After a long hiatus, this newbie has come out of hiding just in time for the summer movie season. Since this is my first HSX summer, I’ve asked some of the heavy hitters here at the HSBR to give us their tips for making money during the summer.

Fielding: The single most important factor in summer movies is legs. You can get rich blindly buying every adjusting opener on Sunday night. Some movies will delist over $30 above their adjust price (GLADI may be the first).

Jen: GLADI is a great example of how summer multipliers are much higher than the rest of the year (see Jimmy’s articles for a better look at multipliers throughout the year). GLADI will have a multiplier near 4 (32.7 estimated opening, delist near 120), and many of the summer movies will have multipliers between 4-5, making them GREAT buys after adjust.

Lesson: BUY every opener after adjust!

Huy: Timing is a huge issue in buying stocks after adjust. They often zip straight up after being unhalted, then drop again and do nothing for awhile before rising closer and closer to their delist values.

Jen: This is a common trend, a slump on the day after adjust. If you are unable to pick up a stock before the price starts to move, it may work best to wait a day or two to see if the profiteers dump it and drive the price back down.

If you are unsure if a movie will prove to have great legs, look at the dropoff percentages from day to day — the lower the dropoff, the better the legs. If you’re still lost, consult the Box Office charts and other fansite tools.

Lesson: Keep an eye on movies from adjust to delist — good deals can show up at any time.

Tanstaafl: And keep up with the blockbuster warrants. They will rise/fall for a bit, then level offat that point you can sell them, buy other stocks, then buy back the warrants that are ARB or will be making money by Sept. delist. If the pattern from last year holds, so many accounts will be holding the warrants that there will be very little price movement, even if there is a huge ARB.

Jen: Last year a number of warrants (AUST2, for example) were priced $10+ under their true value, because so many people were already holding the warrants. Look for these deals in August and early September. For now, small ports should have their money elsewhere.

Also, keep in mind that most of these warrants will delist at $0. The strike prices are insanely high for some, and others will bomb.

Lesson: Warrants are a great buy down the road.

TXRedd: Another factor is that screen counts are generally less important in the summer. Some of the biggest summer hits have been those with 2500+/- (ARMAG, NHILL, etc.) while some of the biggest adjustment losers (GODZI, STARW) had 3000+ screens.

Jen: Keep in mind that per screen averages are much higher in the summer ($12-15,000 per screen is not uncommon), and it’s harder to predict a film’s success purely on screen counts. Movies like BLAIR can come out of the woodwork and become huge hits, and inevitably at least one of the big blockbusters will bomb.

Lesson: Use your instincts and consult others when deciding on openersscreen counts are not enough.

In short, there are a lot of resources at your disposal to help you make the best of the HSX summer. Do a little research, keep an eye on things, and most of all have fun making the easy money!