We talk a lot around here about taking half off the table either when our position doubles in value or we hit a key price target.

It's a great position management practice that increases our win rate while leaving us with partial positions to participate in truly outstanding runs.

But we haven't talked much about alternative ways to "take half."

What if we can take half of our directional risk off the table while leveraging gamma to keep the majority of our open profits in the case of a market reversal, and participate almost fully in a truly massive breakout?

Sounds nice, right?

A situation like this is presenting itself in our current open position in $CM Dec 55 calls. We entered this position in August and now our in-the-money calls are approaching expiration on December 20th.

Here's the chart:

Normally, I would simply trail a tight stop loss in trades like this heading into expiration. In fact, I wrote about doing exactly that in this trade earlier this week. 

But then someone in the All Star Options chat room mentioned that $CM had an earnings announcement coming up before the opening this Thursday (...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in XLB.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. No exits since the last report.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

Last night was our LIVE Monthly Charts Strategy Session for Premium Members of ASC Research.

This 2-times per month LIVE event is one of the biggest reasons why most of the world's largest financial institutions that you've ever heard of come to Allstarcharts for help making big decisions in the market.

One chart that really stood out to me, especially considering where we are in the cycle, is just how many bears there are among individual investors.

In fact, despite the new all-time highs in the S&P500, Dow Jones Industrial Average, Nasdaq100 and Russell2000 Indexes, there are...

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to The 2 to 100 Club.

In this scan, we look to identify the strongest growth stocks as they climb the market-cap ladder from small- to mid- to large- and, ultimately, to mega cap status (over $200B).

Once they graduate from small-cap to mid-cap status (over $2B), they come on our radar. Likewise, when they surpass the roughly $30B mark, they roll off our list.

But the scan doesn't just end there.

We only want to look at the strongest growth industries in the market, as that is typically where these potential 50-baggers come from.

Some of the best performers in recent decades – stocks like Priceline, Amazon, Netflix, Salesforce, and myriad others – would have been on this list at some point during their journey to becoming the market behemoths they are today.

When you look at the stocks in our table, you'll notice we're only focused on Technology and Growth industry groups such as Software, Semiconductors, Online...

In today's Flow Show, Steve Strazza and I discuss the signal (if any) being sent from $VIX with a 13 handle, and we cautioned viewers to not just automatically think that a low VIX means the next spike is imminent.

Then, we got into the opportunity that looks most appealing over the next 6-12 months. 

You can watch the full episode here and get the trade details below: 

Apple has been in a year-long range (see video) that appears to have been decisively broken. 

Here's a zoomed-in one-year chart showing the current breakout about the 234-235 range:

While it may feel like a bit of a chase here, I've got a plan to get us positioned small now, with the potential to get systematically larger into a pull back.

If we don't get the full position on, then at least we'll have a small winning position on that took no heat. In other words, a great risk-adjusted return!

Here's the Play:

I like buying $AAPL December 2025 300-strike calls for approximately $7.50. With options volatility relatively cheap in this name, these calls...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in ITB.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. No exits since the last report.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

Since gold futures hit our second target, the entire complex has undergone a corrective wave. 

While the market hasn't given us the all-clear signal yet, the correction seems closer to the end than the beginning.

Demand for gold worldwide continues to increase, and our intermarket analysis suggests the party is just starting for gold bugs across the galaxy. 

Moreover, our COT sentiment indicator is flashing a buy signal:

The market's mood is for higher prices. It's a Bull Market.

Thus, it's no surprise that a data company providing important information to investors is riding the wave higher.

It pays to buy dips in strong stocks during bull markets, and today, one such opportunity is presenting itself.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to The Minor Leaguers.

We've had some great trades come out of this small-cap-focused column since we launched it back in 2020 and started rotating it with our flagship bottom-up scan, Under the Hood.

For the first year or so, we focused only on Russell 2000 stocks with a market cap between $1 and $2B.

That was fun, but we wanted to branch out a bit and allow some new stocks to find their way onto our list.

We expanded our universe to include some mid-caps.

Nowadays, to make the cut for our Minor Leaguers list, a company must have a market cap between $1 and $4B.

And it doesn't have to be a Russell component — it can be any US-listed equity. With participation expanding around the globe, we want all those ADRs in our universe.

The same price and liquidity filters are applied. Then, as always, we sort by proximity to new...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in XME.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. Closed SMH at profit target.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!