Trade Alert – (SPY) February 23, 2026 – BUY

When John identifies a strategic exit point, he will send you an alert with specific trade information on 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.

 

Trade Alert – (SPY) – BUY

Buy the S&P 500 (SPY) March 2026 $630-$640 in-the-money vertical bull call debit spread at $9.00 or best

 

Opening Trade

2-23-2026

expiration date: March 20, 2026

Portfolio weighting: 10% weighting

Number of Contracts = 12 contracts

This is a bet that the stock market does not hit three-month lows over the next 20 trading days. With the Volatility Index over $22 today it is an ideal time to add this type of position.

With this trade, I am straddling up my existing short position in the (SPY) 3/$710-$720 vertical bear put spread. The two combined positions create what is known as a very wide short strangle, a bet that the index doesn’t move outside the $640-$710 bank by the March 20 option expiration date. It is, in effect, a bet that the stock market will remain stuck within this range for the foreseeable future.

If you want to get aggressive on the long side, buy gold mining shares only.

The themes that long supported this market are dropping like flies. AI, once considered a supercharger for the economy, now threatens to put much of it out of business: banking, finance management, entertainment, and even trucking.

The economy is in a mediocre state at best, growing at a near-recessionary, miserable 1.4% annual rate, with zero job creation and high inflation. The real inflation rate is 3.0% and climbing, once you back in the two months when data were not collected during the government shutdown and marked at zero.

International trade has collapsed. A bond market crash is imminent, thanks to the $11 trillion the Treasury has to borrow or refi this year. That risk is now heightened with the Supreme Court decision banning Trump’s tariffs last Friday.

Therefore, I am buying the S&P 500 (SPY) March 2026 $630-$640 in-the-money vertical bull call debit spread at $9.00 or best.

DO NOT USE MARKET ORDERS UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.

Do not pay more than $9.40, or you will be chasing

Simply enter your limit order, wait five minutes, and if you don’t get done, cancel your order and increase your bid by 10 cents with a second order.

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 sit in front of a screen all day, simply enter a spread of Good-Until-Cancelled orders overnight, like $9.00, $9.10, $9.20, and $9.30. You should get done on some or all of these.

This is a bet that the S&P 500 (SPY) will not trade below $640 in the next 20 trading days.

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

Buy 12 March 2026 (SPY) $630 calls at…………….…$56.00

Sell short 12 March 2026 (SPY) $640 calls at……….$47.00

Net Cost:………………………….…………………………….…$9.00

Potential Profit: $10.00 – $9.00 = $1.00

(12 X 100 X $1.00) = $1,200 or 11.11% in 20 trading days

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you are uncertain about how to execute an 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.