Volume Spike Investor

We are seeing highly unusual volume trading in Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NYSE: BRL) in late after-hours trading tonight.  The culprit is a report (possible rumor) that Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (NASDAQ: TEVA) is in talks to buy the US-generic drug maker.
Barr Labs closed up 1.6% today at $46.82, but its market cap at that price [...]

MFA Mortgage Investments Inc. (NYSE: MFA) rarely if ever makes the most active options list. Today it defied that statement.  The stock actually rose much less than other financials as its gain to $6.35 was a mere 2.1%.  We saw 50,253 contracts of the AUG08 $7.50 CALLS trade today.  The prior open interest was a [...]

Unitedhealth Group, Inc. (NYSE: UNH) saw what looks like major PUT OPTION activity today during market hours, but the reality is that this looks more like an options roll-out trade ahead of Friday’s expiration.  Below are the volumes for each and you can see the open interest:
Contract/Strike           Volume     OpInt
JUL08 $25.00 PUTS      66,375    68,457
AUG08 $25.00 PUTS    [...]

This morning we issued a pre-market down-volume and downward price alert for Research in Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) in early trading with the note that shares could be more insulated than in prior sessions. Shares have actually recovered from lows of $102.81 intra-day and are all the way back up to positive by 0.5% [...]

Magellan Midstream Holdings, L.P. (NYSE: MGG) rarely makes the most active list of options trades. Back on June 17 we noticed what appeared to be an options roll-out trade on roughly 20,000 contracts from June to July in the $22.50 PUTS. We are now seeing this trade roll-out all the way to September [...]

Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC) is seeing a price and volume surge after the company beat earnings this morning. Its shares had been thrown out like the proverbial baby with the bathwater over recent trading weeks as the entire sector has been battered. Wells Fargo posted solid earnings and actually raised its [...]

We are starting to see a surge in the volume and downward pricing action in shares of Research In Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) this morning.  The Blackberry maker saw its shares downgraded this morning as shares were cut to “Underperform” from Hold at Needham.
Shares were indicated down 1% before 8:00 AM but at 8:59 AM [...]