WhatsTrading.com Options Recap — 10/02/2012

Stock market averages are lower heading into the final hour of trading Tuesday. With no domestic economic news to guide the action, headlines from the Eurozone have resulted in some choppy market action, as stocks edged higher early on talk Spain was ready to accept a Eurozone bailout, but then faltered midday after Spain’s Prime Minister Rajoy denied that such a deal was imminent. Trading has been sluggish and uninspired since that time. Twenty-four of the Dow thirty are now under water and the industrials are down 60 points. The NASDAQ lost 4 points.

Overall trading volumes are light today, as the start of the fourth quarter hasn’t held any real major catalysts to motivate an increase in activity. Projected volume today is about 12.4 million and below the average daily volume seen in September. 6.3 million calls and 4.6 million puts traded so far. Stripping out the ex-div trades in JP Morgan (JPM) and others only 5.5 million calls and 4.5 million puts traded so far today. The flow includes a hefty 250,000-contract block of call options on the SPDR Consumer Staples Fund (XLP). January and April 29 calls on Microsoft (MSFT) have seen heavy trading, as a large position of short calls is being rolled from the Jans to the Aprils. Bank of America (BAC) was the subject of Feb 8 – 10 bullish risk-reversals today. Meanwhile, VIX is up .03 to 16.35 amid light volumes in index pits today. 225K calls and 347K puts traded on VIX, SPX and other cash indexes, which is less than half of the usual volume.

Notable Flow

AXL – Bullish flow detected in American Axle and Manufacturing Holdings Inc with 6832 calls trading, or 7x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $11.315 (-0.315) with ATMIV lifting by 2.32 point and 63% of todays call premium trading offer side. Auto Content (Trade-Alert) 15:01

S – Bullish flow detected in Sprint Nextel Corporation with 165557 calls trading, or 4x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $4.92 (-0.26) with ATMIV lifting by 3.56 point and 83% of todays call premium trading offer side. Auto Content (Trade-Alert) 14:01

Bullish flow detected in Kohls Corporation with 3635 calls trading, or 2x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $51.02 (-0.8) with ATMIV lifting by 1.69 point and 71% of todays call premium trading offer side. Auto Content (Trade-Alert) 12:21

High options volume is being seen in JPM, MSFT, S, XLP, BMY, SYY, APC, GM, MDT, MON

Movers
Symbol Last Change %Change StdDevs
ARQL 2.19 -2.81 -56.2% 28.59
MSCI 26.40 -9.42 -26.3% 21.81
EXPR 11.75 -3.26 -21.7% 11.65
PCS 13.52 +2.00 +17.4% 7.05
CLB 100.58 -20.05 -16.6% 13.40
SKX 17.76 -2.61 -12.8% 7.44
CTIC 2.51 +0.28 +12.5% 1.11
CHBT 2.55 -0.35 -12.1% 0.82
RSH 2.06 -0.27 -11.6% 2.08
FNP 11.29 -1.48 -11.6% 7.57

Shakers (Implied volatility Movers)
Symbol IV[30d] IVChg IVChg% SkewAdjChg Last Change
SYY 13.0% +2.7 +25.9% +nan $31.66 +0.10
MLNX 79.7% +15.9 +25.0% +15.5 $102.46 +1.37
ACOM 45.8% -14.9 -24.5% -14.6 $29.90 -0.29
HLF 41.9% -12.9 -23.6% -13.1 $51.71 +1.50
TWC 20.4% +3.6 +21.5% +4.0 $97.91 +2.20
ARUN 62.0% +10.7 +20.8% +7.7 $20.50 -1.88
FNP 52.6% +8.6 +19.5% +nan $11.29 -1.48
TWO 14.5% -3.4 -19.0% -1.8 $11.94 +0.17
FMER 22.1% +3.3 +17.4% +1.8 $14.82 -0.01
VQ 14.3% +2.1 +16.8% +2.9 $12.31 +0.01

52-Week Highs
115 new highs: ACCL ACGL ACMP ADT AGP AHL AHS ALOG AMGN AN AOL AON ARTC BBH BCOR BDSI BIOS BLMN CAB CAG CLW COO CRK CSE CSOD CTGX CYH DST EHTH EMB ENSG EWW EXP FISV GILD GOOG GPI GWAY GWR GZT HD HDB HLSS HRB HTH HTWR IHF INWK IPXL JAZZ JCOM KEP KS LAD LAMR LANC LBY LLY LMCA MDVN MEMP MFA MHP MORN MYGN NGVC NSR NTSP NVAX NVO NVS NYB OCN OFIX PCS PDLI PFE PHH PNRA PSS REGN RMD SAAS SIGI SIRI SIRO SMA SMRT SNTA SNTS SPNC SPSC SQI SRDX SRPT SVA SYNT SYT SYY TAO TCBI TIP TRGP TWC TWTC TYL UHS UVV VCIT VDC VHS VQ WAC WAG WES

52-week Lows
31 new lows: ADTN AMD ARQL ATML BBRG BBW BEBE BRKS CRR CWH CZR DDMGQ ENPH EXPR HUSA IGATY IRF ISIL LDK MDLZ MSCI PGNX RSH SCHS STRI STXS TEU THQI TSU WHX XRTX

Top Equity Blocks
8.95m ATVI 11.05 -0.06 -0.5% FINRA-ADF 14:08:49 – Burst
3.80m PHB 19.04 -0.02 -0.1% FINRA-ADF 10:40:01
2.85m S 4.85 -0.24 -4.7% CHX (MIDWEST) 13:43:38 – Tied to Options
2.85m SIRI 2.65 +0.09 +3.3% FINRA-ADF 13:46:03
2.51m PHB 19.05 -0.01 -0.1% CBOE 10:03:45
2.14m EWG 22.94 +0.21 +0.9% FINRA-ADF 11:32:26 – Burst
1.40m LBTYA 61.20 +0.06 +0.1% FINRA-ADF 14:23:32 – Burst
1.22m S 4.85 -0.26 -5.0% CHX (MIDWEST) 14:05:29 – Tied to Options
1.20m JPM 40.88 -0.08 -0.2% CHX (MIDWEST) 12:54:36 – Tied to Options
1.09m CVGI 7.00 -0.02 -0.3% FINRA-ADF 11:46:14 – Burst

Tags: featured, market update, Sentiment

Category: Market Update