Shares In Amylin Plunge, Options Players Prep For A Rebound
by Option Review - November 8th, 2011 1:29 pm
Today’s tickers: AMLN, XLNX, DF & NTGR
AMLN - Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Inc. – Shares in the biopharmaceutical company plunged 18.1% to an intraday low of $8.95 on Tuesday on news the company ended its diabetes partnership with drug maker, Eli Lilly & Co. Options activity on Amylin Pharmaceuticals, however, suggests some strategists see the selloff as overdone, with a number of investors stepping up today to position for the price of the underlying to rebound. Near-term bulls snapped up more than 1,650 calls at the Nov. $11 strike for a premium of $0.22 apiece. Buyers of the call options profit at expiration if shares in AMLN surge 21.4% over the current traded price of $9.24 (as of 11:50 am in New York), to surpass the average breakeven price of $11.22. Optimism for an AMLN-recovery story spread to the Dec. $10 strike, where more than 5,600 call options changed hands against open interest of 270 contracts. It looks like one investor purchased the majority of these calls for an average premium of $0.85 a-pop. The strategist profits at expiration next month in the event that Amylin’s shares increase 17.4% to trade above $10.85. Longer-dated contracts are the most active in terms of volume on the drug maker so far today. One trader appears to have purchased a 5,000-lot April 2012 $10/$15 call spread for a net premium of $1.30 per contract. The call-spreader may reel in profits of up to $3.70 per contract on the position if AMLN’s shares jump 62.3% to exceed $15.00 by April expiration day. Meanwhile, the sale of 9,000 puts for a premium of $0.63 per contract at the April 2012 $6.0 strike suggests at least one investor expects the price of the underlying to exceed that level through expiration next year. The trader walks away with the premium in hand as long as the put options expire worthless at April expiration day. We note that while much of the activity in Amylin options is likely bullish, the stock was not exclusively populated with bullish players. Some of the volume generated in April 2012 contract calls looks to have been sold by traders betting against the likelihood of steep double-digit gains the shares. Additionally, light put buying the front month indicates other investors are prepared to see the stock pull back further ahead of November expiration. Options implied volatility on AMLN is up 46.7% at 85.0% just after midday…
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DiggThree-legged Bull Eyes Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. Options
by Option Review - July 20th, 2011 4:08 pm
Today’s tickers: ADM, ETFC, VG & XLNX
ADM - Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. – A couple of weeks ago demand for call options on one of the world’s largest processors of corn, wheat, cocoa and other feedstuffs jumped after Warren Buffet said Archer-Daniels-Midland is the “kind of company we look at” in regards to the search for acquisition candidates. Today, ADM options appear to be popular with at least one strategist positioning for further upside movement in the price of the underlying shares through the end of 2011. Shares in the food products company increased as much as 1.4% this morning to $31.00 by 11:30 am in New York. The stock still trades at an 18.5% discount off its more than 3-year high of $38.02 attained in February. Bullish action in ADM options and the bump-up in shares follow a study released by Purdue University economists on Tuesday showing, among other things, that high food prices are expected to persist for the next one to two years. The U.S. government in February said U.S. farm income may reach $94.7 billion this year. Archer-Daniels-Midland is scheduled to report fourth-quarter earnings ahead of the opening bell on August 2. One options trader expecting shares to near multi-year highs by December expiration initiated a three-legged bullish transaction straight out of the gate this morning. It looks like the investor sold 1,000 puts at the December $28 strike for a premium of $1.16 each in order to finance the purchase of a 1,000-lot December $32/$36 call spread at a cost of $1.14 apiece. The sale of the put options more than offset the cost of the bull call spread, thereby yielding a net credit of $0.02 per contract to the investor. The trader adds to his gains in the event that shares in ADM rally another 3.2% over the current price of $31.00 to surpass the effective breakeven price of $32.00 at expiration. Maximum potential profits of $4.02 per contract, including the net credit received, are available to the investor should shares in the feedstuffs producer jump 16.1% to trade above $36.00 at expiration day in December. Shares in ADM last traded above $36.00 at the beginning of May.…
Dell Options In Demand
by Option Review - May 4th, 2011 4:19 pm
Today’s tickers: DELL, CAG, GPS & XLNX
DELL - Dell, Inc. – Strategists populating Dell options today are sending mixed signals on the PC maker ahead of the company’s first-quarter earnings report on May 17. Call buyers in the June contract appear to be gearing up for a rally in the price of the underlying shares, while ratio put spreaders are taking a more cautious stance on the stock. Shares in Dell are currently up 0.25% to stand at $15.84 as of 12:15pm. Options traders exchanged more than 9,800 calls at the June $16 strike on open interest of 3,774 contracts. It looks like nearly all of the contracts were purchased for an average premium of $0.63 a-pop. Investors long the calls profit if DELL’s shares rally 5.0% over the current price of $15.84 to exceed the average breakeven price of $16.63 by expiration day next month. Meanwhile, one or more put players initiated ratio spreads. Approximately 3,500 