Citi is up 16 cents to $26.17 and one player in the options market seems to think the stock can recapture some of the 31.3 percent plunge suffered over the past two months. 3800 Sep 22 – 24 put spreads were sold on the back at 51 cents to buy 19,000 Sep 35 calls for 36 cents. Separately, another investor sold 10,400 Jan14 $20 puts on Citi at $3.15 and is possibly liquidating a position.

Groupon (GRPN) adds 16 cents to $11.74 Monday and, despite an 11.3 percent slide Thursday and Friday, is up 22.5 percent from the all-time low of $9.63 set on May 11. One investor seems to be anticipating additional gains over the next few weeks, as a Jul 12 – 16 call spread is apparently bought on the stock for 65 cents, 4578X. Open interest in the July 16s is 7364 contracts and so the spread might be a roll down in strikes. The bullish play comes a week after the company reported earnings. The stock rose 3.7 percent on the news Tuesday, but has since given up the gains.

JC Penney (JCP), which was pounded for a 20 percent loss Wednesday and lost another 3 percent yesterday, is up 36 cents to $26.30 and one player opens a bullish longer-term options position on the retailer today — selling 5,000 Jan14 23 puts at $4.55 to buy 10,000 Jan14 30 – 37 call spreads for $2.15. 25 cents was collected on the three-way and seems to reflect confidence that shares will have recovered the two-day post-earnings slide by January 2014.

Another day of weakness in Clean Energy Fuels (CLNE) and high put volume have conspired to send implied volatility in the options on the stock racing to new 52-week highs. Shares are down 77 cents to $13.34 and have moved lower in 11 of the past 13 trading sessions for a month-to-date loss of 31.2 percent. Midday options trades on the stock include a multi-exchange sweep of 2,858 Jun 11 puts at the 43-cent asking price. More than 8,000 now traded. Volume in Jun 12 puts is approaching 5,000 contracts. May 13, Jun 13, and Sep 11 puts are also seeing some volume today and 30-day ATM implied volatility has skyrocketed 58 percent to 105. But no news on CLNE today. Earnings were reported on 5/7.

The bearish underlying tone continues Thursday and trading in the options market is brisk heading into-expiration Friday. 4 million calls and 5.3 milllion puts traded in the first two hours. The projected volume of 9.8 million calls and 12.9 million puts yields a put-to-call ratio of 1.31 and would represent the highet since September 28, 2011. The put-to-call ratio for trading in all products across all exchanges has now exceeded 1.0 for three consecutive trading sessions, which is the first time since Nov 8-10. The S&P sits 7.2 percent from its multi-year closing high of April 2, but the high levels of investor anxiety didn’t really resurface until recently and amid a five-day 3.1 percent losing skid seen since last Thursday. The S&P 500 has moved lower in 10 of 13 trading sessions in May and is down 5.9 percent month-to-date. VIX is up .67 to 22.94 today and has rallied 33.8 percent since April. VIX in the low 20s is certainly not extreme and a far cry from the 45+ seen in early October, but given 30-day S&P 500 historical vols are only 10.9 percent and that P/C ratio is spiking suggests that levels of investor negativity and bearishness have indeed reached very high levels.

Citi (C) loses 59 cents to $27.20 in active trading of 39 million shares and has now suffered a four-day 11.5 percent losing skid. Citi shares are now nearly 30 percent below their late-March multi-month highs. The options order flow doesn’t reflect the bearish underlying tone, however, as 153,000 calls and 73,000 puts traded on the bank today. The top trades are call purchases, after an investor bought 35,000 Citi Sep 33 calls for 94 cents and 32,500 Nov 34 calls for $1.18. 1.85 million shares were also sold at $27.85 and the call buying is possibly part of a stock replacement strategy in Citi today.

Darden Restaurants (DRI) sees a midday spike and is up $4.11 to $55.62 on heavy turnover of 4 million shares. Options volume is 25X the daily average, being driven by May, June and July 55 call buyers. 17,000 calls and 2,500 puts traded on the stock and 30-day ATM vols surged 78 percent to 43.5! No news on the stock, but something is certainly out there. Maybe chatter or some other pending news.

DELL is off a nickel to $15.29 and a Jun 14 – 15 put spread trades on the computer-maker for 27 cents, 10000X on ISE. A customer bought the spread, to open, according to ISEE. It doesn’t look tied to stock and comes ahead of a Mar 22 earnings release. RBC yesterday said yesterday that they’re cautious heading into the report and said softer PC data, weakness in the public sector, and the commodity pricing environment could pose a risk to estimates. Stifel is out with similar cautious comments today. The spread is possibly designed to hedge the event risk.

Kohl’s (KSS) is off 19 cents to $47.07 and on a four-day 7.5 percent losing skid since earnings were reported on May 10. Midday options trades on the retailer include a multi-exchange sweep of 3691 May 46 puts at the 25-cent asking price. 6,106 contracts and ISEE is hinting at opening customer buyers. May 47 and Oct 44 puts are also seeing interest and 30-day ATM vols are up 2 percent to 27.5. Bearish trading in KSS might be a play on Nordstrom’s earnings, due out after the closing bell, and Target’s profit report, which is slated for Wednesday morning.

Pandora’s rally continues. Shares are up 94 cents to $10.76 in active trading of 3.7 million shares and now up 24.6 percent in just six trading days. Options on the Internet radio operator are busy for a second day. Like yesterday (see 5/14 color), call buyers seem to be dominating the flow. 22,000 calls and 2,360 puts traded on the stock so far. Jun 9, 10, 11 and 12 calls are busy. May 9 and 11 calls are seeing action as well. 30-day ATM implied vols are up 2 percent to 88 ahead of a May 23 earnings report. Short interest is probably behind some of the call buying in Pandora. As of April 30, short interest as percent of float was almost 30 percent. Prior to the six-day advance, the stock had suffered a two-month 40 percent slide.