As the great John “Hannibal” Smith used to say: “I love it when a plan comes together.”  

Of course Smith’s plans usually involved a great deal of mayhem culminating in things blowing up – very apropos considering the massive market blow up this week.  The plan in Monday Morning’s Alert to Members, which was titled “Cashing in Longs and Back to Cashy and Shortish” was pretty straight-forward:  

If you want to play this rally for more upside, you can still short the VIX (we did the Aug $19 puts on Friday for $1, now 1.20) or play gold down with the GLL Aug $22s, that are still .35 or the GLD Aug $155 puts at .72 BUT I’m not really believing things are fixed so these are SPECULATIVE plays to follow the rally – WHICH I DON’T BELIEVE IN.  Clear? 

What I do believe in is shorting the Dow with DIA Aug $119 puts at $1.20 or the SQQQ Aug $21/23 bull call spread at .85, selling the Sept $19 puts for .55 for net .30 on the $2 spread.  

USO Weekly $38 puts are .44, 20 of those in the $25KP for $880!  (longs are, of course off).

Let’s be straight about that, all the short-term long, including the ones in the Income Portfolio – are DONE.  This was the pop we hoped for and now it’s done and back to cash!  

The VIX puts are, of course dead with the VIX now at 31.66 but the Aug $22 GLL calls are still .15 (down 57%) and the GLD Aug $155 puts are now .95 (up 32%) thanks to that same rise in the VIX.  Not bad for trades I did not believe in.

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