Options volumes were relatively light ahead of the long weekend, though stocks breaking out like PBR and TWTR have been mainstays in the most active options leaderboard in the past week.
1. OXY – Shortly after the opening bell, the Nov 110/115 call spread traded 20k times for $0.64, and the Jan15 115/125 call spread traded 16k times for $0.70, both opening. Those are two large trades, both more than $1 million in total premium each, and their break-evens are all the way up at $110.64 for the Nov trade, and $115.70 for the Jan15 trade. OXY’s all-time high from May 2011 is $117.89.
2. DG – Dollar General remains within a few percent of its $65.99 all-time high from early June. The stock has traded near $64 for the past couple of weeks after announcing the bid for FDO. The Nov 62.5 calls traded 25k at 4.00.
3. PBR – Petrobras continued its strong move higher after breaking above $18, nearing the next resistance level of $20. Calls were very active again, with a buyer of 20k of the Sept 18 calls for 1.90 in the afternoon.
4. TWTR – We discussed our long TWTR stock position in a COO post on Friday. The stock touched $50 on Friday, and call options were active once again. The Sept 50 calls traded over 18k at an average price of $1.83. That line has around 60k of open interest.
5. TTWO – The video game publishers have had a stellar run so far in 2014, as I detailed in Friday’s MorningWord post. TTWO closed within 1% of its 5 year high. The Oct 25 calls were active, trading over 13k at an average price of 0.59 on the session. TTWO has not traded above $25 since Sept 2008.