Put Options Active At Home Depot
by Option Review - January 23rd, 2012 1:48 pm
Today’s tickers: HD, LVS, SBUX & NRG
HD - Home Depot, Inc. – The home improvement retailer’s shares have been on fire during the most recent six month period, with the stock last week soaring to $45.50 – the highest level in nearly a decade – on the heels of a more than 55.0% rally since August. A sizable ratio put spread initiated on Home Depot this morning may be the work of an investor hedging a long position in the shares, or, alternatively, an outright bearish stance looking for shares to pull back somewhat ahead of May expiration. Home Depot was cut to ‘Hold’ from ‘Buy’ at Edward Jones over the weekend and shares in the name today trade 0.95% lower on the session at $44.09 just before 12:00 p.m. in New York. It looks like the put player purchased around 2,500 puts at the May $42 strike for an average premium of $1.54 each and sold 5,000 puts at the lower May $38 strike at an average premium of $0.72 apiece. Average net premium paid to initiate the ratio spread amounts to $0.10 per contract, thus implying profits or downside protection kick in if shares in HD decline 5.0% to breach the effective breakeven point on the downside at $41.90. Maximum potential profits of $3.90 per contract are available on the position if the price of the underlying drops 13.8% from the current price of $44.09 to settle at $38.00 at expiration. The sale of twice as many of the lower-strike put options greatly reduces the cost of downside protection, which may insulate a longer-term HD optimist from losses in the stock’s value given the potential for a broad market correction or disappointing company-specific news to weigh on the shares ahead of May expiration. Home Depot is scheduled to report fourth-quarter earnings ahead of the opening bell on February 21.…
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn 
del.icio.us
DiggOptions Players Swarm Starbucks Corp. After Earnings
by Option Review - November 4th, 2011 1:25 pm
Today’s tickers: SBUX, SYY, GS & ADS
SBUX - Starbucks Corp. – Shares in Starbucks reached their highest since the company’s 1992 IPO on Friday, following the release of better-than-anticipated third-quarter earnings from the Seattle, Washington-based coffee shop operator after the closing bell on Thursday. Starbucks Corp.’s shares earlier rose as much as 7.95% to an intraday high of $44.69. While SBUX shares may be high as a kite post-earnings, options traders appear to be coming down ahead of the weekend. Call selling and put buying in the November contract today may be a sign some strategists are taking profits, locking in gains or possibly positioning for shares to cool in the near term. Put players focused on the Nov. $41 strike, where more than 7,000 contracts changed hands against open interest of 3,279 positions. It looks like much of the volume was printed by buyers of the bearish options at an average premium of $0.44 apiece. Put buyers may profit at November expiration if shares in the world’s largest coffee-shop operator tumble 9.25% to breach the average breakeven price of $40.56. Another 1,500 put options appear to have been purchased at the lower Nov. $39 strike at an average premium of $0.17 a-pop. As for SBUX calls, selling was more prevalent than buying at each strike from the Nov. $42 strike call up through the Nov. $46 strike call. The Nov. $45 strike call is most active, with upwards of 3,600 contracts in play against 2,727 lots of open interest. It looks like investors sold around 1,600 of these calls to pocket premium of $0.59 each. Investors may be taking profits off the table or betting against the likelihood that SBUX shares will continue to hit fresh highs ahead of expiration in two weeks. Options implied volatility on Starbucks Corp. is lower by 9.5% to arrive at 34.6% following earnings.
SYY - Sysco Corp. – Though trading in Sysco Corp. options is mixed this morning, one aspect of the activity is consistent, investors are positioning for the price of the underlying to move following the company’s first-quarter earnings report ahead of the opening bell on Monday. Traders are snapping up both call and put options on the largest North American distributor of food in anticipation of near-term bullish or bearish movement in the price of the stock. Options implied volatility on the stock is running 22.4% higher on the day at 29.65% as…
Puts Fly Off The Shelves At AMR Corp. As Shares Tumble
by Option Review - October 3rd, 2011 2:45 pm
Today’s tickers: AMR, SBUX, FDX & LVS
AMR - AMR Corp. – Shares in AMR Corp. went down in flames today, falling nearly 40.0% this afternoon to $1.83, before trading in the stock was halted for a second time…and then a third, fourth, and fifth time at current count. Implied volatility on the stock shot up 136.39% to 194.42% in early-afternoon trade on fears the U.S. may be heading into recession and concern AMR Corp. may need to eventually consider bankruptcy protection. Investors eyeing the breathtaking drop in shares of the airline operator snapped up in- and out-of-the-money put options across multiple expiries. The November $2.0 strike put attracted the greatest volume, with more than 12,000 contracts having changed hands against open interest of 574 positions. It looks like most of the puts were purchased for an average premium of $0.21 apiece. Investors long the puts profit in the event that shares in AMR Corp. trade beneath the average breakeven price of $1.79 at expiration next month. Same-strike puts expiring in October drew a crowd, as well. Traders purchased the majority of the more than 9,700 puts exchanged at the Oct. $2.0 strike for an average premium of $0.14 each. Put premiums may appreciate should implied volatility edge higher and shares in the parent company of American Airlines fall further as the story continues to play out.
