Options with unusual activity highlight puts and calls for stocks that have a high volume-to-open interest ratio. The volume for the underlying equity gives an indication of the strength of the current market direction, while the open interest for the put or call tells you the number of option contracts that are currently "open" (not yet liquidated). When there is a high ratio of underlying volume-to-option open interest, this may be an indication that the options are more "liquid" and that they may be easier to enter or exit a trade.
The page defaults to show today's data, and the "Details" link on each line item will take you to the symbol's Unusual Options Activity page for the expiration date show, for even more in-depth analysis (Premier Members only.) Additional filtering options are available for Premier Members.
Flipcharts are available, and you may choose to view charts for the underlying equity or for the option strike when you open the Flipcharts link. Site Members may also download the data on the page to a .csv file.
Emailed Reports
Site Members may opt-in to receive an End-of-Day Email report of the top Stocks, ETFs, and Index symbols. The End-of-Day Email digests are sent at 5:30 PM CT, Monday through Friday. Barchart Premier Members may also receive the same reports at mid-day (noon CT) for a closer look at daily developments.
The page also has an opt-in to receive Barchart's free email newsletter, The Unusual Options Activity Report. Sent Monday-Friday, this newsletter provides daily analysis on an options contract that is trading at a higher volume relative to the contract's open interest.
What's Included (Today's Report)
For U.S. market, options volume must be greater than 500, options open interest must be greater than 100, last price must be greater than 0.10, and the volume / open interest ratio must be 1.25 or above. For Canadian market, options volume must be greater than 5, options open interest must be greater than 25, last price must be greater than 0.10, and the volume / open interest ratio must be 1.25 or above.
The Strike Price column will also give you additional information, based on the last traded price.
- Bullish - If a call trades at or above the ask/offer, or a put trades at or below the bid, a bullish sentiment would be attached to the trade and the Strike price is displayed in green.
- Bearish - If a call trades at or below the bid or a put trades at or above the ask/offer, a bearish sentiment flag would be attached to the trade and the Strike price is displayed in red.
Options information is delayed a minimum of 15 minutes, and is updated at least once every 15-minutes through-out the day. The page starts updating for the new trading day at approximately 8:55a CT.
Note: 0DTE Friday option expirations are removed from the website at 7:45pm ET each Friday.
Historical Report & Page Filtering
Available only with a Premier Membership, you can view historical pages by choosing a date from the Historical date picker. This will show you the data for the page as of the chosen date. Historical Unusual Options Activity reports start at 05/14/2020. Flipcharts and Download tools are also available for historical reports.
On-page filtering is available for either today's report or any historical date you select. Additional filter options include:
- Symbol - enter one or more symbols (separated by commas)
- Delta - greater than, less than, or between specific values
- Options Type - view either Puts or Calls
- Expiration Type - view either Monthly or Weekly expirations
- Expiration Date - select a specific expiration date, or exclude options expiring after a specific expiration date
Note: If you apply on-page filtering then click the "Screen" icon, the page filters are not carried into the Options Screener.
Screen
Available only with a Premier Membership, you can base an Options Screener off the symbols currently on the page. This lets you add additional filters to further narrow down the list of candidates.
Example:
- Click "Screen" on the page and the Options Screener opens, pulling in the symbols from the Unusual Options Activity page.
Note: ALL the symbols from the page are pulled into the screener. To narrow the list down by expiration date, use the "Days to Expiration" filter in the screener. - Add additional criteria in the Screener, such as "Moneyness", or "Implied Volatility".
- View the results and if you wish, save the Screener to run again at a later date.
- Running a Saved Screener at a later date will always start with a new list of results. Your Saved Screener will always start with the most current set of symbols found on the Unusual Options Activity page before applying your custom filters and displaying new results.
Data Updates
For pages showing Intraday views, we use the current session's data with new price data appear on the page as indicated by a "flash". Stocks: 15 minute delay (Cboe BZX data for U.S. equities is real-time), ET. Volume reflects consolidated markets. Futures and Forex: 10 or 15 minute delay, CT.
