PCL – Plum Creek Timber – It appears that an investor sold a 15,000 lots strangle on paper-manufacturer, Plum Creek using February options. The implied volatility reading on the share price of 38% remains above the 31% on the share price performance. Call premium at the 35 strike was sold at 1.15 and pushed it lower by 4% on the day while the 10% decline in put premium was accounted for by simultaneous selling of puts at the 25 strike price. Together the premium of 2.05 implies that this investor expects that shares in Plum Creek remain hemmed between $37.05 and $22.95 during the next five months. Shares are 0.4% higher today at $31.32. There is also action at the same expiration 30 series where 5,000 calls traded close to a 3.40 asking price while puts traded on identical volume at a mid-market premium of 2.63. This is more opaque than the strangle and could represent a reversal in which a Plum Creek bull is selling puts to purchase calls. However, it could also be a sold strangle in a similar vane to the above. The currently implied trading range in this case would be between $23.97 to $36.03.
TBT – ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury ETF – With today’s comments from Fed chairman Bernanke sending bond prices spiraling, investors have targeted call options on the inverse exchange traded fund, TBT, to target a continuation in the move. Likely investors expect further normalization in the yield curve as the discussion on a tighter policy stance expands. As bond yields have fallen during the recent four months, the price of this ETF has slipped from near $60 per share to $42. Today its price stands at $46.14 for a 4.8% gain. Note that the fund focuses on the 20-year area of the yield curve and is double leveraged, which account for today’s sharp price movement. Investors targeted call options in expectation of a further move and used October calls up to the 49 strike to play that move. They also bought calls at the 46 through 50 strike prices.
GE – General Electric – Option sellers chose to write call premium at the December contract using the 21 strike price today. We can see around 7,000 calls sold at premiums between 9-11 cents as shares in the conglomerate slip by 0.6% to stand at $16.13 today. The premium may be part of a long stock and short call combination (covered calls) if indeed the investor wants to enhance a bullish view on the stock. However, the likelihood in our opinion is that the investor is choosing a low probability event and taking in premium. The delta at the 21 strike indicates only a 7% chance of these calls landing in-the-money come year end expiration. March call options at the same strike also appeared to suffer a similar fate ahead of the weekend where sellers took in the approximate 40 cent premium some 6,500 times or around twice the established open interest at the strike.
