via JPM... Is the US retail impulse weakening? Over the past few days we started seeing the first signs that this previously strong US retail impulse is subsiding. 1/x
The most high frequency proxy of this US retail impulse is the one based on small traders equity option flows, i.e. option customers with less than 10 contracts... 2/x
After rising to record highs in the last week of January, this call option buying metric appeared to have stabilized at close to record high levels during to the first two weeks of February.... 3/x
However, Monday’s release by OCC revealed that this metric declined sharply last week raising concerns that this option flow metric is experiencing significant downshifting. 4/4 @jam_croissant@HayekAndKeynes@SqueezeMetrics@FadingRallies
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via MorgStan... There are a lot of similarities with this week’s unwind in crowded positions and that of January, but also a lot of differences. First the differences, which on net make this event worse than in January: 1/x
Today all of the pain is on the long side... This is concerning because long-side pain is always more challenging to deal with than a short squeeze, given most funds run long. 2/x
Both ends of the barbell trade are underperforming – NDX and RTY are going lower versus SPX. Given running a secular growth + cyclical reopening barbell has been increasingly the trend over the last few months, this underperformance is painful. 3/x