …
Look how they have messed with my AAPL’s this morning ! … Sheesh !
Nicu 11:38 am on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
there is no $245 pin, as there are no options @ $245, meaning that in between $240 and $250 the total value of options is linear so the max pain (minimum of this value) is either $240, $250 or there is no pin if they are of close values, case in which there is no “attractor”
caruso2323 1:08 pm on August 27, 2010 528 days ago Reply
@nicu
Thanks for correcting me… It seems that this is attributable to AAPL’s “high price” … Not advocating a stock split (just a buy-back… LOLO) …
So Nolav’s big ass hedge fund will mostly win unless a miracle happens…
I thought it moved by $5 increments (Like RIMM … BTW its maximum pain for September is set at 55, while it traded as low as 45 today ! … maybe it is oversold … )
nolavabo 3:13 pm on August 27, 2010 527 days ago Reply
Monthly options exist in $5 increments. Weekly options are $10 increments.