Are you not filing taxes as a professional trader? My CPA files my taxes under the “Trader Tax Status”. If you spend the majority of your time as a professional trader, you qualify to file ALL of your trades with the 60/40 long/short term capital gains split (futures, stocks, and options is my understanding).

Obviously, neither one of us are tax professionals and I’m not giving tax advice. This just piqued my curiosity. Something to maybe ask your CPA about if nothing else.

https://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc429

https://greentradertax.com/trader-tax-center/trader-tax-status/how-to-qualify/

Good move IMO. Always a bit of a crap shoot holding index positions (or full/unhedged positions) into a potential market-moving economic report.

thanks for the quick response, I’m leaning more towards scenario 2 personally, so I lightened up my QQQ and IWM shorts, hoping for a better re-entry post CPI.

Great question & something that I’ve already put some thought into:
Scenario 1: The abatement in inflationary pressures that I was harping on a month ago when the CPI (and media headlines) were (erroneously) scorching hot, along with the perceived pivot that it would allow the Fed (to less-hawkish or dovish) has already been fully prices into the ~20% rally off the mid-June lows in the $NDX.
Scenario 2: A cooler than expected print on the CPI is the catalyst for one last thrust higher as much as up to but not (on a weekly closing basis) above my max. bounce target of the 200-day SMA on the $NDX.
Scenario 3: I’m wrong (as both scenarios 1 & 2 make me $ as they are close enough to the closing of longs & going back to swing/trend shorts.. i.e.- scaling out of swing/trend longs & into shorts around scenario 1&2)