<p>You only have to generate 30 bucks month to get level 2 quotes, so you have them razorsharp.</p>
<p>The CMG jul350 puts that expire today were trading for 0.22 yesterday. Today, those options are trading for $29.</p>
<p>That’s a nice return if you were long those coming in today. </p>
<p>Now, if you were short those naked…</p>
<p>Here’s a comment from a poster at Boston Central (shopping reviews). I believe that the Merrimack Premium Outlets are bigger than the Wrentham Outlets. The backups on the highways for holidays are legendary. We’re hoping that it isn’t horrible during the holidays but I think that “moderately bad” is the best that we can hope for. Simon has another big mall near the border (near where I work) and traffic is a complete nightmare around the holidays - I avoid the area as much as possible. Unfortunately Trader Joes is near that mall so I can’t avoid the area completely.</p>
<p>I was at the Wrentham Outlet on black friday at midnight. Lousy sales. No great deals,. Nothing I couldn’t live without. And worse of all trying to get out of the parking lot. It took us 2 and a half hours to get out of the parking lot. I called the wrentham oultet office 4 times and the last time they hung up on me. I was told their was a police man directing cars out of the outlet. They lied. The stop lights were reset for blinking red. If they had been operating correctly it would never have been that bad. Finally we were able to go behind the oultet and get out on the side of Ruby Tuesday’s. There was no police man and security anywhere. I never want to go to that outlet again. It is was a horrible experience. I feel like I wasted my time. I wish I had never gone. Our car was almost hit 4 times. And a SUV and minivan tried to push our jeep out of the way. I kept calling and asking for security and kept getting blown-off. I hate that mall now and never want to go there again. I told every person I saw how horrible that mall was and I will continue. I have never been that annoyed or scared of being run over as I was that day. The parking lot was a nightmare as well. It was totally unorganized and the help desk was rude and unhelpful. I will discourage people from attending this next year and discourage them from going to this mall. I believe the only mall worth going to is the emerald mall. It was much easier to get into and out. Plus the sales were a lot better for the consumer. The parking at the emerald mall was fantastic. Unlike the wrentham village premium outlet, There were cars everywhere and no way out. If we had stayed on side e parking lot near the wrentham mall I think we would still be there…</p>
<p>There may be some duplicates as some stores are in multiple categories.</p>
<p>Aeropostale
American Eagle Outfitters
Ann Taylor Factory Store
Banana Republic Factory Store
Bass
Bloomingdale’s The Outlet Store
Brooks Brothers Factory Store
California Sunshine Swimwear
Calvin Klein
Chico’s
Columbia Sportswear
Converse
DKNY
Ecko Unltd
Elie Tahari
Gap Outlet
Guess Factory Store
Haggar Clothing Co.
HanesBrands
Izod
J.Crew
Jockey
Jones New York
Kasper
Lane Bryant Outlet
Levi’s Outlet Store
Loft Outlet
Lucky Brand
Maidenform
Michael Kors
Nautica
Nike Factory Store
Oakley Vault
PacSun
Polo Ralph Lauren
Puma
Reebok
Saks Fifth Avenue Off 5th
Talbots
Timberland
Tommy Hilfiger
True Religion Brand Jeans
Under Armour
Van Heusen
Vineyard Vines
White House Black Market
Wilsons Leather
Zumiez</p>
<p>Carter’s
Disney Store Outlet
Gymboree Outlet
Hartstrings
J.Crew | Crewcuts
Nautica | Kids
OshKosh B’gosh
Stride Rite Keds Sperry</p>
<p>Aerosoles
Asics
Bass
Clarks Bostonian
Cole Haan
Converse
Crocs
Easy Spirit
Ecco
Famous Footwear Outlet
Naturalizer
New Balance Factory Store
Nike Factory Store
Nine West Outlet
Puma
Reebok
Rockport
Saks Fifth Avenue Off 5th
Saucony
Skechers
Sperry Top-Sider
Stride Rite Keds Sperry
Timberland</p>
<p>Coach
Samsonite
Travelpro
Tumi
Wilsons Leather</p>
<p>Claire’s Accessories
Coach
Cole Haan
Fossil
Gold Toe
Kay Jewelers
Lids
Michael Kors
Sunglass Hut
Ultra Diamonds</p>
<p>Corningware Corelle Revere
Kitchen Collection
Le Creuset</p>
<p>BareMinerals
Bose
The Cosmetics Company Store
Fragrance Outlet
Lindt Chocolate
Perfumania
Yankee Candle</p>
<p>Auntie Anne’s Soft Pretzels
Bananas
Buckhead Grill
Chicken Now
China Max
Dairy Queen
Green Leaf’s
Villa Fresh Italian Kitchen</p>
<p>Traffic sounds like it is a nightmare at some of these outlet malls. </p>
<p>I would never go to these places at Christmas time with that kind of traffic.</p>
<p>I do like some of the stores at the Merrimack Mall.</p>
<p>WMT is pushing for internet sales to become taxable. I think there is bipartisan support for this. </p>