SBUX - Starbucks Corp. – Fresh prints in Starbucks Corp. put options this morning indicate one investor may profit handsomely should shares in the maker of Frappuccinos and Tazo teas decline substantially in the next seven weeks to November expiration. The spread may be an outright bearish bet on the specialty coffee retailer or a protective play on the stock ahead of the company’s fourth-quarter earnings report after the final bell on November 3.…
Bulls Scoop Up Sprint Nextel Corp. Calls
by Option Review - March 10th, 2011 4:33 pm
Today’s tickers: S, FTR, JTX & SBUX
S - Sprint Nextel Corp. – Medium-term bullish positioning is building up in Sprint Nextel Corp. options today with shares in the name trading 3.00% higher on the session at $4.84 as of 12:20pm in New York. Investors expecting shares in the provider of various communications products and services to extend gains through May expiration engaged in plain-vanilla call buying, purchasing the options out-right to position for shares to potentially reach a new 52-week high in the next couple of months. Volume is heaviest at the May $6.0 strike where 20,750 calls have changed hands versus previously existing open interest of 7,482 contracts. It looks like roughly 18,000 of the calls were picked up at a premium of $0.08 each. Call buyers make money if Sprint’s shares jump 25.6% over the current price of $4.84 to surpass the effective breakeven price of $6.08 by expiration day in May. Sprint Nextel Corp. is scheduled to report first-quarter earnings before the market opens for trading on April 28, 2011.
FTR - Frontier Communications Corp. – Put volume on the communications company jumped today after sizable trades were initiated in the May contract. It looks like investors responsible for the put activity may be purchasing the contracts to brace for bearish movement in the price of the underlying stock. Shares in Frontier Communications Corp. are currently down 0.90% to stand at $8.00 as of 12:30pm. The selection of the May contract put options could be coincident with the firm’s first-quarter earnings report, which is scheduled for release before the opening bell on May 5, 2011. One trader appears to have purchased some 3,000 puts at the May $8.0 strike for a premium of $0.40 each. The investor starts to make money on the put-acquisition if shares in FTR decline 5.0% from the current price of $8.00 to breach the effective breakeven point at $7.60 by May expiration day. Volume is greatest, however, at the lower May $7.0 strike where 15,000 put options…
Shares Of Starbucks Slide, After Company Warns That Commodity Inflation Will Whack Earnings
by ilene - January 26th, 2011 5:11 pm
Courtesy of Joe Weisenthal, Business Insider
 Image: Starbucks.com |
A strong quarter from Starbucks is marred by this jolt of reality
- The company now expects EPS of $1.43 to $1.47, reflecting 15% to 20% growth over fiscal 2010 non-GAAP EPS on a 52-week basis. No restructuring charges are anticipated in fiscal 2011.
- The company also expects EPS for fiscal Q2 and Q3 to be in the range of $0.32 to $0.33 in each period, and EPS in fiscal Q4 is expected to be approximately $0.35.
- Commodity costs, which are now expected to have an unfavorable impact on EPS of approximately $0.20 for the full fiscal year attributable primarily to higher coffee costs, are reflected in the revised EPS target.
Current estimates had been at $1.49. The stock is off about 2% after hours.
Monday Market Movement – “Like Moths to a Flame!”
by Phil - November 29th, 2010 8:01 am
"Investors are drawn to China like moths to a flame." – Neil Woodford
That’s a great quote. Neil is the head of investments at Invesco, running the UK’s largest investment fund with a decade of 15% average returns under his belt so let’s take the man seriously for starters. Mr Woodford’s concerns coincide with figures showing that food prices in China were 10.1pc higher in October than in the same month last year – a level of inflation not seen since mid-2007. This is deepening concern that China’s economy is now starting to overheat.
"I do not deny that in the long term an economy like China will grow much more rapidly than the West. But I think one has to be very careful about correlating growth necessarily with economic opportunity, and opportunity to make money," said Mr. Woodford.
