Friday, August 31, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-31-12

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Thursday, August 30, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-30-12

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Venoco (VQ) - Equity and Option Markets Agree; Deal Isn't Done; Vol Diff Opens


VQ is trading $11.11, up 1.1% with IV30™ up 2.0%. The LIVEVOL® Pro Summary is below.



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Venoco, Inc. is an independent energy company primarily engaged in the acquisition, exploration, exploitation and development of oil and natural gas properties.

This is a vol and stock note on a firm that has news of its CEO taking the company private. Let's start with some news and then get to the vol. News:

---
8-16-2012

What: Shares of oil and gas explorer Venoco (NYSE: VQ) jumped 17% today when word leaked out that its CEO is lining up financing to buy the company.

So what: CEO Tim Marquez, who owns 50.3% of shares, has offered to buy the remaining share of the company for $12.50 per share, and he may be moving closer to financing the deal. He is in advanced talks about a $436.5 million package that would include debt, asset sales, and capital raises to buy out the company.

Now what: Since shares closed yesterday at $9.53, the market hasn't had a lot of faith that Marquez's offer would wind up in an actual buyout. But rising energy prices may make a deal easier to pull off; if financing comes through a deal may close as early as September.

Source: The Motley Fool via Yahoo! Finance; Why Venoco's Shares Popped, written by Travis Hoium.
---

On 8-29-2012 S&P cut VQ's credit rating but did remove the rating "from CreditWatch with negative implications and assigned a stable outlook."
Source: S&P via Reuters; TEXT-S&P cuts Venoco's corp credit rating to 'B-'.

Let's turn to the Charts Tab (six months) below. The top portion is the stock price, the bottom is the vol (IV30™ - red vs HV20™ - blue vs HV180™ - pink).



On the stock side I've highlighted the pop on that takeover news. We can see that until then the stock ride was a bumpy one. The 52 wk range for VQ is [$6.50, $12.00], so that takeover price would be an annual high if it gets realized.

On the vol side we can see how the implied dipped slightly on the news. A vol drop would be normal behavior on a takeover bid, the fact that the vol both didn't drop very much and has risen since reflects the option market's pricing of the likelihood of the event occurring. Or, in English, the option market does not reflect a lot of certainty around this takeover in the near-term, and for that matter, neither does the equity market ($11.11 is not $12.50).

Let's turn to the Skew Tab to examine the line-by-line and month-to-month vols.



The skew has maintained a normal shape, but the vol rises from the back to the front monotonically. In English, the option market reflects elevated risk in the near-term (Sep expo.) relative to the intermediate-term (Oct expo) and long-term (Dec expo).

Finally, let's turn to the Options Tab, for completeness.



Across the top we can see the monthly vols are priced to 110.64%, 81.65% and 62.79% respectively for Sep, Oct and Dec. As a more concrete example of the vol diff, check out the mid-market value for the Sep/Oct 10 put spread. That spread is priced to ~$0.125 in a stock that was trading in the mid 9's a couple of weeks ago. A few minutes before I took that screenshot, the spread's mid-market price was just a dime. The day before the news, that spread was priced to ~$0.85.  This is just another way to examine the difference in risk premia between the front two months -- that is, to use prices rather than vols.

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Pre-Market/Post Market: 8-30-12

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Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-29-12


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Best Buy Co. (BBY) - Options Reflect Upside Potential in Near-term; Vol Diff Gaps Open to Upside


BBY is trading $18.14, up 1.6& with IV30™ up 13.9%. The LIVEVOL® Pro Summary is below.



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Best Buy Co., Inc. is a multinational retailer of consumer electronics, computing and mobile phone products, entertainment products, appliances and related services.

This is a vol and skew note on a company embroiled in what appears to be an unwanted private takeover bid from it's ex-Chairman. Let's start with some news, then move onto the vol 'n stuff 'n stuff. I do also note that I wrote about BBY on 7-2-2012; sort of a pre-cursor to today's news. You can read that post here:
Best Buy (BBY) - Stock and Vol Up on LBO "No" News

Here's the news that started this story:

---
(Reuters) - Best Buy Co Inc's (BBY.N) former Chairman Richard Schulze is not expected to present a buyout or other proposal to the company's board anytime soon, a person familiar with the situation said.

Media reports said Schulze was close to presenting an offer for the consumer electronics chain. Discussions around a leveraged buyout of the company are still in the early stages, the person said.