<p>I am a little surprised AMZN is acting so well…but
I never did understand that stock.</p>
<p>Yes, same stores, almost exactly…did you say it was a Simon outlet mall? This one is a Simon Group property</p>
<p>Yup. Chelsea started the process of getting permitting back in 2005 and was then acquired by Simon.</p>
<p>Amazon is doing trailblazing stuff in retail, logistics and delivery. I think that they got a bump from Google’s good results. Inside Google’s report was a significant increase in paid clicks which may mean that people are clicking more with Google search on ads and buying things. Amazon appears at the top of a lot of Google searches.</p>
<p>They also provide cloud services for app companies - that’s definitely a growth market.</p>
<p>Sell aapl Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday? Anybody own cat or planning on buying next week?</p>
<p>Well…my short puts expired worthless in MSFT and PEP. JPM was a big nothing and Intc disappointed me again. </p>
<p>I bought a lot of 5 year CDs back in 2007, and they are expiring in Aug and that is a bummer.</p>
<p>No clue about Aapl. No dreams this time. I might play Amzn’s earnings. I don’t know what the market is going to do next week.</p>
<p>[Why</a> Your Brain is Killing Your Portfolio - WSJ.com](<a href=“Why Your Brain is Killing Your Portfolio - WSJ”>Why Your Brain is Killing Your Portfolio - WSJ)</p>
<p>For the most part, I agree with everything in that article. I’ve read about numerous systems using everything from the solar flares, phases of the moon to “technical analysis” for which people make money. This tells me, its not the system but how people handle risk. I typically prefer selling otm puts specifically because the odds are heavily in my favor whereas in many other option strategies or stock strategies its more of a gamble. I also prefer selling weekly puts in heavily traded options such as spy because I can always roll it out (and collect more premium in the process) to the following week starting on Thursdays. If worse comes to worse, I’m going to buy it at a lower price. For me successes in calls and stocks is mainly luck and buying the flavor of the month such as aapl. I frequently make money doing it but I doubt as much if I just bought and held particularly since March 2009. Since that time, buy and hold has been difficult to beat. I keep a record of how I do and although I’ve beaten the market in 2010 - 2012, I lagged the market in 2009 which has greatly reduced whatever advantage I had.</p>
<p>Why just puts? </p>
<p>Didn’t you get assigned the spy in 2011 when the market crashed in August?</p>
<p>It is just puts because if assigned its at a lower price and far otm. Here is an example:</p>
<p>I sold 6/1 IWM puts for .32 on 5/30. On 6/1 during the day, IWM 75 puts were .64 so I would be assigned. I didn’t like the price since it looked like IWM was going to go down further, so I bought back those puts for .64 and sold 6/8 puts for 1.05 which expired otm on 6/8. I therefore ended up with .32+.41 = .73 not including fees. I could have kept going if it continued to drop or just be assigned. This happens because of time value in the option - the latter date option is worth more. If necessary I could have bought back the puts and sold more months out if necessary which would obviously reduce my profit.</p>
<p>"Among the mutual funds that were in the top half of performers in late 2009, according to Standard & Poor’s, only 49% of them still remained in the upper half a year later; a year after that, only 24% were left. That is just about what you would get if you flipped a coin. Trying to find the winners is futile if victory is determined largely by luck.</p>
<p>When confronted with the unpredictable, however, the frontopolar cortex refuses to admit defeat. It draws on all your computational abilities to search for patterns in random data.</p>
<p>In the absence of real patterns, it will detect illusory ones. And it will prompt you to act on them.</p>
<p>No wonder so many investors find it hard to muster the willpower to buy and hold a handful of investments for years at a time."</p>
<p>Destroying wealth, there are many ways to do this.</p>
<p>A negative interest rate…echhhhh.</p>
<p>“He said policymakers would need to consider whether it could take the deposit rate below zero, which would mean the central bank would start charging banks for the privilege of parking spare cash in the ECB.
“It’s still possible,” Coeure told students at an event in Mexico City. “It’s true that we are hitting a psychological limit at zero. And it’s unclear whether markets can function at negative interest rates. Some of them can.”
