Today’s tickers: SPY, MCP & JNPR
SPY - SPDR S&P 500 ETF – A massive bearish spread initiated in the final hours of the trading session on Monday afternoon suggests one big options market participant is prepared for a roughly 8% pullback in the S&P 500 Index during the next few months. Shares in the SPY, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the performance of the S&P 500 Index, slipped to an intraday low of $140.97 earlier today after consumer confidence fell the most in 10 months, but have since recovered to stand 0.10% lower on the session at $141.40 as of 11:30 a.m. ET. The large, approximately, 100,000-lot Nov. $130/$140 put spread purchased Monday for around $2.47 per contract makes money if the price of the underlying slips 2.7% to breach the average breakeven point on the downside at $137.53. Maximum potential profits of $7.53 per contract are available on the position in the event SPY shares drop 8% to settle at or below $130.00 at November expiration. The strategy could be looking ahead to the meeting of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming; betting the markets may be disappointed in what Bernanke and others have to say as the U.S. settles in for the long weekend. Additionally, with the S&P 500 Index having traded up to its highest in four years on an intraday basis last week, the spread may simply be locking in recent gains to protect against any bumps in the road, central bank-related or otherwise, that could trip up the market in the next few months.
MCP - Molycorp, Inc. – Shares in Molycorp are up 11.5% today at $10.61 after the rare earth metals mining company announced Monday it began operations at its Mountain Pass mine in California. Weekly call options on Molycorp are seeing the most volume in the first half of the trading session, with the Aug. 31 ’12 $10 and $11 strike calls changing hands more than…
