Market Overview
The blue-chip Dow Jones ended higher after hitting an intraday record high on Friday(Aug 15), as UnitedHealth's shares jumped after Berkshire Hathaway raised its stake, but other Wall Street indexes slipped as mixed data clouded the Federal Reserve's next monetary policy move.
Regarding the options market, a total volume of 61,995,799 contracts was traded, up 8% from the previous trading day.
Top 10 Option Volumes
Source: Tiger Trade App
UnitedHealth gained 12% after Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway revealed in a regulatory filing that it bought roughly five million shares in the company, worth about $1.6 billion. Rival health insurers Elevance Health, Molina Healthcare, and Centene also traded higher. Berkshire Hathaway purchased shares of home builders Lennar and D.R. Horton, and steel maker Nucor in the second quarter as well. Nucor rose 0.7%. Berkshire also pared its investments in Apple and Bank of America.
There are 1.49M UnitedHealth option contracts traded on Friday, up 314% from the previous trading day. Call options account for 70% of overall option trades.
Unusual Options Activity
Source: Market Chameleon
Nu rose 9.1% after the Brazilian fintech reported second-quarter net profit growing 42% from last year to $637 million, beating expectations. The company added 4.1 million new customers in the quarter, reaching a total of 122.7 million customers globally.
There are 716,497 Nu option contracts traded on Friday, up 171% from the previous trading day. Call options account for 72% of overall option trades. Particularly high volume was seen for the $14.5 strike call option expiring August 22, with 95,786 contracts trading. $NU 20250822 14.5 CALL$
TOP 10 S&P 500 Bullish & Bearish
This report shows stocks with the highest volume of bullish and bearish activity by option delta volume, which converts option volume to an equivalent stock volume (bought or sold).
If we take the total positive option delta volume and subtract the total negative option delta volume, we will get the net imbalance. If the net imbalance is positive, there is more bullish pressure. If the net is negative, there is more bearish pressure.
Based on option delta volume, traders sold a net equivalent of -966,820 shares of NVIDIA stock. The largest bearish delta came from selling calls. The largest delta volume came from the 15-Aug-25 180 Call, with traders getting short 2,520,233 deltas on the single option contract.
Top 10 bullish stocks: UNH, INTC, MSFT, LLY, TTD, PG, CRM, F, FSLR, CCL
Top 10 bearish stocks: NVDA, BAC, GOOGL, SMCI, BEN, KO, KVUE, CSCO, HRL, MCD
Source: Market Chameleon
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