Selected Dividends and Earnings for August 17, 2008 to August 23, 2008

Monday, August 18, 2008

Dividends

• Aflac Incorporated (AFL) - $0.240 payable 2-Sep
• Ashland (ASH) - $0.275 payable 15-Sep
• Honeywell (HON) - $0.275 payable 10-Sep
• Marathon Oil Corporation (MRO) - $0.240 payable 10-Sep
• Moody's Corporation (MCO) - $0.100 payable 10-Sep
• Target Corporation (TGT) - $0.160 payable 10-Sep
• Walgreen (WAG) - $0.113 payable 12-Sep

Earnings

• Lowe's Companies (LOW) before market open

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Dividends

• Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM) - $0.130 payable 11-Sep
• Microsoft (MSFT) - $0.110 payable 11-Sep

Earnings

• Analog Devices Inc. (ADI) after market close
• Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) after market close
• Home Depot Inc (HD)
• Medtronic Inc. (MDT) before market open
• Target Corporation (TGT) before market open

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Dividends

• 3M Company (MMM) - $0.500 payable 12-Sep
• Allegheny Technologies (ATI) - $0.180 payable 9-Sep
• Barclays PLC (BCS) - $0.895 payable 1-Oct
• Carnival Corporation & Carnival plc (CCL) - $0.400 payable 12-Sep
• Cummins Inc. (CMI) - $0.175 payable 2-Sep
• ITT Corporation (ITT) - $0.175 payable 1-Oct
• Liz Claiborne (LIZ) - $0.056 payable 15-Sep
• Questar Corp. (STR) - $0.123 payable 15-Sep
• Sherwin-Williams (SHW) - $0.350 payable 12-Sep
• Williams Companies Inc. (WMB) - $0.110 payable 8-Sep

Earnings

• JDSU (JDSU) after market close
• Limited Brands (LTD) after market close
• Salesforce.com, Inc. (CRM) after market close

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Dividends

• Assurant, Inc. (AIZ) - $0.140 payable 9-Sep
• Equifax Inc. (EFX) - $0.040 payable 15-Sep
• Northrop Grumman (NOC) - $0.400 payable 6-Sep
• Parker Hannifin Corp. (PH) - $0.250 payable 5-Sep
• Robert Half International (RHI) - $0.110 payable 15-Sep
• The Hershey Company (HSY) - $0.298 payable 15-Sep
• United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) - $0.450 payable 9-Sep

Earnings

• Gamestop Corp. (GME) before market open
• Gap Inc. (GPS) after market close
• H.J. Heinz Company (HNZ) before market open
• Intuit (INTU) after market close
• Patterson Dental (PDCO)

Friday, August 22, 2008

Dividends

• Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) - $0.460 payable 9-Sep
• The McGraw Hill Companies (MHP) - $0.220 payable 10-Sep

Underlined tickers are those that are particularly interesting for me; they may be on my watch list, or I may have open positions (i.e. likely naked put options or the underlying).

Summer Natural Gas Trade (UNG)

I am sure this is old news but natural gas (UNG) tends to bottom every summer and then improve near the fall. This is mostly due to the fact that natural gas is a relatively local commodity. Excess natural gas is stored during the summer and then used for heating in the winter.

So, an idea is to sell the at-the-money natural gas ETF (UNG) puts. For example, the Sep 37 Put for 2.50 is a 7.2% return on risk over a month. As any commodity, it's very volatile which is why the premiums are good.

It's not as risk free as the chart would seem because there is an underlying trend in natural gas, but with options, it is possible to mitigate that risk and profit.

This can also be done with natural gas stocks, e.g. Chesapeake Energy (CHK).

Blizzard deal brings opportunity in The9 Limited (NCTY)

NCTY does online gaming (i.e. MMORPGs) in China. Blizzard is licensing some games to one of The9 Limited (NCTY)'s competitors, NetEase (NTES). This lead to a ~20% drop in NCTY to 18.16. The 52 week low is at 15. P/E is reasonable at 10.

