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Well, I don't know if anyone else has noticed this but GVZ is no longer trading -- well its trading, but you can't buy or sell on it. I was long a GVZ straddle. I am quite pissed off as it was automatically liquidated before market opening today. Yes I still made a profit (15%), but at the current prices, I would have returned well north of 500%. For the second time in 3 years, I've now been burned by not reading a full prospectus. GVZ's states that, in the event of large early market moves, the MM has the option to CLOSE ALL POSITIONS pre-market, at a "reasonable price given the close of the prior day." In other words, the deck is REALLY stacked against you. I'm done with this one.

Thinkorswim has some good P/L charting tools. I created a paper-trading account with them so I could use their software - it's free. I do my actual trading at IB.

Some CNBC report in December had the Barclay's info. But you can read about it in public documents as well: Barclays, in the VXX PPM (well over 200 pages long BTW), they expressly disclose that their investment arm, barclays capital, inc. "may acquire a short position in the VXX ETN." Go read the audited financials of Barclays capital, inc., they have HUGE short positions in the ETN's they trade (not surprising if you go read the returns on the ETNs they offer). Basically, as far as I can tell, its a huge scam that nets them piles of money. Basically: 1. Offer ETN, charge fees to do it; 2. Collect interest on ETN sales; 3. Trade against ETNs at the same time you sell it to other because you know its going to decline in value. I'm sure Barclay's would just say, because they are the market maker, they're hedging their position. That's a load of BS. Who in their right mind would continue offering an instrument that loses well north of 50% of its value EVERY YEAR? If I was on a trading desk and designed a strategy to lose my customers over 50% of their money each year, I'd be fired in 10 seconds -- unless the sale to my customers made my company millions. Sorry if this sounds like conspiracy, but there's simply no way this type of thing should go on. That said, as it makes me money each quarter, I don't know why I gripe.