And so it is that the moths are all drawn to the light, even as it burns them. For they are blindly drawn to its grace, hitting their heads about the light, destroying their senses, going without food, and becoming easy prey to those that hunt them. Even those few moths that will get within the embrase of the light will burn unable to escape, ever.
There was no escape for Ireland this weekend as the IMF and EU pinned the country down and forced them to swallow a $130Bn aid package at (get this!) 6.7%. $17.5Bn of this money is to come out of Irish pension funds all just to make sure Bill Gross doesn’t lose any of the money he lent to Ireland! I honestly cannot tell you who is the more vile, despicable villain in this debacle. Is it the banks, who started this mess with their idiotic lending practices? Is it the lobbyists and lawmakers, who turned Ireland into a tax haven for EU Corporations and destroyed the economy by funneling tax breaks to the wealthy? Is it the Irish Government, who stupidly bailed out the failing banks with guarantees that put the nation on the hook for more money than their entire GDP. Is it the bondholders, who drove up the cost of financing Ireland’s newfound debt to levels that threatened to break the National Bank or is it the EU & IMF, who are effectively playing the role of loan sharks, borrowing $100Bn at…
Industry Acquisition News Spurs Activity in Brookdale Options, Sends Shares Soaring
by Option Review - October 22nd, 2010 4:47 pm
Today’s tickers: BKD, COH, CNP, JNY, SBUX, XRX & SLB
BKD - Brookdale Senior Living, Inc. – Shares of the operator of senior living communities are up 18.7% at $19.74 this afternoon after earlier rallying as much as 20.4% to an intraday high of $20.03. Brookdale’s shares jumped after Ventas Inc. agreed to purchase the real estate assets of Atria Senior Living Group for $1.5 billion in cash and stock. The acquisition sent shares in Brookdale, the largest owner of senior communities in the U.S., higher on sentiment the stock is undervalued and spurred bullish trading in its options today. One options strategist utilized longer-dated calls and puts to position for shares to continue their ascent. The trader purchased 1,745 calls at the January 2011 $20 strike at a premium of $1.60 each, and sold the same number of puts out at the April 2011 $17.5 strike at a premium of $1.30 apiece. The cost of buying the call options is reduced to just $0.30 per contract, thus positioning the investor to make money if BKD’s shares rally above the effective breakeven price of $20.30 ahead of expiration day in January. The sale of the put options is a nice way to cheapen the cost of taking a bullish stance on Brookdale, but is not without its risks. The trader could have 174,500 shares of the underlying stock put to him at $17.50 each if the puts land in-the-money at expiration in April 2011. But, the $1.30 premium per contract received for bearing this risk appears to be a favorable trade off for this bullish player.
COH - Coach, Inc. – The luxury retailer of handbags and accessories popped up on our scanners this morning after one investor dabbled in near-term put options. Coach’s shares are currently up 0.50% to stand at $44.64 as of 12:55 p.m., but earlier rallied more than 1.20% to touch an intraday high of $44.96. The near-term pessimistic play observed in the November contract today may be the work of…
Weak Dollar Wednesday – Which Way Now?
by Phil - September 29th, 2010 8:24 am
Everything is proceeding exactly as I have foreseen – Emperor Palpatine
In Monday’s post I said: "we really would like to see a little volume consolidation before we make another run at the 1,150 line on the S&P" and we zigged and we zagged until yesterday’s close where "THEY" punched it up to EXACTLY the 1,150 line (see Dave Fry’s chart) where we, of course, failed – because it’s all a load of BS end-of-quarter window dressing but HEY – 1,150, how about that!?! 1,150 is the 7.5% line on the S&P (see Monday’s chart) and that goes hand in hand with Dow 10,965 (not there yet), Nasdaq 2,365, NYSE 7,280 and Russell 672.
As I mentioned yesterday, our betting is still all over the place as we may go up on a technical breakout or we may go down and the fulcrum for the markets is currently the dollar, whose devaluation relative to the exchange value for a stock certificate is responsible for the vast majority of our recent market. We’re positioned bearish in that we have 10:1 bets made to the downside on some ultra hedges so we will be thrilled with a pullback but, on the whole, we’re still really just protecting our bullish bets – even our review of the September Dozen this weekend couldn’t find too many reasons to take the money and run as we just didn’t look weak enough to quit on our most bullish trade ideas.
Our overriding concern is that Japan makes good with their promise to intervene on the Yen, which will boost the buck, knock down commodities and tank the markets. Why is that not happening? Well our own Government is doing everything they can to de-value the dollar. We talked out quantitative easing yesterday and GS issued a report yesterday saying there was NO CHANCE that the Fed would raise rates and, in fact, they may even lower rates to ZERO.
