so here’s my annoying I-told-you-so, albeit a bit premature.
OIL. I told you all to buy oil, told you all to starting nibbling at about $37/bbl, and increase your stake if it hits $35/bbl, which it did. I bought the oil ETF’s on Dec 18th, and then I (thankfully) doubled-down on Dec 26th as oil and associated ETF’s bottomed.
Here’s what I bought to the tune of 20% of my portfolio. The notes show the price increase off the Dec 25/26 bottom, which I acknowledge is where I added to my stake, not the price at which I bought all my shares.
UCO PROSHARES TR II PROSHARES ULTRA DJ AIG CRUDE (went from 10 to 13.7)
DXO POWERSHARES DB CRUDE OIL DOUBLE LONG ETN (went from 2 to 2.55)
USL UNITED STS 12 MONTH OIL FD LP UNIT BEN INT (went from 28 to 30)
So I’m well in-the-money on those bets. And oil has moved even higher very recently which is not yet shown up completely in those ETF’s, but it will early next week, unless oil has a horrible weekend.
Frankly, I’m not sure my next step. I think 2009 will bring oil prices that are again lower, lower even than $35/bbl. I might take my profits next week on those oil ETF bets. Yet, it is likely Israel will escalate its attack on Gaza which is helping drive oil up.
Have I lost any money this month? Yes, I bought SDS on 16 Dec, shorting the S&P500 and by the 22nd I was up over 10% on that bet; I should have dumped it then. I didn’t see the discontinuity coming that happened on Dec 22/23 as SDS went off-track from the S&P500 and dropped about 14% in the opening hours of Dec 23rd. Also, while I did see a fool’s rally forming with the S&P500 at 860, I procrastinated on selling SDS and going long. SO I’m still short the S&P500 which has moved up to 903, leaving me down 12% on that short-S&P500 bet. Keep in mind I picked up that short-S&P500 bet when the S&P500 was 910 so that tells you how much that Dec 23rd discontinuity on SDS ruined that bet, which would otherwise have been in-the-money now.
So the last couple weeks have been a wash between my short S&P500 (losses) and my long oil ETF (gains); yet this year-end has me closing the year with my portfolio at a 52-week high with a net gain of 51% (excluding all 401K/ROTH contributions, but including all costs) so I’m happy with that.
