Trade Alert – (AAPL) January 9, 2026 – BUY

When John identifies a strategic exit point, he will send you an alert with specific trade information as to what security to sell, when to sell it, and at what price. Most often, it will be to TAKE PROFITS, but on rare occasions, it will be to exercise a STOP LOSS at a predetermined price to adhere to strict risk management discipline.

 

BUY the Apple (AAPL) January 2026 $245-$250 in-the-money vertical Bull Call spread at $4.60 or best

Opening Trade

1-9-2026

expiration date: January 23, 2026

Number of Contracts = 25 contracts

We are in between monthly expiration dates now so I am going to kick off out trading year with a conservative two-week play.

You hear a lot of incredible stories in Silicon Valley.

An electronic compact disc is coming that can deliver perfect sound and movies. Have you heard of the Internet? Compaq is offering a computer that will sit on your laptop! Have you any idea how Google is going to make money? Steve jobs is building a smart phone! Is he out of his mind? Elon Musk is building an electric car with a 250-mile range. Hey, I heard about this thing called “artificial intelligence.”

So I listened very carefully the other day when I friend of mine told he had scored the real estate deal of the century.

His house had sat on the market like dead wood for a year and a half priced at $4.0 million. It was a very nice 5,000 square foot Italian villa type home with a huge garden and a fantastic 360-degree view.

Then out of the blue, a cash buyer aid he wanted to rent the house for a year for the spectacular over-the-market rent of $20,000 a month, plus all utilities. Then, he offered to pay 10% over the asking price, or $4.4 million to buy the house outright and would pay $400,000 in cash for the option to do so, payable immediately.

My friend, puzzled but ecstatic, asked why he was going about buying a home in this way. The buyer answered that he had some stock options from his company that he didn’t want to cash in for a year. His profession? He had a PhD in artificial intelligence.

That set the alarm bells off in my head.

I pulled out a paper map of the San Francisco Bay Area and drew a circle around the house within one hour driving time to reduce the number of potential candidates. Then I called a seasoned technical analyst and asked him which big California stock had a chart that was just about to breakout to the upside. He didn’t hesitate.

Apple!

It all makes so much sense. Apple is one company behind in artificial intelligence that has the most money to do something about it. All they have to do is buy a ready-made AI company like perplexity and it will be out front.  The shares will race to $260. I then calculated how high Apple shares would have to rise to justify the enormous premium for my friend’s house. I hit bang on $260.

I am therefore buying the Apple (AAPL) January 2026 $245-$250 in-the-money vertical Bull Call spread at $4.60 or best.

Don’t pay more than $4.75, or you will be chasing.

DO NOT USE MARKET ORDERS UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.

If you don’t want to sit in front of a screen all day or live in a foreign time zone when the US stock market is closed, such as Australia, or don’t want to spend all day in front of a screen, simply enter a spread of Good-Until-Cancelled orders overnight, like $4.60, $4.65, $4.70, and $4.75. You should get done on some or all of these.

This is a bet that Apple (APPL) will not fall below $250 by the January 23, 2026 option expiration in 10 trading days.

To learn more about the company, please visit their website at https://investor.apple.com/investor-relations/default.aspx

Here are the specific trades you need to execute this position:

Buy 25 January 23 2026 (AAPL) $245 calls at………….………$16.00
Sell short 25 January 23 2026 (AAPL) $250 calls at…….……$11.40
Net Cost:………………………….………..………………………….……..$4.60

Potential Profit: $5.00 – $4.60 = $0.40

(25 X 100 X $0.40) = $1,000 or 8.70% in 10 trading days.

 

 

 

If you are uncertain about how to execute a bear put options spread, please watch my training video by clicking here.

The best execution can be had by placing your bid for the entire spread in the middle market and waiting for the market to come to you. The difference between the bid and the offer on these deep-in-the-money spread trades can be enormous.

Don’t execute the legs individually, or you will end up losing much of your profit. Spread pricing can be very volatile on expiration months farther out.

Keep in mind that these are ballpark prices at best. After the alerts go out, prices can be all over the map.