Week Begins with an Unpersuasive Selloff

Buyers were spent before the opening bell Monday after rallying index futures moderately overnight. The failure to make headway in the early going gave way to a begrudging 150-point selloff in the Dow that took bears more than two hours to get rolling. That’s why I am not looking for much follow-through on Tuesday. Whatever happens, we hold two tracking positions — one bullish, the other bearish — in DIA that will give us a horse in the race no matter what. Subscribers who reported filling the bearish trade in the chat room have already logged a theoretical gain of at least $284; but the bull play — buying May 18 248 calls near what turned out to be their intraday low — will need a strong rally to turn the position into a risk-free vertical spread as intended.