Now, I don’t know about you but I’m holding out for when the government PAYS ME to borrow money. Maybe then I’ll be willing to let them lend me $1Bn as long as they pay me $2.5M a year to hold onto it. Our greedy little IBanksters couldn’t wait though, and they rushed out and borrowed another $500M from the Fed yesterday (POMO) at the outrageous rate of 0.25%.…
Weekly Wrap-Up – Why Does This Rally Give Me the Creeps?
by Phil - April 25th, 2010 8:29 am
I’m sorry, I am trying so hard to get bullish but it’s not working…
My only solution is to, as we often joke, switch off my brain and stop reading the news (listening to it is great as everything is coming up roses in TV-land) and ignore the now-exposed shenanigans on Wall Street (why should I worry about my investments just because the people running the game are up on fraud charges?) and for goodness sakes don’t even look at something as depressing as "The Economic Elite vs. the People of the United States of America," neither Parts 1-3 or Parts 4-6 because that can lead to thinking and thinking makes it REALLY hard to go to sleep at night with your money riding on the top of an 80% market while gold is trading at $1,150 an ounce because of overwhelming global instability and a total lack of faith in the global financial markets.
Yep, if we don’t think about all that stuff and focus on the good stuff, like the fact that Unemployment is only 3% for those of us who earn $150,000 a year (for the poor it’s 31%), and 93% of our virtually fully-employed analysts predict the S&P will finish the year even higher (although not too much higher) with only Andrew Garhwaite of Credit Suisse in need of an "attitude adjustment" with his puny target of 1,175, which is 32 points lower than Friday’s close. Fortunately, enlightened analysts like Deutsche Bank’s Binky Chad think we can still squeeze another 100 points out of this rally (about 10%) although Goldman Sachs is wimping out at 1,250, their partner in "whatever you want to call it", JP Morgan is up at 1,300. So it’s BUYBUYBUY from the gang of 12 and we’ll be whipping Andrew into shape by the next report or he may find himself the fall guy for the next scandal…
Oops, sorry, I wasn’t supposed to mention the scandals as that’s not really a buying premise unless of course you look at the sheer volume of things the IBanks were getting away with and then look at the virtual nothing that is being done about it and then we can conclude there is no reason they can’t pump this market back up to Dow 14,000 because we already know it was such total BS last time, when we dropped 50% like…
Thursday’s Thrills – Greek Tragedies and Wall Street Worries
by Phil - April 22nd, 2010 8:28 am
Obama is coming to Wall Street.
The President will laying out his case for legislation at 11:55 to crack down on Wall Street with new regulations. "One of the most significant contributors to this recession was a financial crisis as dire as any we’ve known in generations," Obama will say, according to excerpts from his speech released by the White House. "And that crisis was born of a failure of responsibility — from Wall Street to Washington — that brought down many of the world’s largest financial firms and nearly dragged our economy into a second Great Depression. It is essential that we learn the lessons of this crisis, so we don’t doom ourselves to repeat it. And make no mistake, that is exactly what will happen if we allow this moment to pass — an outcome that is unacceptable to me and to the American people."
The President needs just one Republican vote (or two non-votes) to pass the 1,336-page Financial Reform Bill authored by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd which aims to bring new oversight to hedge funds and derivatives while cracking down on risky bank trading and to put in place protections for consumers of financial products. It will also establish a system for unwinding troubled financial companies to (theoretically) prevent a repeat of past catastrophes with BSC, LEH and AIG.
The House of Representatives approved a bill in December that called for the most sweeping regulatory changes since the Great Depression of the 1930s. The House bill embraced most of a comprehensive package of financial reform proposals introduced by Obama in 2009. The Senate version, if passed, would have to be reconciled in joint committee with the House before it goes to Obama for his signature and becomes law. Meanwhile, the IMF has a proposal on the table to tax bank balance sheets that some analysts suggest will cut pre-tax profits by as much as 20% if the measure moves forward
And speaking of catastrophes that need unwinding – Greece has sent the Pound and the Euro back to recent lows and has Europe down about a point as The EU says Greece’s budget deficit last year was worse than it previously forecast and could top 14 percent of gross domestic product as “off- market swaps” cloud its estimates. The EU’s statistics office said today Greece’s deficit was 13.6 percent last year, higher than the government’s…
German
Spanish
French
Italian
Portuguese
Japanese
Korean
Russian
Chinese
Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
(
