On 11/24/09, I sold 2 PM Mar10 55 Covered Calls for a net deposit of $128.49 in an IRA account.  My basis for these PM shares is now 46.94, excluding dividends received.

I like PM for the dividends and for the options premiums that I collect.  I went out to Mar10 for the current Calls because, although the Nov09 50 strikes expired worthless, the stock has been trading too close to 50 for too long and I am suspicious (afraid?) that it will be above 50 soon and I wanted to give myself a little additional cushion.  An extra $5 in the strike would not hurt either just in case it does get called away.  Of course, as I write this PM is down to 48.09 today.  Maybe the $50 strike would have been okay after all.    But, a bird in the hand…

Speaking of dividends, PM raised its dividend .04 for the last dividend which I received in October.  That increase raised my return to 4.8% on my basis prior to selling the current Calls.