Wiki Selling TSLA Options - Be the House

[DaBooster]

I'm still trying to figure out a good DTE when buying options, and I know that there isn't a one-size-fits-all answer by any stretch.

I'm finding that my success with buying options comes from buying the max dte options at what I consider a good price and waiting. So far I'm getting good exits in a month or less, but as long as I'm convicted about the 12 month window (buy 27 months out, look to close with 12+ months remaining, but anytime along the way is fine) - that is working pretty well.


Here at this 178ish price I'm looking for the share price to be a bit more down before I buy more of the June '26 300 strike calls (or maybe 250s - I definitely stick with the high volume strikes).

I've sold some of my 150 strike puts but still have most. I think I'd like to see a pop back towards 190 before I buy these again. My thinking is more down than up from here, but I'm only feeling enough conviction to hold onto what I've got - not enough to add.

I plan to buy Jun '26 250 calls when they are down to around $20 ($135 SP)

 

[Arul]

Amen to that.

I'm here since the beginning of the thread and am still a noob.

I agree it is not advice but we apprecite your contributions and I am learning from it not trading from.

 

[2Pearls]

I'm not convinced the wave ended. We'll see. But I'm looking at the next ten days now and wondering where the SP is going to go.

The trend is down and there is no news coming stating otherwise. And, I read the eps Was revised downward as well for the year. I am thinking we might be in the 160’s over the next couple of weeks and a lower P&D could move the stock down further. I hope I am wrong...but this is starting to feel like the end of 2022... when most of us thought the bleeding would stop at some point, but it just kept going down. Yes, I know Elon selling had a lot to do with that, but with eps revised lower for the year now, it seems to be having the same effect.

 

[Yoona]

If you can pls share what you are seeing the Algos doing/price action it would bring a measure of peace of mind to many here.

did.i.not.just.post.2.charts.

everyone wants to know direction - we all want to be comforted by and be guided by and be handheld by a pointer - but no one here and no one on X and no one on youtube can predict direction, it's just not going to happen coz everyone is just guessing (case in point: predict JOLTs tomorrow and you'll get 100 diff noise)

but we are all very good in predicting range (EW, fib, channels, lines, 1σ, gamma, vanna, OI, youtube gurus) and that's way more than good enough to prepare a plan

bull flag says down 168ish, fib says up 190ish, gamma says 170-180, vanna says 170-185, OI says 175-190, wickedstocks says this, dailytrader says that

of course, we are assuming no black swans (stock split news, stock buyback news, st*pid tweets, EM selling, recall, etc)

in other words, instead of non-stop panicking, prepare 2 plans: what to do if stock goes 168? what to do if stock goes 190? then execute it

if we don't have a plan, we are trading according to the latest "news"... AJ? garyblack? reuters? - everyone has an agenda

 

[Jim Holder]

Elon tonight on OEM FSD licensing:

 

[Max Plaid]

And correct me if I’m wrong, but you can’t offset taxes with losses, right?

when I have losses like that (ok, I’ve never had losses like that) and i really think the stock is going to remain flat, DOWN or maybe just slightly up over the next 30 days, I BOOK THE LOSS and turn that into a carried asset going forward, and will re-enter that equity most likely at a LOWER price, or same price and yet I’ve turned that booked loss into an ASSET from a tax standpoint.

But, if in Belgium that policy doesn’t apply, well that’s a bummer.

Losses on shares indeed are non-deductible, but I wouldn't sell those, better to keep them and just keep generating premium

But options losses are full deductible, so that's not a problem, but I do all my trading in my company and I really don't want to book a loss as it might trigger an audit, and Belgian tax audits are a lottery, they make the rules up as they go along, to be avoided!

So I prefer to keep my profits and taxes steady year over year, just to avoid discussions

Can you define turning it into a carried asset going forward? The loss would only work to offset gains this year and just $3k per year after. Is that what you meant?

In my case as it's company account, the full tax loss would be carried forward, no funny "$3000" annually rule AFAIK

I just don't want to go there, that's all

But I will mitigate it by drip-rolling the Dec 2025 +c200 further out, half this year to 2026, or 2027 if the options become available, then the rest next year, and close them out if the opportunity comes - main thing there is not to have them assigned to DITM short calls, that was the issue last year when I first bought them (at a much lower price) when the SP was 167, but when it rallied to 299 in just over a month I couldn't offload the calls for huge profits ad I'd written -c200's against them, doh!

Now I know better and keep some shitcalls as escape-route

Also if I kick the can down the road on these to 2026, 2027 and Tesla deliver on the gen3, then they should print

Anyway, the main point is that most of the loss is already in those and selling them now would be dumb when they can bemused to underwrite weeklies for the next two years...

And yes, I don't have any restraint on strike price of longs needing to be lower than the short, maybe just need to pony-up some cash-reserve

 

[Max Plaid]

Not sure what to do tomorrow. I did not agree with Troy about Q1. Jan + February so far: Europe is up over 32% YOY (despite Germany being down because of the loss of EV credit), China sales up 9%, US probably doing well with price increases, Berlin was at record production of 6k. But now Berlin production is down for 1-2 weeks thanks to the terrorist attack, so that will be 12k deliveries gone.

The plan to help deal with my 2 year old +170/-195 BPS expiring next week that was looking so good three days ago, was to sell 180CC today for $5, which I did, to sell shares at cost basis 185 to take assignment on the -195P (or keep rolling the -195P after that to close the $10 gap). But for the plan to work, the SP needs to be over 180 next week. If the SP crates more because of Berlin tomorrow, maybe I should just sell a lot of shares to buy back cheaper. Aaarg!

