Tech rebounded and volatility eased: the account rose 11.10%
On Monday the technology sector rebounded after two weekly declines. QQQ rose 1.11% to 712.20 and the Nasdaq-100 1.09%, while the S&P 500 gained 0.70% and the equal-weight S&P 500 only 0.35%: the advance was concentrated in the largest technology companies. Anthropic's public IPO filing revived demand for AI-related shares, and the Philadelphia semiconductor index gained 2.8%. Among the largest Nasdaq-100 companies, Tesla rose 5.21%, Nvidia 2.39%, Broadcom 2.33% and Microsoft 1.54%; Meta Platforms fell 1.88% after announcing a large equity raise. The 10-year Treasury yield held at 5.00%.
Volatility declined across the curve. VIX fell 1.06 points to 18.39 and VXN 1.90 points to 26.40; 30-day QQQ implied volatility (own calculations) eased from 24.91% to 22.97%, and the skew index from 31.4 to 29.3. VIX/VIX3M closed at 0.922, moving away from the Tense threshold of 0.95; on the Convexa scale the regime stayed Normal.
The account closed the session 11.10% higher, against a 0.71% gain in SPY. The main contribution came from the lower side of the options structure, which gained as the market rose and implied volatility and skew declined. The upper side of the structure worked against the account as QQQ rose and offset part of the gain, as did the expiring short-dated protection. During the session the upper side of the structure was partly closed and adjusted, and the expired protection was replaced. The week of 26–30 October began at +11.10% (SPY +0.71%); month to date the account was down 29.09% (SPY +0.36%), and since the start of the public record on 5 August the result was +9.11%, against −0.55% for SPY.
At the close the weekly QQQ straddle priced a move of ±2.32% to the Friday 30 October expiry. Ahead were the start of the Fed meeting on 27 October, the rate decision on 28 October at 14:00 ET, Microsoft and Alphabet results that evening, the advance estimate of third-quarter GDP and PCE data on 29 October, and Amazon results after the close on 29 October. The Fed remained in its blackout period through 29 October.
Editor’s Note reflects the author’s market perspective at the time of publication and should be read as commentary, not investment advice.