Monthly Update for February

I plan to do a monthly update of my account and trades, so here's the first one.

Beginning Cash: $6,000
Current Cash: $6,160.09
Income for month: $160.09
Commissions Paid during month: (2.95 x 2) = $5.90
Open Positions: 2, ERX 17.5 and XSP 61
Reserve Requirement (75% of strikes): 5887.5

- ERX -
Current Price: 22.43
Strike: 17.5
OTM: 22%
Days til Expiriation: 19
Notes: It's a highly volatile 3x leveraged ETF. I'm only 22% out of the money, which isn't much considering the one week I've held this stock, it's moved up or down 10% on three days. I'll be watching the position on Monday, if the market as a whole looks week, I'll be dumping it. At the current Ask, I'd make about $9 for the month.

- XSP -
Current Price: 73.73
Strike: 61
OTM: 17.3%
Days til Expiriation: 18
Notes: This is a mini of SPX, which is the option that follows the S&P 500. It's also European so trading stops on the Thursday before expiration. The S&P would have to drop 17.3% in 18 days for me to lose on this trade. That would be about 1% a day. I'm not worried about this trade (at this time) and will probably let it expire. I am however disappointed in how much of my reserves its taking up. Since its a 61 strike, that's requiring a lot of reserve capital. I may trade this in the future for the relative safety of it, but the reserves are high so I may try some other options.

I'll just be watching the markets for the next few days before determining what to do for next month. It's been so volatile lately that no position seems secure. I'm glad I get to be trading at this point in time. I'll get to learn the hard way.