in-the-money puts at the June $16 strike were purchased for an average premium of $0.81 each, while 7,000 puts at the lower June $15 strike sold for an average premium of $0.37 apiece. Investors employing the spreads paid a net premium of $0.07 per contract, on average. The sale of twice as many of the lower-strike put options substantially reduced the cost of positioning for a pullback in Dell’s shares through expiration day next month. Traders may be using the put-play to hedge a long position in the stock, or may be positioning for shares to decline rather than rally as call buyers’ actions suggest. The parameters of the put spread, for outright bearish players, indicate maximum potential profits of $0.93 per contract if shares in DELL settle at $15.00 at expiration. But, if the position turns out to be not quite bearish enough, investors start losing money beneath a breakeven share price of $14.07.…
Contrarian Options Player Sheds Put Options on Lloyd’s Banking Group PLC
by Option Review - May 25th, 2010 4:50 pm
Today’s tickers: LYG, XLV, MSFT, XLF, F, AZN, LYV, AZO, MW & XLNX
LYG – Lloyd’s Banking Group PLC – One optimistic options strategist initiated a short put stance on Lloyd’s Banking Group PLC today, suggesting perhaps that shares of the underlying stock are not likely to collapse much further ahead of October expiration. Lloyd’s Banking Group shares fell as much as 8.9% to an intraday low of $2.88 in morning trading, but recovered slightly during the session to stand 5.05% off yesterday’s close at $3.16 a share as of 2:45 pm (ET). Across the pond, Lloyd’s Banking Group shares declined the most in London trading, falling 8.9% to 50.52 pence, as concerns over the creditworthiness of European financial institutions continues to weigh heavily on U.K. banking stocks. But, back to U.S. equity options on LYG, the contrarian investor opted to sell short 4,000 puts at the October $2.5 strike in order to pocket premium of $0.30 per contract. The trader keeps the full amount of premium received on the sale as long as LYG’s share price exceeds $2.50 through expiration day in October. The short sale of put options in this case implies the investor is happy to have 400,000 shares of the underlying stock put to him at an effective price of $2.20 each should the put contracts land in-the-money at expiration.
XLV – Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund – A large chunk of out-of-the-money put options were purchased on the Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund today as part of a delta neutral trade enacted by one cautiously optimistic options player. Shares of the XLV, an exchange-traded fund designed to produce investment results that correspond to the price and yield performance of the Health Care Select Sector of the S&P 500 Index, declined 0.65% to stand at $28.54 as of 3:35 pm (ET). It looks like the investor purchased up to 22,500 put options with a .31 delta at the September $26 strike for a premium of $1.08 per contract. The trader picked up the puts in conjunction with the purchase of stock at $28.25 a-pop. The delta neutral transaction is meant to offset potential losses faced by the investor should shares of the XLV continue lower because of the larger proportion of put options held by the trader. The purchase of shares of the underlying stock in combination with the put options indicates the investor…
Testy Tuesday – Have the Markets Become Comfortably Numb?
by Phil - January 19th, 2010 8:08 am
"There is no pain you are receding
A distant ship’s smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move but I can’t hear what you’re saying.
When I was a child
I caught a fleeting glimpse
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone
I cannot put my finger on it now
The child is grown,
The dream is gone.
but I have become comfortably numb." – Pink Floyd
I have a theory that the markets (and the American people in general) aren’t irrational, they are simply shell-shocked after suffering a very traumatic group financial experience…
To be shell-shocked is to be "mentally confused, upset, or exhausted as a result of excessive stress" and the most common symptoms are: Fatigue, slower reaction times, indecision, disconnection from one’s surroundings, and inability to prioritize – That certainly sounds like our Congress doesn’t it? Combat stress disorder was first diagnosed in WWI, when 10% of the troops were killed and 56% wounded – far worse than had been experienced in previous wars. Our current financial crisis has similarly affected more people than any previous crisis with almost everyone knowing someone who is bankrupt or lost their jobs or homes and almost no one escaped the carnage of the downturn without some financial damage.
Combat fatigue may go a long way to explaining the severe drop-off in volume that has plagued the markets since March, with participation now down to 25% of where we were last January and that leaves us open to the blatant sort of market manipulation that Karl Denninger caught last week as well as the usual nonsense we get daily from HFT programs that drive the market with such precision that we are able to tell how the day is going to go by simply checking our hourly volume targets. Here’s a clip from CNBC where a floor trader discusses market manipulation as a fact of trading (2 mins in).
As Nicholas Santiago points out on In The Money Stocks, "January is usually a very high volume month, yet it has started off the New Year even lighter than the last two months of 2009. Light volume markets are very difficult to short. Hence the old saying, ‘never short a dull market’." Not only is the market volume…
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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
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