Quadruple Witching

Today is/was quadruple witching with plenty of options and futures expiring simultaneously.

My questions: Has anybody looked back at their trading results and isolated this type of day and compared their average returns on this day against all other days? If so, do you do better or worse on expiration days?

I am also interested in hearing what specific strategies you might apply on this day?

I know that some people take certain days off and don't trade them (like Fed days). Did you take today off?

I was active in the markets for about an hour, putting on a new position short (shorted the +802 $TICK divergence at 11:04am). Once I got my short position to a comfortable profit with a b/e+ stop in place, I let the market do it's thing.

On OP X days, because of all the imbalances at the open, I tend to stay out of the way until the IB is established. This morning was especially bad at the open. But considering the risk in the market right now, this sort of thing is to be expected. Once things clarified and re-balanced (sort of), I was able to get my business done, turn off the trading screens, and enjoy a nice lunch

Good trading!!

Nice way to end the week.

In terms of strategies, two come to mind...

1. Come in with a specific trade objective, like I mentioned above, I was looking to find strength to put on the new short position. So I used the artificial imbalances and divergences to my advantage.

2. On a much shorter time horizon, these same imbalances can be used to arb the indices. There were some very nice opportunities presented this morning, but I ignored them to stay focused on my task/goal.

quote:

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Originally posted by day trading

Good trading!!

Nice way to end the week.

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Thanks, it pays to be lucky

So you are basically using all the same techniques that you use in everyday trading and then overlaying on top of that the fact that there are a few more resistance/support levels and factors on expiration day.

Correct me if I'm wrong! but I knottiest it was unusually calm trading day I called it (orderly) trading, this time was in gradual dissent! in the past it was so chappy (un-orderly)that 5 point swings 3 to 4 times a day so to play in any direction was difficult, so Friday I decided to play Equities for about 1/2 an hour and shut down and worked on my web sites.
I my opinion Fed and expiration days I decided to stay out from now on.

I agree, it was a fairly orderly market on Friday.