The Pelosi Options Trading Strategy: 3 Key Takeaways

Nancy and Paul Pelosi have become a subject of fascination for retail investors. Paul is an investment banker and Nancy is the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Using data derived from Unusual Whales, a website geared at alerting retail investors to large and unusual options flow movements, we can get a clearer picture of what strategies Paul and Nancy use in the markets.

In 2021, the Pelosi portfolio held a total of $45,707,479 in assets, with 56% of the holdings in the technology sector.

Much of the equity in 2021 came from the $7.1 million in options reported in their 2019 disclosure. Some of those positions included Amazon AMZN, Tesla TSLA, Disney DIS and other big tech services.

Using the chart above, we uncover Pelosi's plays to infer the strategies used that helped them beat the S&P 500 by 24% in 2021:

• Calls on big tech - The Pelosiss had strong conviction in the technology sector in 2021
• In-the-money (ITM) LEAPS - They purchase contracts with an expiration date of one year or greater
• Sell/Exercise - In each case outlined above, the contracts were exercised, or sold the day of expiration

Photo: courtesy of Gage Skidmore via Flickr