Boys and Girls;

Metals hit most of our portfolios pretty hard today as the US dollar crept up against the Euro and Asian Currencies.  It was one of the biggest drops in gold in quite a while.  GLD our ETF (actually an ETN) of choice was down 2.65% today.  The chart is turning ugly as well.  I am going to let the market do its thing, but I am ready to get everyone out of the shiny stuff and take our losses.  Gold treated us nicely earlier in the year so we can take the hit if it looks like its moving south.

Moody's spooked everybody out of the gate by indicating they were going to downgrade a bunch of foreign debt in Europe.  That started the landslide.  Then Intel adjusted their future revenue estimates blaming supply chain issues and sluggish PC sales.  All of this had the market down in excess of 200 points.

Our PUTs in FNSR, XLF, HRB, ALXN, VRUS, PRGO, D, and PNRA were shaping up nice today.  In fact I had PNRA come within 2% of my "sell to close" which would have given us a 30% gain in three trading days.  PRGO came very close today as well.

We got most of you into a January Call Option on the VXX @ $40.00, playing what will be the probable volatility of the market over the next 30-45 days.  It is a slightly in the money trade as the VXX was trading at 41 and change when we bought it.  We paid $4.91 for the options so our break even is $44.91.  The market improved the last 12 minutes of trading so we are off about 10% on those options.  That why it's called volatility.

Volume was light today.  Keep a close eye on the 1,220 level for the S&P 500 as that seems to be our current support level.  If it falls through that level, it is a far drop to 1,075 its only other clear support level. I can't be at the opening tomorrow as I need to buy tickets for a High School Football game at 6:00 am. If things get crazy, I can trade from my iPhone but it is painful to do so.

Enjoy the evening.