The tone of trading has a wait-and-see feel without much volume and volatility in the equity market, but an uptick in implied vols (VIX) suggests that players are bracing for event risk. The earnings calendar remains loaded with reports and the economic calendar holds key data Tuesday through Friday. Meanwhile, FOMC is slated for Wednesday and the ECB will also make a rate announcement later this week. Trading is understandably cautious and, as a result, even gains across Eurozone equity market failed to spark a rally on Wall Street. Spain’s IBEX led the advance overseas with a 2.7 percent gain. Yet, crude oil is down 40 cents to $89.73 and gold gained $4.5 to $1622.5 an ounce. Volumes are light on Wall Street, with less than 4 million shares trading, but might pick up tomorrow amid end-of-month position squaring. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 7 points and the NASDAQ is off 11.
Heading into the final hour, overall volumes are relatively light in the options market. 5.4 million calls and 4.5 million puts traded across all the exchanges. Vols are mostly higher ahead of this week’s heavy dose of earnings and economic news. CBOE Volatility Index (.VIX) snapped a three-day losing streak to add 1.20 to 17.90. Among the individual names seeing action, a massive Dec 11 – 13 put spread was bought on XLF and the spread is covered in more detail on the home page today. VIX saw a notable Oct 20 – 30 call spread print in early trading. iShares Small Cap Fund (IWM) was the subject of a sizeable three-way bearish play in the December Quarterlys. SHAW, which was the subject of bullish flow multiple times this month (7/6, 7/9, and 7/10) is up 54 percent on a bid from CBI. Large blocks of calls traded in Sprint Nextel today. Call volume is 150K contracts. STX, HTZ, and FST are among the names seeing interest ahead of earnings, after the closing bell (try symbol @earnings in Flow Monitor).
Notable Flow
FST – Bullish flow detected in Forest Oil Corporation with 7763 calls trading, or 3x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $6.71 (0.18) with ATMIV lifting by 6.33 point and 52% of todays call premium trading offer side. (Trade-Alert) 14:01
GES – Bullish flow detected in Guess Inc with 3853 calls trading, or 4x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $30.32 (-0.47) with ATMIV lifting by 3.01 point and 70% of todays call premium trading offer side. (Trade-Alert) 13:01
BG – Bullish flow detected in Bunge Ltd with 2398 calls trading, or 2x the recent avg daily call volume in the name. Shares near $66.3 (0.93) with ATMIV lifting by 1.10 point and 84% of todays call premium trading offer side. (Trade-Alert) 12:41
High options volume is being seen in XLF, EFA, S, OCZ, CBI, SHAW, LNKD, DNDN, SAN, FITB
Movers
Symbol Last Change %Change StdDevs
SHAW 41.29 +14.60 +54.7% 18.71
PGNX 5.42 -5.38 -49.8% 20.17
ACUR 2.00 -1.08 -35.1% 12.01 Pre-Earnings
LUFK 47.65 -11.68 -19.7% 7.40 Post-Earnings
TGE 7.40 -1.48 -16.7% 6.06 Post-Earnings
AWI 38.26 -6.87 -15.2% 8.55 Post-Earnings
CBI 34.76 -5.95 -14.6% 6.28
CSIQ 2.71 -0.43 -13.9% 3.53
TRS 21.72 +2.53 +13.2% 5.96 Post-Earnings
OSG 5.74 -0.85 -12.9% 2.17
Shakers (Implied volatility Movers)
Symbol IV[30d] IVChg IVChg% SkewAdjChg Last Change
ARR 15.0% +5.7 +60.7% N/A $7.79 +0.12
PWRD 48.3% +11.5 +31.1% N/A $9.53 -0.13
CBI 39.6% +9.4 +31.0% -1.2 $34.78 -5.92
GDOT 81.6% -29.7 -26.7% N/A $10.16 +1.10
AMLP 10.6% -3.2 -23.4% -3.3 $16.50 +0.07
JEC 37.2% +6.8 +22.2% +6.7 $39.28 -0.17 Pre-Earnings
MWE 25.1% +4.5 +22.0% +0.9 $52.46 +0.11
MELI 62.9% +11.0 +21.2% +7.6 $69.91 -5.80
NXY 15.9% +2.8 +21.2% +0.4 $25.54 -0.27
HZNP 85.7% +14.4 +20.3% N/A $5.78 -0.53
52-Week Highs
141 new highs: .UTY .VSTRP AAT ACXM ADP AEE AEO AEP ALGN AMGN ARIA ARR ARRY ASH ASML ASPS ASR AVA AWK BBH BCOR BIIB BREW BRK/B CAB CHL CHTR CL CLNY CNL CNO CORN COT COV CSGP CSU CYS DDD DEO DLX DPS DTE DVY EBAY EGHT EMB EXR FAF FE FNV FRME FRT GPS GY HCN HNZ HRG HUB/B IHS IOC ISBC KCAP KMB KO KVHI LF LGND MAT MED MLNX MMP MO MPC MTH NCT NEE NI NOC NRGM NU NVAX NVE OCN OILT OKE PCG PCY PEP PRFT PSA RA RAI RIGL ROL ROP RPAI RTH RYN S SAIA SBAC SBS SCG SEMG SHAW SHW SNAK SPB SPSC SRE SSI SSS SSYS STC SUI SWHC T TCBI TEG TLLP TMH TRP TU TV TWO UDR UGP UL ULTI UNP V VRSN VTR VYM WIBC WMT WR WXS XEL XLP XLU
52-week Lows
45 new lows: ACUR AUO CAGC CECO CEP CPLA CTRP DXD EDMC EGI ENZ GEVO GIVN GNK GSI INFN ISIL JKS JRJC JST KV/A KWT LDK MKTS MM MOBI PCXCQ PWAV RAH RFP SATC SBLK SDOW SPU SPWR SPXU SQNM SREV STP TAN TSL TSTC TXCC VOG YGE
Top Equity Blocks
2.60m NOK 2.18 +0.06 +2.8% 11:22:42 – Average Price Trade
2.34m QQQ 65.13 +0.26 +0.4% 10:57:03 – Burst
1.96m BRFS 14.15 -0.16 -1.1% 10:46:40 – Burst
1.80m REM 14.76 +0.03 +0.2% 14:05:15 – Burst
1.50m RAD 1.17 14:25:42
1.22m IYE 40.60 +0.19 +0.5% 10:03:53 – Burst
1.06m CYB 25.14 -0.02 -0.1% 14:09:13 – Burst
1.03m SIRI 2.19 +0.02 +0.9% 13:53:03
1.00m QQQ 64.78 -0.12 -0.2% 13:17:51 – Tied to Options
1.00m EWZ 52.95 -0.59 -1.1% 12:04:33 – Tied to Options