I exercised the Jan2011 $20 calls I bought on CCJ. I then sold the stock for $40.84.
I bought the calls in June2010 for $4.50 per share. As the price of CCJ increased, the value of the calls increased apace.
At this time I had two profitable choices:
1) Exercise the calls. I would pay $20 for a stock currently selling around $40. I could then either hold CCJ in anticipation of further appreciation, or sell it immediately and bank the cash gain.
$ profit = (Revenue - Cost) * # shares
$ profit = ((current price) - (premium paid + strike price)) * # shares
$ profit = (($40.84) - ($4.50 + $20.00)) * # shares
For a profit of $1,634 per contract.
2) I could sell the calls to another buyer. The bid price for the calls at that point was about $20
$ profit = (Revenue - Cost) * # shares
$ profit = (current premium of calls - premium paid) * # shares
$ profit = ($20.00 - $4.50) * # shares
For a profit of $1,550 per contract.
It's useful to look at different scenarios to see which is more profitable.
