The markets traded lower this morning but then steadily gained all afternoon to close with small, but broad based gains. RUT closed up $5 at $600 and the SPX inched up another $4 to close at $1106. These market gains came in the face of a stronger dollar, which is a reversal of the trend of the past several months when stock gains appeared to be tied to a weaker dollar.

The 500/510 put spreads in my Dec RUT iron condors now stand at 4.2 standard deviations OTM and the 630/640 call spreads stand at 1.5 standard deviations OTM. I closed the twenty 630/640 call spreads for $0.25. I will allow the 500/510 put spreads to expire worthless. Assuming those spreads do expire worthless, our Dec condor will finish at a net gain of $2,450 or 15%. My Jan condor stands at a P/L of +$1,260, delta = -$53 and theta = +$108.

This Dec RUT iron condor trade has some lessons in it so let's perform the post mortem: it began with 20 contracts of the 500/510 puts and 20 contracts of the 660/670 calls for a total credit of $3,800 with 51 days to expiration. The RUT first threatened our put spreads and our total adjustments on the put side cost us $360. About that time, we closed the 660/670 calls for a gain of $1,100 and opened 20 contracts of the 630/640 calls for a $2,400 credit. But that move proved to be too aggressive since we then spent $2,090 protecting our call spreads as the RUT moved upward. If I had not rolled those calls downward, this condor would have finished at a gain of $3,440 or 21%. The lesson is: when your adjustment triggers are tripped, move promptly with the planned adjustment, but be very cautious about rolling spreads up or down in an attempt to increase your gains. You may be moving too close to the fire if the wind changes.