Source: Reuters via Yahoo! Finance; No bid by Best Buy ex-chairman to come soon: source, reporting By Nadia Damouni; editing by Gerald E. McCormick.
---

So that was sort of no news with news expected soon, but denied. But here are some headlines from Briefing.com in chronological order (Provided by Briefing.com (www.briefing.com)):

06-Jul-12 15:23 ET: Best Buy to layoff 2400 employees - CNBC

11-Jul-12 09:33 ET: HHGregg at a 3.5 year low following Q1 warning and FY13 guidance cut, now off ~32% (7.80 -3.74) -Update BBY -6%

13-Jul-12 09:42 ET: Best Buy trading lower off the open; Hearing cautious comments at Cleveland Research

30-Jul-12 08:44 ET: Best Buy spikes to $20 then comes back to ~$19 following renewed takeover reports;

30-Jul-12 08:43 ET: Best Buy founder Schulze recruting executive team for buyout - Bloomberg

06-Aug-12 08:35 ET: Best Buy Founder Richard Schulze confirms proposal to acquire BBY for $24.00 to $26.00 per share

Richard Schulze, Founder and former Chairman of BBY, submitted a written proposal to the Best Buy Board of Directors to acquire all of the outstanding shares of the company that he does not already own for a price of $24.00 to $26.00 per share in cash. The purchase price, which is based on current public information and is subject to due diligence, represents a premium of 36% to 47% to Best Buy's closing stock price of $17.64 on August 3, 2012. Schulze is Best Buy's largest shareholder, controlling 20.1% of Best Buy shares.
---

And finally, the news today:

---
29-Aug-12 07:08 ET: Best Buy: Buyout feasible albeit unlikely - Oppenheimer

OpCo notes clients continue to ask whether the firm believes former BBY chairman Richard Schulze will prove successful in his attempt to take the Co private. The BBY situation is clearly fluid. Shares are likely to remain susceptible to an ongoing deluge of data from BBY and its potential suitors. In the end, firm views a deal to purchase Best Buy as unlikely. Ample cash flow and a still healthy balance sheet suggest that BBY could support the added leverage associated with a leveraged buyout (LBO). OpCo believes, however, that potential private equity buyers will ultimately balk at a deteriorating business model that is increasingly falling victim to the inroads of new non-traditional CE competitors and a weak product cycle.

Provided by Briefing.com (www.briefing.com)
---

OK, let's actually look at what's going down with the options. Ultimately, it's the skew that caught my attention, but let's start with Charts Tab (six months), below. The top portion is the stock price, the bottom is the vol (IV30™ - red vs HV20™ - blue vs HV180™ - pink).



On the stock side we can see the decline from ~$28 in late March, to now in the $18 range. While the ride has been bumpy, BBY is down from $25.43 as of one year ago, or a -28.7% move. At one point in the last two years, BBY was trading near $45 a share. The 52 wk range in stock price is [$16.25, $27.89].

On the vol side we can see a rather bumpy ride in the implied as well. Most notably however is the move today -- a significant pop raising the vol to the 85th percentile (annual). The 52 wk range in IV30™ is [29.46%, 73.33%].

Let's turn to the Skew Tab where we can see a phenomenally interesting term structure.



We can see that the $16 strike puts are all priced pretty similarly across the front three months. Then there's an awesome upside skew in the Sep options, a noteworthy but less abrupt upside skew in the Oct options and then a downward sloping upside skew in the Dec options.

Simply stated, the option market reflects substantially greater upside risk (potential) in Sep than Oct, and in Oct than in Dec. Extrapolating a bit of meaning into this, we might also say that the option market reflects the takeover / private decision / ordeal will be over by Dec expo.

As a definitive example of how much the skew shape has changed with the news headlines over the last two months (above), I've included the Skew Tab from 7-2-2012, below:



We can see a parabolic shape to the Jul options and a vol diff that was beginning to open up between the OTM calls in each month, but the shape has changed considerably. Note how the OTM puts were still priced higher than the ATM options in both expiries back in early Jul and how that is clearly not the case right now. Very cool.

Let's turn to the Options Tab, for completeness.



We can see the monthly vols across the top are priced to 67.78%, 63.35% and 59.54%, respectively for Sep, Oct and Dec. Looking more closely, we can see the vol diff between the Sep and Oct OTM calls, getting as large as 17 vol points in the Sep/Oct 25 call spread (while the ATM vol diff is just five vol points).

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Pre-Market/Post Market: 8-29-12

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Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-28-12

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Netflix (NFLX) - Depressed Vol; Does Vol Trend Make Sense into Sep & Oct?


NFLX is trading $62.90, up 0.8% with IV30™; down 2.5%. The LIVEVOL® Pro Summary is below.



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Netflix, Inc. (Netflix) is an Internet subscription service streaming television shows and movies. The Company’s subscribers can watch unlimited television shows and movies streamed over the Internet to their televisions, computers and mobile devices, and in the United States, subscribers can also receive digital versatile discs (DVDs) delivered to their homes.

