Thursday’s Vital Data: United States Steel Corporation (X), Twitter Inc (TWTR) and Netflix, Inc. (NFLX)

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U.S. stock futures are treading water this morning ahead of another deluge of corporate earnings reports, led by the likes of Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) and Dow Chemical Co (NYSE:DOW). Additionally, Wall Street is digesting details from President Donald Trump’s tax plan, which were unveiled last night. Analysts say the plan is light on details and does not provide information on funding for the tax cuts.

Thursday’s Vital Data: United States Steel Corporation (X), Twitter Inc (TWTR) and Netflix, Inc. (NFLX)Heading into the open, futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average are up 0.05%, with S&P 500 futures down 0.02% and Nasdaq-100 futures ticking 0.03% higher.

On the options front, volume remained well above average on Wednesday, with about 16.1 million calls and 13.1 million puts changing hands. On the CBOE, the single-session equity put/call volume ratio stagnated at 0.61, as did the 10-day moving average, which held at 0.70.

Driving Wednesday’s most active options, shares of United States Steel Corporation (NYSE:X) plummeted nearly 27% yesterday as the company offered up an abysmal first-quarter report. Meanwhile, Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) finally showed signs of growth, sending options traders scrambling for calls. Finally, Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) is consolidating after breaking out to fresh all-time highs following a licensing deal with China’s Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU).

Wednesday’s Vital Options Data: United States Steel Corporation (X), Twitter Inc. (TWTR) and Netflix, Inc. (NFLX)

United States Steel Corporation (X)

On Wednesday, shares in U.S. Steel Corp. suffered their biggest single-day loss since the company went public roughly 26 years ago.

Investors were none too pleased with the company’s reported first-quarter loss of 83 cents per share, as analysts were predicting a profit of 35 cents per share. Revenue came in at $2.73 billion, also falling short of Wall Street’s predictions for sales of $2.95 billion. Furthermore, U.S. Steel halved its full-year 2017 earnings outlook.

X options traders were also shocked. Volume on the day came in at a near-term high of 717,000 contracts, with calls actually eking out 54% of the day’s take. Following yesterday’s plunge, X stock is now trading well below all major call strikes in the May series, with the nearest meaningful accumulation totaling about 2,200 contracts at the $23 strike. Meanwhile, heavy put accumulations still lie below X stock in the May series, with 3,100 at the $22 strike and 2,500 at the further out of the money $18 strike.

Twitter Inc (TWTR)

After several quarters of drought, Twitter finally offered up a solid quarterly report yesterday, and options traders are cashing in. For the quarter, Twitter said it earned 11 cents per share on revenue of $548 million, blowing past the Street’s estimates for a penny per share on sales of $511.9 million.

User growth was also better than expected, with Twitter adding 9 million — 7 million more than expected — on the quarter to hit 328 million users. However, the report was tempered by second-quarter guidance of $95 million to $115 million, which fell well shy of estimates for $141 million.

TWTR options traders flooded the stock with calls following the report. Total volume swelled to more than 554,000 contracts, with calls snapping up 75% of the day’s take. Many of these calls may have been the work of profit taking, and if you got into the May $15/$16 bull call spread I suggested on April 20, be sure to set stop losses or be ready to close out if TWTR trades north of $16 — if you didn’t get out at the peak early yesterday.

Netflix, Inc. (NFLX)

NFLX shares surged to fresh all-time highs on Tuesday following news that the company had broken through into the Chinese market. Netflix signed a licensing deal with iQIYI, a streaming platform owned by China-based Baidu. iQIYI currently supports about 500 million monthly subscribers, providing Netflix with a considerable viewer base in country. Terms of the content provided are not yet clear, but Netflix’s original content is rumored to be in the mix, which is another huge win for the company.

But NFLX options traders expressed caution during Wednesday’s trading, with calls only making up 56% of the more than 277,000 contracts traded on the stock.

Furthermore, the $150 strike could be a major point of contention for NFLX going forward, as there are more than 7,000 call contracts currently open at this strike in the May series, with about 2,200 puts thrown into the mix as well.

As of this writing, Joseph Hargett did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.


Article printed from InvestorPlace Media, https://investorplace.com/2017/04/thursdays-vital-data-united-states-steel-corporation-x-twitter-inc-twtr-netflix-inc-nflx/.

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