January 2015 Core Strategy Pre-Trade Analysis Friday January 9th 2:04 PM Posted in: Daily Blog Start Trading Once a month, Options-Intelligence uses its vast options trading history to generate key statistics to aid our Core Options Trading Strategy members. These statistics are designed to arm option trades with invaluable information and insight into the the trends and expectations for the upcoming option trading cycle. In our first pre-trade analysis of the new year, we'd like to take a moment to thank all of our members for their continued support. We have big plans for 2015 and are excited to see the future of Options-Intelligence as we move forward. You may have noticed we are beginning to include some charts with our performance data. We believe this will help members see the profit windows which are critical for long term success with our trading strategies. Historical Option Performance for January [one_half] As we turn our attention to January, a few important statistics require us to carefully evaluate our expectations for this month. First and foremost, we must give careful consideration to the winning history. As you know, the Core Strategy is our best performer with most months boasting better than 80% winning histories. However, in January, the outlook is significantly lower at just above 70%. Secondly, we must consider the low average return for the month. At just below 50%, results in January are tempered from their normal range of 70% (December) to 140% (May). These two factors dictate that we must focus on lower returns for the month. This is not a month to knock it out of the park. Set reasonable, even humble, limit orders to lock in your profits early. Read Dave's commentary this afternoon and listen carefully to what the man has to say! [/one_half] [one_half_last] Key Stats 106 Total trades 77 Winning trades 72.64% Winning history 47.75% Average return Winning history at common returns [do action="cs-winning-history-month" month="01"/] [/one_half_last] Historically successful picks Historically, January is pretty rough on the Core Strategy as this is one of the few months without 100% winners. Please note we no longer trade EBAY. Stock Plays Wins Winning History Average Return AMZN 6 4 66.67% 43% BRCM 6 4 66.67% 89% DIA 11 8 72.73% 37% EBAY 8 7 87.50% 47% IBM 8 6 75.00% 66% QQQ 9 7 77.78% 40% YHOO 5 3 60.00% 17% Remember, no matter how great the statistics are or how good past trades were, you must set realistic limit orders to trade this strategy profitably. We highly recommend member's focus on our own target profit goals! As always, make money and happy trading!