Slow To Start
The market woke up yawning and stretching on this Monday morning, perhaps
indicating people’s minds are more focused on tomorrow’s election than trading
options. Options order flow was lower than normal before the bell.
Pre-open paper showed an overall ratio of call
buyers to sellers even, at 1:1. Put sellers outnumbered put buyers 3:2. The top
5 players in terms of order flow are once again in the technology sector:Â
CSCO, MSFT, RMBS, ORCL, and INTC.
RMBS, the stock we have been following rather
closely in this column over the past few days, continues its upward bounceÂ
with the stock climbing to 72. This upward trend is reflected in the options
market with put sellers leading buyers 3:1, although today RMBS call buyers and
sellers are equal at 1:1. We
noted a strong push in put buying in CSCO, at a little over a 2:1 ratio, a
marked increase in recent put activity. INTC paper indicates a strength in
call selling, with a 5:2 margin of buying.
After the first hour of trading, call buying
increased somewhat, so that buyers slightly outnumbered sellers 3:2. Put sellers
had moved into a 1:1 ratio to buyers. The top 5 in order flow remained basically
the same, with JNPR making a strong move on the open, with the new rankings as
follows: CSCO, RMBS, JNPR, MSFT and INTC.
It may be worth noting that JNPR’s appearance in the Top 5 was based on a
large number of smaller contracts. VRSN showed significant movement in larger
sized contracts.