2/19 Almanac

Friday, Feb. 19, is the last trading day before February options expire, 28 the March and 56 the April.

Blue chip stocks (SPY) closed the latest regular session at $110.91, up 0.6% from the prior close.

In total, 3 billion shares were traded on the three major U.S. stock exchanges, down 3.2% from yesterday.

Burning Question: Is it scary that the 8th best-selling book on Amazon.com is called The Coming Insurrection, with The Invisible Committee listed as the author?

On the jump, humor prize, mediawatch, rules, econ reports, portfolio and a good book...

Mediawatch: Winner of the prize for Most Humorous Explanation of a Stock Market Move goes to (drumroll) MarketWatch, which headlined its stock market story, "Stocks gain steam as plane-related worries ebb". The plane in question was a small private airplane that crashed into a building in office that houses the Internal Revenue Service. I enjoy good satire. Stephen Colbert, eat your heart out!

The AP, no doubt mindful of the gravitas required to maintain the news creds of the World's Oldest and Largest Newsgathering Organization, credited, quite credibly, a stronger manufacturing report.

My rules allow trades today in March iron condors and covered calls, along with butterfly, calendar and vertical spreads. I allow myself to trade unhedged call and put option purchases that expire in April or later. These economic reports will be released: The consumer price index at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. This is the government's primary measure of inflation. With unanimity on interest rates beginning to fray a bit on the Federal Open Market Committee, the CPI will microscoped for the least signs of inflation. My portfolio consists of . . . February expiry: CVS, iron condor, p28/-p31/-c34/c36 ERTS, iron condor, p15/-p16/-c18/c19 MCO, covered call,  s/-c30 PALM, covered call, s/-c13

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March expiry:

• AKS, iron condor, p19/-p20/-p25/p26
• CAL, covered call, s/-c19
• CSCO, iron condor, p22/-p23/-c25/c26
• GCI, covered call, s/-c15

Shares for dividends: AOD, NLY.

Good trading!

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Topics: S&P 500, SPDR, Spiders, AK Steel Holdings, Alopine Dynamic Dividend closed-end fund, Continental Airlines aviation, Cisco Systems networking, CVS Caremark, pharmacies, drugs, Electronic Arts games, Gannett newspapers media, Moodys bond rating, Annaly Capital Management, Palm smartphone Pixi Pri.