Month End Summary – November 2019

November helped bring my account balance close to my year end goal of $100,000, but I was more conservative than I could’ve been and trailed the major indexes for the month. The good news about my conservative stance that I haven’t adjusted yet is that today, the first trading day of December, is lower and my losses are smaller than the would’ve been.

My account ended November with a Net Asset Value (NAV) of $99,594.46 according to Interactive Brokers (IB) after ending October with a NAV of $98,004.64. I had a gain of $1,589.82 (~1.62%) on paper for November (less than the S&P 500’s 3.40% gain for the month and the Dow’s 3.72% gain). I had $1,837.43 in net realized gains from my QQQ shares (including the original naked put premium and the November covered call premium that aren’t included until the shares are sold), IWM covered call, QQQ naked put, and FEZ covered call. Also, I paid $6.97 for the monthly fee minimum. Interactive Brokers charges $10 each month as a minimum for trading fees on accounts that have less than $100,000. Hopefully, that won’t be an issue again after December.

Quicken reported that I have an account value of $99,547.94, which is a penny more than what IB shows after I add in the $46.53 in interest accruals that IB credits in advance of the actual payment. I’ll leave the rounding error for another month to see if it shakes itself out.

I’m 90.94% invested in this account as of the end of the month, 3.62 percentage points below the end of October. I have $9,025.30 left in uninvested cash and two different option contracts set to expire in December. My December options have about $200 worth of time value left in them and my January options have roughly $875 in time value remaining. Unless small cap stocks rally nicely in December, I’ll need to make another trade to make up the extra gains I need before the year ends if I want to climb back above $100,000.

This is my asset allocation in my IB account as of the end of October:

• Large-cap ETF: 20.08% (including QQQ)
• Mid-Cap ETFs: 35.64%
• Small-Cap ETF: 32.31%
• International: 3.99%
• Individual Stocks & Other Sector ETFs: 0.0%
• Bonds: 0.0%

According to Morningstar, here’s how I compare to the major indexes (including dividends) through the last trading day, November 29, 2019:

• Dow Jones: YTD change +23.05%, 12-month change +12.48%
• S&P 500: YTD change +27.63%, 12-month change +16.11%
• NASDAQ Composite: YTD change +30.60%, 12-month change +18.21%
• Russell 2000: YTD change +22.01%, 12-month change +7.51%
• S&P Midcap 400: YTD change +22.75%, 12-month change +8.86%

My return according to Quicken through November 30, 2019:

• YTD Return: +19.12% (not annualized)
• 1 Year Return: +10.13%

The VIX ended the month at 12.62 and the VXN ended at 15.84. The VIX finished November 0.60 points lower than the end of October. The VXN finished 1.52 points lower. The VIX peaked on November 21, when it hit an intraday high of 13.86. The VXN peaked on the more than two weeks earlier, on November 5, at 17.12. These volatility levels were too muted to make me want to jump in on more option writing, but I was waiting to see volatility a little lower before buying options. I might have missed the opportunity based on today’s trading action. Volatility is still fairly subdued and I might buy some protection before long. For now, I’ll sit on my $9,000+ that I have in reserves and wait for a better opportunity to profit when stocks resume their rally.