This is a quick vol note in a company that has seen its stock price tumble from as high as $300 (intra-day high) to now in the low 60's in just over a year. Let's start with the Charts Tab (six months), below. The top portion is the stock price, the bottom is the vol (IV30™ - red vs HV20™ - blue vs HV180™ - pink).



On the stock side I note three phenomena:

1. For the two earnings cycles in the last six months, we can see rather abrupt gaps down. Specifically:

4-24-2012: The stock dropped from $101.24 to $87.68 (13.4%) (close-to-close)
7-25-2012: The stock dropped from $80.39 to $60.28 (25%) (close-to-close)

2. The stock was trading over $120 as recently as late March of this year and is down nearly 50% from those levels. The catalysts to the moves down have been earnings (see #1 above).

3. As of late, the stock has found a rather quiet period following the disaster that was the last earnings cycle on 7-25-2012 (earnings were released 7-24-2012 AMC). In fact, the stock tends to have these quiet periods, then abrupt moves (usually down and usually off of earnings).

On the vol side we can see three phenomena as well.  Specifically:

1. The implied is now trading very close to an annual low. The 52 wk range in IV30™ is [45.29%, 93.63%], putting the current level in the 3rd percentile (annual). It's the level of the implied that caught my attention today.

2. The short-term historical realized vol (HV20™) is down to 35.06% and the HV10™ is now down to 29%. In English, while the implied is near an annual low, the very short-term realized vol is even lower. See... a quiet period...

3. The long-term historical realized vol is 68.82%, substantially elevated to both the implied and the short-term historical realized levels.

Let's turn to the Skew Tab to examine the line-by-line and month-to-month vols.



NFLX does tend to have this parabolic skew shape where both the upside and downside are priced to higher vol than the ATM options. This does reflect upside risk (potential) that is higher than a "normal" skew. You can read about option skew here:
Understanding Option Skew -- What it is and Why it Exists .

Finally, let's turn to the Options Tab, for completeness.



Across the top we can see the monthly vols are priced 46.40% (Sep) and 50.29% (Oct). The next earnings release for NFLX should be in late Oct, but after Oct expo. That Dec vol is elevated at ~58% likely due to that next earnings date. An interesting question to ponder is whether the "quiet" period trend for NFLX up until earnings will hold through the months of Sep and Oct -- months which may have elevated systematic risk (regardless of firm specific risk). Whichever way you lean, an interesting trade analysis develops with that depressed vega.

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Pre-Market/Post Market: 8-28-12

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Monday, August 27, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-27-12

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YELP - Elevated Vol Nears All-time High as Stock Drops


YELP is trading $19.21, down 1.4% with IV30™; up 2.8%. The LIVEVOL® Pro Summary is below.



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This is a vol note on a stock that is hitting all-time highs in the implied as the stock is dipping. Let's start with the Charts Tab (six months) is below. The top portion is the stock price, the bottom is the vol (IV30™ - red vs HV20™ - blue vs HV180™ - pink).



On the stock side we can see how far the equity price has declined of late. On 8-8-2012, this stock closed at $26.46 and as of this writing the stock is down more than 27% from that level. Earnings were announced on 8-1-212 (AMC) and the next day the stock did rally up from $18.82 to $22 or ~17% on that news. The 52 wk range in stock price is [$14.10, $31.96].

Turning to the vol side we can see how elevated the implied got into earnings, then how it came in after (normal behavior). What's interesting (and caught my attention) is the vol rise of late. On 8-15-2012 the IV30™ closed at 70.47% (and the stock closed at $22.11). As of this writing the implied is over 114%, or a rather awesome 62% rise in less than two weeks. The 52 wk range in IV30™ is [50.42%, 115.96%], putting the current level right on that annual high.

Let's turn to the Skew Tab to examine the month-to-month and line-by-line vols for the front two expiries.



While there is some bumpiness to the curves, the shape is basically normal. I do note how elevated the front month is to the back. The option market reflects elevated risk in the near-term (to Aug expiry) relative to the intermediate term (out to Sep expiry). This is a bit odd in that Aug vol does have a tendency to sort of fall asleep as late Summer can be a slow month, while early Fall (Sep) does tend to show higher vol. As a proxy, the VIX Aug options reflect ~18.30%, while Sep options reflect 22.85%.

Finally, let's turn to the Options Tab, for completeness.



We can see across the top that the monthly vols are priced to 117.23% and 99.44% respectively for Sep and Oct expiries. Something is a foot for YELP...

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Pre-Market/Post Market: 8-27-12

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Friday, August 24, 2012

Post Market Report: 8-24-12

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Pre-Market/Post Market: 8-24-12

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