This morning I BTC 4 TBI Aug08 15 Calls and STO 4 TBI Jan09 17.50 Calls for a net deposit of 98.01 in my taxable account.  My basis for TBI is now 16.07.

TBI has been trading up recently and has traded above 15 several days during this period.  It gapped up in mid Jul08 and appears to be headed higher.  At my prior strike price of 15 I was underwater and did not want to take the chance that I might be called away although I considered that a rather small risk prior to option expiration.  Now, I can let TBI be called away in Jan09 an be a little ahead of the game.  Or, perhaps better yet, the options will expire worthless and I can continue to pick fruit from the option tree.

On 7/22/08, I sold 4 TBI Aug08 15 Covered Calls for a net deposit of $189.00 in my taxable account.  My basis, after option premiums, in these TBI shares is now 16.31.

I am still underwater on these TBI shares but am getting closer to break even, picking up .47 per share with this sale.  TBI does not pay a dividend so it does not fit into my current general investment objectives.  Even so, as long as I can make this kind of monthly return by selling Covered Calls I will probably continue to own it and sell the Calls.  After all, if this continues I will own TBI free and clear in less than a year and then the rate of return will be infinite.  :-)  That will be hard to beat.

I am still catching up from being on vacation for 17 days so I am still a little behind posting recent activity in my various accounts.  I think I can post everything today.

July has been an okay month for me.  Or was it?  I own 200 shares of IndyMac Bank (IDMC) and used to own 200 shares of Countrywide Financial Corp (CFC).  Of course the CFC is now 36 shares of Bank of America (BAC) which is a little better than CFC. 

As I wrote earlier, I was assigned 300 share of Yamana Gold (AUY) in an IRA account which I am okay with.  As document earlier I rolled out several Jul08 options that I did not want to be assigned or called away.  All of the rest of my Jul08 option positions expired worthless allowing me to keep all of the option premiums.  Here is the list of those options that expired.  Note that the Total Received column may be higher because it is the result of rolling out a prior option.  For example, the AGU Put was originally sold in Dec07 and rolled out three times before it finally expired in Jul08.  The actual net received was 8.72 per share or $1744.  Still not too bad though.  Also, where there are multiple rows for a stock each row represents a separate trading account.