The list of symbols included on the page is updated every 10 minutes throughout the trading day. However, new stocks are not automatically added to or re-ranked on the page until the site performs its 10-minute update.
For reference, we include the date and timestamp of when the list was last updated at the top right of the page.
Page Sort
Pages are initially sorted in a specific order (depending on the data presented). You can re-sort the page by clicking on any of the column headings in the table.
Views
Most data tables can be analyzed using "Views." A View simply presents the symbols on the page with a different set of columns. Site members can also display the page using Custom Views.
Each View has a "Links" column on the far right to access a symbol's Quote Overview, Chart, Options Quotes (when available), Barchart Opinion, and Technical Analysis page. Standard Views found throughout the site include:
- Main View: Symbol, Name, Last Price, Change, Percent Change, High, Low, Volume, and Time of Last Trade.
- Technical View: Symbol, Name, Last Price, Today's Opinion, 20-Day Relative Strength, 20-Day Historic Volatility, 20-Day Average Volume, 52-Week High and 52-Week Low.
- Performance View: Symbol, Name, Last Price, Weighted Alpha, YTD Percent Change, 1-Month, 3-Month and 1-Year Percent Change.
- Moving Averages View: Symbol, Name, Last Price, 20-Day Moving Average, % From 20-Day Moving Average, 50-Day Moving Average, % From 50-Day Moving Average, 100-Day Moving Average, % From 100-Day Moving Average, 200-Day Moving Average, % From 200-Day Moving Average.
- Fundamental View: Available only on equity pages, shows Symbol, Name, Market Cap, P/E Ratio (trailing 12 months). Earnings Per Share (trailing 12 months), Net Income, Beta, Annual Dividend, Dividend Yield, and Latest Earnings Date.
Note: For all markets except U.S. equities, fundamental data is not licensed for downloading. Your .csv file will show "N/L" for "not licensed" when downloading from a Canadian, UK, Australian, or European stocks page. - Mini-Chart View: Available for Barchart Plus and Premier Members, this view displays 12 small charts per page for the symbols shown in the data table. You may change the bar type and time frame for the Mini-Charts as you scroll through the page. The default settings for Mini-Charts are found in your Site Preferences, under "Overview Charts".
- Pre-Post Market Data: Available for Barchart Plus and Premier Members, this view will show any pre- or post-market price activity for U.S. equities only.
View Symbol More Data (+)
Unique to Barchart.com, data tables contain an option that allows you to see more data for the symbol without leaving the page. Click the "+" icon in the first column (on the left) to view more data for the selected symbol. Scroll through widgets of the different content available for the symbol. Click on any of the widgets to go to the full page. The "More Data" widgets are also available from the Links column of the right side of the data table.
Flipcharts
Also unique to Barchart, Flipcharts allow you to scroll through all the symbols on the table in a chart view. While viewing Flipcharts, you can apply a custom chart template, further customizing the way you can analyze the symbols. Flipcharts are a free tool available to Site Members.
Note: Flipcharts, unlike the full-page chart or Dashboard, does not stream updated data to the chart.
Download
Download is a free tool available to Site Members. This tool will download a .csv file for the View being displayed. For dynamically-generated tables (such as a Stock or ETF Screener) where you see more than 1000 rows of data, the download will be limited to only the first 1000 records on the table. For other static pages (such as the Russell 3000 Components list) all rows will be downloaded.
Free members are limited to 1 site download per day. Barchart Plus Members have 10 downloads per day, while Barchart Premier Members may download up to 250 .csv files per day.
Note: Due to licensing restrictions, Canadian fundamental data cannot be downloaded from Barchart.com. You will see "N/L" in a downloaded column when this is the case. Fundamental data for US equities is also limited to 15 fields per download request.
Should you require more than 250 downloads per day, please contact Barchart Sales at 866-333-7587 or email solutions@barchart.com for more information or additional options about historical market data.
