Friday, Feb 22nd recap

The /ES opened at 1507 hit a high of 1509 within two minutes then crept down to 1503.25 by 1112hrs. It then reversed to 1512 by 1300 before hitting a day high of 1515 at 1600hrs. It was kind of a weird day for the market as it tried to figure out which direction it wanted to go after the two big sell-offs in the days prior.

$HPQ really surprised me the way the stock acted. I figured that it would sell off as those who got in at 14, 15, 16 could sell at 18.50ish to lock in profits. However, more buyers came in bidding the stock up to a high of 19.83, absolutely unreal... mainly because I don't think the company is going anywhere. I guess other people do, I wish them luck.

$AIG faded like I thought $HPQ would have, opening at 39.20 hitting a high of 39.59 within 3 minutes of open only to fade to 37.86 by 1415.

$GS traded slightly higher, maybe in sympathy to $AIG as I had guessed it may have. The Friday expiry 155s would have been an unwise play, but the following week March expiry 155s would have been solid as they traded from around 1.00 near the open to 1.30 for most of the day.

$ANF was the play of the day, that I didn't play. Obviously hindsight is 20/20, but based on the trading range in the pre-mkt (total range from high to low of $6.02) you knew it would move after the open, it was just a question of up or down. It opened at 48.02 and the Friday expiry straddle was $1.00. However, with the horrible guidance the best bet would have been to buy a near the money put, and the Friday expiry 48 was going for .50 off the open, or .60 about 10-15 minutes later. Further validating the pay off odds of buying a put, is the rip the stock has been on since November, up nearly 60% from $30. If you've been in since then, why hang around for a weak guidance when you can cash out your profits? Well the 48 put paid out nicely, from .60 up to a day high of 2.87.

$GOOG ended up tanking off the open, opening around 800 then hitting a low of 793 only to rebound back to 800 on the day.

$NFLX traded somewhat rangebound for the first couple of hours trading between 180 and 183 before hitting a day low of 178.

Rumors on the day:

Both $SNDK and $AKAM both had rumors hit the street on buyout talks but neither gained any traction. I usually check the options to see if there's any volume in them before I follow the trade, neither had any large call buys so I held off.