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The RIC trade with VIX Dec17 15/14p and 20/21c turned out to be a nice winner. Since the VIX settlement price is 24.09, the 20/21 vertical call spread will be settled at 1.00 (a pre-commission gain of 122% on the 0.45 cost of the RIC). Hopefully, some others were able to make something on this trade as well. Since this was my first short-term VIX trade using options very close to expiration, one thing did occur that was kind of surprising to me. With the VIX at 23.50 yesterday afternoon at around 3:30, I tried to close this 20/21c vertical for 0.90 and could not do it - I could only get around 0.80. For a normal 1.00 spread that far away from my short strike, I would normally be able to close around 0.95 late in the afternoon of expiration day. I guess the VIX has the potential to drop significantly overnight, so there still significant premium there?? I didn't want to forfeit $20 per spread in potential profit by cashing out early since there appeared to be a nice buffer in that the current VIX value was a significant amount above my short strike, so I decided to hold thru expiration (If I had a large amount invested, I would likely have sold some of it to lock in a profit). The lesson is that to achieve anything close to full value on these VIX vertical spreads, you really have to plan on holding them thru expiration.