This morning I BTC 1 TIE May08 17.50 Covered Calls and STO 1 TIE Dec08 22.50 Covered Call for a deposit of $42.51 in my taxable account.

I don’t normally like to sell Covered Calls so far out and for such a small premium but I wanted to roll up enough to provide some additional room for the stock to continue moving up.  The 22.50 strike price may not be enough but by December I should be able to roll it out and maybe up again.

The market is moving so fast in some areas that I can’t seem to keep up with it.  After April 2008 expiration I sold Covered Calls on several stocks at strike prices that I thought would allow them to expire worthless.  I was expecting the market to continue moving essentially sideways.  TIE is one example that did not behave as expected causing me to roll out and up.  Yesterday it was AA, MNST and NYX.  Again today I see that NYX has already moved ahead of my new strike price.  I have the same situation with DIVX but have not dealt with it yet.   In this case I need to call the broker (E*Trade) because for some reason (they gave me a reason but it sounded lame) they will not allow on-line trades on DIVX options.  With the exception of AA the other stocks I felt compelled to take action because my basis is below the strike price.  I am never happy just getting out of a stock with a loss when I can attempt to “fix” it with options.