Bill Luby, of VIX and more, recently pointed out that the 1st / 2nd month volatility futures had recently set a record (now 70 days) for continuous time spent in backwardation—where the value of the 1st month is higher than the 2nd month. Not just a trivia question, this condition has been feathering the pockets of those holding volatility ETNs like VXX / TVIX, …
Linkedin recently reported their 3rd quarter earnings, or rather losses. The good news however was that their revenue growth surprised analysts on the upside, more than doubling from last year’s numbers. LNKD was trading around $80 this morning, and the November 19th $70 puts were at 1.0 bid / 1.2 asked. The implied volatility on those puts was around 83, which seemed …
The prices of SPY from this year and the same date 6 years ago continue their intertwining. For the last two years, just using the old SPY chart has been a better predictor than any number of CNBC commentators—too bad I haven’t been able to convince myself to use this as my market strategy. Today’s closing price of $122, was only $1.5 different from the …
It’s tough right now to get returns above 1% a year right now without taking significant risks. For example ten year treasuries are running around 2% without much upside and a lot of downside. Stocks paying dividends of 2% or more are common, but they will track a general downturn. Typically quality high dividend stocks won’t decrease as much as other stocks in a downturn, but …
Nassim Taleb crosses over into foreign affairs with The Black Swan of Cairo. He takes the position that in political, as well as financial matters that attempting to eliminate volatility increases the likelihood that nasty Black Swan events will occur.
