Stopped Out at One in the Morning

Week of Apr 13–Apr 26, 2026

For a week and a half, nothing: the market ground out a winning streak the Nasdaq hadn’t matched since 1992, thirteen green days running into Friday, April 17, and this account’s May 29 strangle just watched its call side get slowly leaned on. Then came the weekend. U.S.-Iran tensions escalated sharply, and the record’s next entry is timestamped 1:00 AM Monday: buy back the whole strangle at 9.30, a full point over the 8.20 collected. First stop-out of the record, $126.96 after fees, booked at the Sunday futures reopen.

What actually happened

Date	Action	Details
Mon Apr 20, 1:00 AM	Closed	2x /ESM6 May 29 4750P/7650C strangle, 9.30 debit. -$126.96
Mon Apr 20, 10:16 PM	Opened	2x /ESM6 Jun 5 4900P/8000C strangle, 5.00 credit

The full cycle write-up is in the trade journal. The short version of what the log shows: a GTC buyback resting at 3.10 was canceled at 12:51 AM, and nine minutes later the position was bought back at 9.30, three times that. That’s not a target exit. That’s paying whatever it costs to be flat, in the first minutes the market would let it happen after a bad weekend.

Here is the honest framing, straight from the trader: this was early in the journey, and mistakes were being made without always being recognized as mistakes in the moment. The best reconstruction is that this exit was about buying power, a position whose margin requirement had swollen into a real constraint on the account, rather than a calm read of the war headlines. It was an early-days mistake, not fully understood while it was happening, and it gets recorded here as exactly that.

What moved the market this week?

Monday, April 20: the S&P slipped about a quarter percent to 7,109 and the Nasdaq snapped its 13-day streak as the weekend’s escalation landed. Tuesday was worse, with markets fretting that a ceasefire deadline would pass without a deal. In other words, the fear that showed up in this account’s 1:00 AM fill showed up in everyone else’s Monday, too. By the end of the stretch the indexes had steadied. The re-entry that same Monday evening collected 5.00, noticeably less than the 8.20 the market had been paying two weeks earlier.

Anything new tried?

The first loss, and the first exit under pressure. Also the first same-day re-entry after a loss, at wider strikes: 4900 and 8000 against an index around 7,100, with the call side pushed further away after weeks of being leaned on.

Takeaway

The first two closes of the record were patient, resting-order wins. This one was a 1:00 AM market exit at triple the canceled target, for reasons only partially understood at the time. The record keeps it because the record keeps everything, and because the next several months of smaller sizes and wider strikes read differently once you know this night is behind them.

Frequently asked questions

Why was the strangle closed at 1:00 AM?

The buyback printed at 1:00 AM Monday in the account's local time, which is the Sunday evening reopen of /ES futures. U.S.-Iran tensions had escalated over the weekend, and the position was closed into that reopen for a 9.30 debit against the 8.20 collected, a $126.96 net loss.

Was this a panic close?

The trader's own recollection is that this stretch was early in the journey and mistakes were being made without always being recognized in the moment; the belief is that this exit was specifically about buying power pressure. The log shows a canceled 3.10 buyback attempt minutes earlier and then a fill at 9.30, which is consistent with getting out fast at the reopen rather than working an exit.

What did the account do after the loss?

It re-entered the same evening: a 2-contract /ES June 5 short strangle at 4900 and 8000, sold for a 5.00 credit about 21 hours after the losing close. The template didn't change; the strikes moved wider apart relative to the index.