Daily Options Report

So let's say it's expiration and you have short options near the money. The best idea is clearly to just cover them and let someone else earn that last dime or nickel. But let's say for whatever reason you let nature take it's course.

And then you come back Monday and you're assigned and instead of giving up a dime, it's now 50 cents or a dollar or whatever against you. Now what?

In my opinion, you should just cover, unless you intended to go long or short the name for whatever reason.

I had 2 such situations on Monday, AAPL and GLD. I covered half of both pre-open, then covered the rest of GLD around unch, while with AAPL just morphed the position into a flattlish collar.  And then watched a few hours later as GLD tanked, while AAPL shot up. So I felt like both a genius and a nitwit.

And then I'm thinking, that's silly. I've traded 20 plus years now (ouch). I've had hundreds of instances of closes near strike where I just let positions go. And I would guess my net gain/loss covering on Monday if I so choose is about zero. Sometimes you get a lucky open, sometimes not so much. There's truly no point in leaving it on though, either roll on Friday or just plain close it, that's my strong opinion.