Intermediate · Smart money · 6 lessons · about 24 min

Reading the Tape

Most options prints are hedges. Learn the four parts of an alert and how to tell which prints carry conviction.

  1. 01What is options flow?Whenever an options contract trades, the exchange logs the ticker, contract, size, price, and side.
  2. 02Volume vs. open interestVolume is the number of contracts that changed hands today at a given strike. It resets to zero at every open.
  3. 03Sweeps vs. blocksA sweep fills one order across several exchanges at once and pays the ask.
  4. 04Premium & convictionA $50K premium print can be one retail trader. A $2M print on a short-dated, out-of-the-money contract is harder to dismiss.
  5. 05Ordinary hedging printsThe majority of large options flow prints are hedges: funds protecting equity books, institutions managing delta, desks…
  6. 06Scoring an alertScore an alert by working through four checks. Is it a sweep or a block? What is the notional premium? Does today's volume exceed…

Educational content only. Not financial advice.