Oct 12 - Week 41 and Quarter 3 Ends (YTD)
- YTD returns (as of Oct 11)
- 401K / Brokeragelink update
- Week 41 Option/Dividend Data
- Recession or Q4 Santa Claus Rally
YTD returns (as of Oct 11)
Friday was a "big" RED day, and this shows it.
The most important thing to note is that we have been in an uptrend for the last 5 months or so (since mid-April).
However, my 401 (k) plan is part of that $323,000. To examine it in more detail, here is the breakdown of that sub-account:
My 401K is worth 167K. What you notice is the "average" amounts I invest into my retirement plan for 2025 (<6K as of Oct 12) with $816 from MATCHING funds. There are many "Finance Social media" bloggers who often "max" out (those that save 22K or more (via SEP IRA, Solo IRA)).
My portfolio is often dependent on Time and the investment choices that I make, not the size of the cash I save per year.
401K / Brokeragelink update
I have not provided an update in about 3 months, so here are the updated slides:
Even after Friday's drop, my account is still 23K higher than what it was on July 10 (300K). If you factor in the total of only 6K of new cash, the market has returned over 30K since Feb 18, 2025.
My 401K plan went from 110K (Jan) to over 167K (Oct) with 6K coming from new cash contribution.
Week 41 Option/Dividend Data
Here is the pivot data of my trading history:
Quarter 4 is off to a BAD start. You can see that week 40 and week 41 have had negative returns in my option/dividend income. $13 of that was from Dividends. Why and how did I lose money?
Let's pivot the data by ticker to see what happened:
Based on this, you can see a trend. Both #AMD and #MRVL are in the chip sector. In both cases, the shares are moving up, and if I'm losing money, it means my COVERED CALL was limiting my UPSIDE! I pay cash to roll the COVERED calls up in strike price to try to recover "some" upside.
I have PUT credit spread and Covered calls open at the same time. In this case, I can use some of the profits from one side to help OFFSET the position on the "LOSING SIDE" of the trade. This is used to hedge or reduce risk while trying to make a small profit.
If you go into the details of each trade, you can see that here. I spent $262 today to move the strike price $15 in my favor (or $1500 of potential profit) if AMD stays above $150.
This is how adjusting covered call can be done to try to recoup SOME of the profits of the LIMITED upside, even if the stock POPPED 30% in a week. It will most likely take 4-12 months or longer to adjust these positions.
Recession or Q4 Santa Claus Rally
The markets look to be turning red in October. Fourth Quarter is generally a good time to be fully vested because of the "Santa Claus Rally".
Q: What am I doing differently since last week?
A: Nothing.
My portfolio has a mix of SP500 (low-cost ETF), boring dividend stocks, higher risk growth companies, Bitcoin, Ether, options (covered call and put credit spread), etc.
Short-term goal: