Volume Spike Investor

We are seeing at least some active options trading in the SPDR Gold Shares (NYSE: GLD) ETF now that oil has broken under the $1100/ounce mark, although the “active volume” here is more continued rolling contracts in appearance than anything fishy.  We never (or almost never) use an ETF analysis as the search for major traditional moves, but in the gold trade this is one of the more common ways for the public to make short-term and long-term bets on the price of gold on the cheap.  Here are are the trading volumes seen in the GLD for JAN-2010 CALLS and PUTS alone with contract volume and the open interest:

CALL$    Volume    OpInt.
107.00    3,640    14,198
108.00    2,432    8,393
109.00    3,391    12,264
110.00    4,049    71,376
111.00    1,516    8,805
112.00    2,748    36,456
113.00    1,648    22,643
114.00    2,057    10,450
115.00    3,097    78,206
116.00    1,219    36,088
117.00    247    27,926
118.00    514    20,428
119.00    457    16,021
120.00    1,252    89,610

PUT$    Volume    OpInt.
100.00    1,237    49,969
101.00    432    5,244
102.00    556    5,955
103.00    1,484    15,776
104.00    1,936    7,895
105.00    1,804    21,651
106.00    2,426    13,442
107.00    2,199    21,180
108.00    2,351    12,407
109.00    1,062    8,279
110.00    1,902    25,711

At 12:50 AM EST the GLD is down 1.7% at $107.04.  As we have noted on multiple occasions, Gold may be dead for the rest of 2009.

JON C. OGG
DECEMBER 21, 2009