Combined with the recent downturn in the Shanghai composite, this seems like an interesting trade.

When the market opens tomorrow, I am going to look at selling puts at the 15 strike. The Dec 08 15 Put looks interesting at 1.75. A 10% return on risk in 4 months.

I am looking to diversify out of high concentrations in financials so this would be a good fit. Need to do some more due dilligence but definitely interesting.

Closing Hedges on Wachovia (WB) and Bank of America (BAC)

Short selling restrictions lapsing on broker-dealers combined with options expiration week (lots of open interest with strikes below the current price) means that we are seeing downward pressure. It might be temporary or it might be another few weeks of financial doom and gloom.

Either way, this is a good time to take profits on any calls (naked or covered) on financials (WB, BAC, BCS). I am closing some August 17.5 and 20 WB calls and also closing some September 20 calls. The plan is either to write lower strike calls for more time premium or to wait for an uptick. Which happens depends on price action for the rest of the week.

Gasoline Turnaround? Reducing exposure to refiners (VLO, TSO, FTO)

Valero (VLO), Tesoro (TSO), and Frontier Oil (FTO) are my favorite refiners. I use them to play the crack spread. They are ideal for put selling because of high volatility and strong book values (refineries are easy to value at replacement cost times some modifier).

After a 4.3M draw in gasoline inventories vs. 1.3M expected draw, refiners are up ~10%. So I am taking some positions off the table. In particular, FTO Aug 17.5/15 Put spread and TSO Aug 15/12.5 Put spread. I am hoping to sell another similar spread in Sep options on any pullback. If this is actually a turn around, naked puts in FTO, TSO, and VLO will be making money. So I am leaving those on the table as they are several months out and I am near breakeven.

Nice to have a stable day after a massive rally, even if you are taking loses are hedges.

Two Interesting Drops: Whole Foods Market (WFMI) and Otter Tail (OTTR)

During the day, Otter Tail (OTTR), a wind energy play, is down 20% and back to reasonable valuations after an earnings miss. Possible slow down trend in days to come as the Cramerica crowd get nervous. After that, it's a good put selling stock. High dividend payout means that there is some pricing support (and it's great to carry the stock while selling calls against it). I am looking at selling some longer term options.

Don't know much about OTTR. Did a rush read through the annual report during the day. They are a bunch of diversified businesses. So I am going to add some delta and then see where it heads. I like dividend stocks in interesting industries.

With the new lower multiple, it might be interesting to pair trade OTTR and FPL (i.e. short FPL and long OTTR).

Whole Foods Market (WFMI) misses and guides down. WFMI is down 20% after hours. I am short some Aug 24 calls against some naked Nov 25 puts. Looking to increase delta at these levels through a combination of events. Let the Aug 24 calls expire. Buy back the puts and the stock (artificial assignment). Then sell some more out of the money puts.

It wasn't hard to guess that WFMI would miss and guide down. High end groceries in a consumer led downturn. It's a matter of whether the news is priced in. On a huge rally day, the news seems particularly bad.

So, the interim plan is: Sell covered calls on banks (WB, BAC, BCS); sell front month naked calls (as a way of initiating a short position) on credit risk plays (COF, FNM, FRE); sell long term out of the money naked puts on commodities (CHK, FCX, VLO, TSO, FTO).

Penny Wide Options and TD Ameritrade Izone

Penny wide options are a good thing. The tighter bid/ask spread means fewer dollars lost on transaction cost.

But the problem, at least the one I have is that, there is no list (at least I can't find one) of which options trade in penny wide markets. That's just annoying.

The bigger problem is Izone (it probably affects TD Ameritrade too) doesn't seem to have the list either. So I am constantly finding trouble entering orders on options that I see quoted in penny wide due to the system not knowing it is penny wide. The system seems to think that it's nickel wide.

How hard can it be to write a program to look at the bid/ask of every single listed option to see if it is penny wide and then compare said list to the database of penny wide options? Can't be very.

Another example of large companies lacking innovation (not trying to pick on TD Ameritrade).