The point that Troy is making is that previous Europe deliveries were very lumpy being heavily biased to the third month due to the GF3 logistics

Now Tesla have managed to smooth the wave quite a bit, so we've been seeing a levelling of deliveries across the quarter, so the logic goes that more cars in month 1 & 2 would mean less in month 3, compared to previous years, so the +% we're seeing now os potentially mis-leading

Fact is we don't know, can still be that March is a bumper month, so it's all speculative, even though the logic is reasonable

Troy also talks about inventory in Europe being very high, if that's the case then maybe GF4 production downtime won't impact as much on deliveries as some expect

Here's 2023 Europe numbers, levelling out as the year progressed, not 100% certain, but quite indicative

 

[elasalle]

Just got assigned a $200 put … will wheel at the open …

 

[Max Plaid]

Just got assigned a $200 put … will wheel at the open …

What was the expiry?

 

[elasalle]

What was the expiry?

This Friday
.. had a good mini run past 4 weeks with no assignments on this one

 

[Max Plaid]

Two things...

Aside SMCI being added to S&P need of next week, there's the rebalancing at the same time, lots of discussions in the past about the impact of this, none of which I can recall, but if someone wants to chip-in

Secondly, a friend gave me the heads-up on an inventory tracker I have't seen previously: Tesla New Inventory Counts, aggregated Globally

 

[thenewguy1979]

But not if you are in a different country like Max Pain is...
Their pain is maxed...

The name is Max Plaid not Max Pain. He aint no perverted Machoist. Right bros?

 

[Tachyon]

Right now , aren’t we all are and at Max pain ? It’s the singularity !

 

[thenewguy1979]

Bear are in control premarket. Pain may be here longer then usual.

Recap - dl003 target 143 wave C, Tivoboy 165/160, Yoona waiting to buy at 160………..

 

[Jim Holder]

@dl003's excellent post from March 3, 2023 regarding surviving a deep TSLA correction.
Note: It's remarkable how the price ranges are the same we're dealing with today in March 2024.

Surviving a Deep TSLA Correction
During Winter, what matter most is keeping yourself and loved ones safe and sound: cash reserve, low margin usage, low expenses etc. Whatever mistakes we made during the good times, now is not the time to ponder the woulda's and coulda's. Now is not the time to “make it back.”

Bear market doesn't just go straight down. Bears can lose just as much money as bulls during a bear market. I know because I see it every day. Once we have ensure our survival through this dark time, we have to accept what we have right now is all we have to work with. It keeps us from taking unnecessary risks in order to get back to “the good old days.”

Then, we need to find systems and methods that we have successes with. Start small and slow. Fail small and often. Make those small losses back before betting larger.

Personally every day I try to answer these questions:

1) What are the important supports/resistance levels?

2) What is the large/medium/small degree wave count? Where are we aka Are we more likely to go up/down/sideway this day/week/month?

3) Is there a bullish/bearish divergence signal on the appropriate timeframe? If we drop 10% from high I’m not going to look at anything lower than 1h for signs of reversal.

4) How is the market going to try and trap me today?

If the trend is up LT and MT I'm going to sell ATM puts aggressively. If it is up LT but down MT, Im going to try to find a ST bottom to sell OTM puts. If it is down LT I will not sell any puts. Bottoms can be called based on S/R, wave count and divergences.

Macro event timing is also a powerful tool. I don't know how CPI and FOMC is going to go but I know the week before will be a reversal to the mean week. People will settle big bets before the week is over which means there's a limit to how low/high the SP can go.

Since my downside target is 17x, I'm betting it's not going to get and stay there by next Friday. On the upside, 210 is a fib level only reachable while the broader market sentiment is bullish. I'm betting it's not going to reach and stay above 210 by next Friday because the market is not bullish.

 

[Max Plaid]

The name is Max Plaid not Max Pain. He aint no perverted Machoist. Right bros?

Not really the think I'm into, but if Scarlett Johansson insisted on it then I'd give it a go

Right now , aren’t we all are and at Max pain ? It’s the singularity !

Good news is that this isn't our first rodeo, we went through worse last year IMO and we're mostly much better positioned as a result, sure some have a few underwater puts, hardly surprising as we we close end last week above 200, but I assume we're not writing more on the way down on the "hope" that "this is the bottom"...

On that matter, take care with your puts folks, extrinsic getting washed-out fast, I'm looking at what to do with 3/22 -p200's already, not waiting until next week. Might even go nuclear and throw them out to 2026 and pick them off over time...

Example, 43x 3/22 -p200's can be rolled to 20x June 2026 -p200, or even 10x -200 straddles, that's a lot of risk reduction right there, early assignment of 4300 shares is quite an event, early assignment on 1000 is trivial by comparison...

Deeper look and 10x Dec 2025 -c195/-p210 would work, sacrifices 10x LEAPS/shares for writing against, but significantly reduces risk IMO

Bear are in control premarket. Pain may be here longer then usual.

Recap - dl003 target 143 wave C, Tivoboy 165/160, Yoona waiting to buy at 160………..

Trad carefully folks, don't go betting the house, easy to assume it dumps from here, and it may well do so, but as mentioned yesterday, can reverse hard and fast too, for no obvious reason

 

[ProfessorZoom]

if Scarlett Johansson insisted on it then I'd give it a go

 

[elasalle]

Mr Market needs Scarlett too

 

[Jim Holder]

Can someone pls explain the following:

We hear:
"Large amounts of puts are flowing in, SP will drop."

Then we hear:
"There are so many puts/large -GEX wall at 'x' strike, there's no way MM will let price go down there to pay out the puts." Also, " They lower the price to kill all the calls and then go back up to kill the puts."

How to reconcile the two?

 

[Jim Holder]

Max-Pain update:
3/8: 185
3/15: 190
3/22: 185
3/28: 190
4/5: 185
4/12: 185
4/19: 200
5/17: 200