Options Positioning

Methodology

Data. Alpha Vantage's HISTORICAL_PUT_CALL_RATIO returns, for a given stock, the ratio of put volume to call volume across its entire option chain on the latest trading session (as well as a breakdown by individual expiration, not used here). A ratio above 1.0 means more puts traded than calls that day; below 1.0, more calls than puts. This page sweeps that endpoint across the full S&P 500, one call per company. A related endpoint, HISTORICAL_VOLUME_OPEN_INTEREST_RATIO, was considered too, but returns a separate ratio for every individual contract (thousands of rows per company, no aggregate figure) — useful for options-desk-level analysis, disproportionate to what a cross-sectional positioning page needs, so it's left out.

Why median, not mean. Put/call ratio is right-skewed: a handful of thinly-traded option chains can print a ratio of 3, 4, or higher on a single day's low volume, while the bulk of liquid names sit in a fairly narrow band. The market and sector summary figures use the median for that reason; the page also shows the mean alongside it so the gap between the two is visible rather than hidden.

The momentum test. Pearson and Spearman correlation between each company's put/call ratio and its trailing 3-month return relative to SPY, the same two-method check as every regression on this site. A positive, significant relationship would mean bearish options positioning is concentrated in names that have already underperformed — consistent with put buying as portfolio insurance or momentum-following hedging on recent losers, not necessarily a forward-looking signal. A weak or flat relationship would mean options positioning isn't simply tracking where the stock has already been.

What this page doesn't claim. A single day's put/call ratio is noisy and reflects hedging flow as much as directional conviction — a high ratio on a stock ahead of a binary event (an earnings date, an FDA decision) can mean protective hedging on an otherwise-bullish position, not bearishness. This page reports positioning as it stood on the date below; it does not claim the ratio predicts forward returns, and the market-median history above is too short right now to test that even if it did. A later run, once enough weekly snapshots have accumulated, could test whether an elevated market-wide put/call ratio precedes weaker index-level returns — not attempted here.

Sector and company name come from Sector Beeswarm's own weekly metadata; 3-month relative return comes from Relative Strength Leaders/Laggards's latest snapshot. This page's own sweep is a one-time snapshot as of the date below, not a recurring refresh, though its market-median history accumulates across whatever runs do happen.