Saturday, September 12, 2009

El Paso Corp.: Back Ratio Call spread after ABC low



Let me start by explaining the weekly chart. Although I have not labeled it, there was a 5-wave gain from March to mid June. This was immediately followed by an A B and C (?) wave. The orange circle near the A wave shows how the stock bounced very neatly off the 50% fib retracement. Wave B tested the high around 10.90 and bounced back down for wave C. Wave C is bouncing neatly off fib levels (retracement of the trend and extension of the AB wave) and the red trendline. Thus, I believe the correction may be over and the bull trend will probably continue to new highs.

I have also done some time studies. These studies (fibonacci extensions of the AB wave, retracements of the trend and the low-low cycles) say that the correction low should be in the range of the blue rectangle. As you can see, the wave C low falls very neatly smack in the middle of the blue rectangle.

Finally, the Stoch is making a bullish reversal in the oversold zone which is avery strong bullish indicator.

To further confirm my analysis, I took a look at the daily chart. The daily is a zoom in of Wave C from the weekly chart. Although the fibonacci price studies are not as neat on the daily chart, the time study (not surprisingly) shows that low should have been made on 9/3 (which it did). The Stoch is still in a bullish trend although it is in overbought zone which is of some concern.

Additionally, the bear channel and the trendline I have drawn in red shows we are just hitting the high and could potentially face resistance at the 9.90 level.

Overall this looks like a high probability set up for a bullish trade. I have been looking at Back Ratio call spreads and the following looks like an excellent trade:
Buy 30 Oct 09 $9 Calls
Sell 15 Oct 09 $8 Calls

Although the prices will probably change a little as the stock moves (I plan to enter at 9.91), right now this trade will cost $579. If the stock should rise to the Wave B highs, I should make around $1000 (depending on time). At expiry my max loss is $2561, but I am setting a max loss of around $400 with a stop loss exit at 9.63.

Update:
Price broke above 9.91 today and I went long the BRC spread. Unfortunately I got kind of screwed on the bid ask and got a terrible price. My breakeven on the spread is 10.10 today and each day it falls as time decay hurts. This has made me move my stop up to 9.75 and also reduced my profit potential at 10.70 to a mere $600. Still, the stock moved to as high as 10.02 today and my hypothesis seems to be coming true.

1 comments:

Unknown said...

Good post. Thanks...



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