Full Disclosure

For starters, allow me to make full disclosure.

On Monday I sold puts on shares of Groupon as a reflection of a short term bullish sentiment on its shares.

Unless you've been living in a cave or have been on an South Pole expedition you know that Groupon is that beleaguered daily deal space leader that has had a rough time of things.

If either of those are the case, you probably also still own shares of Research in Motion.

Sometimes you are your own worst enemy and there are no better recent examples of that adage than Groupon and Research in Motion.

From its IPO, including pre-IPO and post-IPO behaviors its been an embarrassment every way you can imagine. Embarrassment is one thing, but for those that purchased IPO day traded shares at $26, the drop below $15 is more meaningful.

In the past, I've been critical of Groupon and its juvenile leadership and arrogance. If you really care. take a look.

If you're really without a reason for living, I suppose that you could check through the Twitter archives and read other miscellaneous comments that I'd made over the months, especially about CEO Andrew Mason, although he certainly wasn't the only culprit.

During that time, I'd never own shares, nor had any interest, long or short in the shares of this company.

On Monday, I finally decided to take a position, by selling those April 2012 puts.

I did so following Groupon's press release regarding yet another accounting issue.

In the past, I've done very well selling puts on companies after they've taken big hits, but not being terribly speculative or risk taking by nature, those positions have always been small.

In this case, if I am assigned shares, I'll be on the hook for about 0.28% of my portfolio.

Since Monday, other than mentioning the fact that I had taken the position, I've made no comments, derogatory or laudatory, regarding Groupon.

Not as if I actually would influence anyone by doing so.

Click to read more ...

Is that All it Takes?

The day started with a nice surprise for me.

Still upset about the bad luck I'd had when my computer froze during the final minutes of FrIday's trading session, I was prepared to start the week with most of my Freeport McMoRan shares assigned from me after just having sold those calls earlier in the day on Friday.

Compound that with only a net $8 profit from the big mega-Millions drawing and you've got some blood pressure raising seething going on that can be internalized for only so long.

Sometimes, though, the system is neither perfect in its execution nor in its pricing.

For example, sometimes really stupid people win really big lottery prizes.

They can be safely assessed as having been stupid on the basis of blowing through tens of millions of dollars and more in just a few years and being left with nothing but memories of days of grandeur.

That reportedly happens fairly often, so there may be an inverse corrrelation between jackpot winners and IQ. I still don't understand all of the testimonials of past jackpot winners who claim that their lives became worse in so many untold ways after their good fortune.

Seven out of ten people that I polled on that issue agreed that it was a sign of stupidity at its greatest height.

Sometimes the system gets it wrong too, as shares are expected to be assigned if they closed more than a penny above their strike price.

But the surprise, the yawn of a system taking a break, was right there, staring at me this morning.

I felt as if I'd gotten a gift when only the smaller lot of my Freeport shares was assigned, leaving a bit more than 75% of the shares still safely stored in my portfolio.

Not quite a Mega-Millions jackpot, but I gladly accepted it.

Of course had those shares not taken a well deserved climb well higher this morning, I'd be muttering about the inequity of the system letting me down and would be raging against those 1% fat cats that comprise the 1% of the 1%.

Instead, move over and make room for me and my boys, Mac and Moran.

Click to read more ...