Mittal (MT) launched suprise bid for Arcelor
Mittal (symbol MT), one of the stocks I hold in for my Investment Experiment just launched a surprise bid to buy the Arcelor, another huge steel company.
I have to admit this one took me completely by surprise. MT has been climbing recently well exceeding my $30 strike. This underscores the main risk of selling covered calls. If the stock moves up a large amount here I don’t get to participate in the gain. In essence I’ve already sold my shares for $30. (Actually a little more when you include the premium I received for the option.)
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This has happened a few times to me in the past and always causes me to resist the urge to kick myself… 
I shouldn’t be too unhappy though, I am now virtually guaranteed roughly a 11% profit on my investment, on a stock I bought in mid November last year. I’ll take that any day and not cry over the missed opportunity.
According to my openportfolio I’m up over 9% year to date and 7% overall. I’m crushing the S&P by over 7% this year. That’s not bad. Again, no guarantee that I’ll continue my (short) winning streak. I am probably due for a loss anyway.
So, on option expiration day in Feb (Feb 17th) I’ll again be largely in cash. If there is an opportunity to do so profitably I may unwind my MT options and sell some more but that has typically not worked out for me in situations like this.
Time to do some more research and line up my next play.