“Some of them apparently can’t. So before making the next step, which would be moving the deposit facility to a negative yield, we’ll reflect about it,” he added.
Denmark introduced a negative interest rate this month and the ECB is watching closely how the move plays out.
Global markets were roiled on Friday by concerns Spain may need a full-blown sovereign bailout after its heavily indebted eastern region of Valencia said it would need financial help from Madrid.
The euro slumped broadly on Friday, setting a two-year low against the dollar while weakening to record levels against other currencies.”</p>
<p>[ECB’s</a> Coeure says negative bank deposit rate an option - Yahoo! Finance](<a href=“http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ecbs-coeure-says-negative-bank-035738110.html]ECB’s”>http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ecbs-coeure-says-negative-bank-035738110.html)</p>
<p>[Central</a> Banks Helpless As Denmark Goes NIRP, Cuts Deposit Rate To NEGATIVE 0.2% | ZeroHedge](<a href=“404 | ZeroHedge”>Zerohedge)</p>
<p>"
Denmark’s central bank cut its main borrowing costs to record lows and brought the rate it offers on certificates of deposit below zero, as policy makers test uncharted territory to fight a capital influx.
*
The benchmark lending rate was cut to 0.2 percent from 0.45 percent, while the deposit rate was reduced to minus 0.2 percent from 0.05 percent, Copenhagen-based Nationalbanken said in a statement today. The move followed a quarter of a percentage point cut in the European Central Bank’s main rate to 0.75 percent. Nationalbanken doesn’t hold scheduled meetings and only adjusts rates to defend the krone’s peg to the euro.
*
“There’s no experience of how negative deposit rates will affect the financial markets and the krone,” Jacob Graven, chief economist at Sydbank A/S, said in a phone interview today before the decision was announced. “It’s a sign of the strong Danish economy. This is good. The opposite situation would be far worse, if the central bank would have to hike rates to defend the krone. We have a luxury problem.”
*
Denmark has stepped up its battle to prevent the krone from strengthening beyond its currency band as the nation’s haven status attracts investors. Danske Bank A/S, the country’s biggest lender, said last week it now has a risk scenario that envisages Denmark abandoning the peg should the cost of fighting currency appreciation grow too high. The bank doesn’t view this as a likely outcome, it said.
The liquidity trap has been sprung. Soon everyone will be paying their banks for the privilege of holding their cash for them."</p>
<p>^^I don’t know much about that zerohedge site but I’ve gotten the impression, it always has a negative slant on things.</p>
<p>Yeah…when I read that there are countries with nominal negative interest rates,</p>
<p>I think zero-hedge has a negative bias.</p>
<p>I mean, you can’t find this information anywhere but web sites that tilt negatively.</p>
<p>It’s not like nominal negative interest rates are fact.</p>
<p>Probably not a big deal. Nominal negative interest rates are a common occurence.</p>
<p>Japan here we come,i mean here we are… ;)</p>
<p>A gloomy editorial on retirement.</p>
<p>The writer says it takes, on average, 20 times your income at retirement to retire (if you don’t have pensions, haven’t paid off your house, etc).</p>
<p>Most people haven’t saved that. I guess the average person has only saved about 30,000. That’s a little bit short.</p>
<p>I am not sure I love the writer’s solutions including professional managers handling the investments. I don’t think professionals have that great a track record and their fees hurt returns.</p>
<p><a href=“Opinion | Our Ridiculous Approach to Retirement - The New York Times”>Opinion | Our Ridiculous Approach to Retirement - The New York Times;
<p>"Seventy-five percent of Americans nearing retirement age in 2010 had less than $30,000 in their retirement accounts. The specter of downward mobility in retirement is a looming reality for both middle- and higher-income workers. Almost half of middle-class workers, 49 percent, will be poor or near poor in retirement, living on a food budget of about $5 a day.</p>
<p>To maintain living standards into old age we need roughly 20 times our annual income in financial wealth. If you earn $100,000 at retirement, you need about $2 million beyond what you will receive from Social Security. If you have an income-producing partner and a paid-off house, you need less. This number is startling in light of the stone-cold fact that most people aged 50 to 64 have nothing or next to nothing in retirement accounts and thus will rely solely on Social Security."</p>
<p>On a more positive note…inexpensive places to live…</p>
<p>[The</a> Best U.S. Cities for Retiring On $100 a Day - Yahoo! Finance](<a href=“http://finance.yahoo.com/news/the-best-u-s--cities-for-retiring-on--100-a-day-20120720.html]The”>The Best U.S. Cities for Retiring On $100 a Day)</p>