Rare arbitrage profit from call vs put prices: explain why not being taken?

Quote from spindr0:

If I may, I'd like to ask one of the adults here, what is LocateStock? I trade with IB and often carry a lot of short stock, at least a lot for me. Is LocateStock anything that I could, would, should use? Thx
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No idea; I've never seen it or come across it before this conversation.

I can imagine it plays a role for institutional investors (and maybe larger retail) who're putting on a short position and need certainty about borrowing rates + availability. (IB's "daily" indicative rates + hourly availability makes it pretty hard to use, doesn't it? My rule of thumb is to stay away from anything where I even have to worry about it.)

I wish OneChicago was more relevant.
 
Quote from Option Trader:

easily buy the Feb 1 calls for $.10 (= median between bid & ask
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Ummmm, that's the definition of "ask" - the price at which you can easily buy (at least some) contracts. If it were easy to buy at the "median" (?) then that would be the "ask".
 
with options of such a low price, you will always have to go across the spread to get anything like the previous poster pointed out.
 
Quote from Rodney King:

Ummmm, that's the definition of "ask" - the price at which you can easily buy (at least some) contracts. If it were easy to buy at the "median" (?) then that would be the "ask".
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Did we really just have a 9 page thread only to find out that Option Trader doesn't get the concept of a bid/ask gap? Seriously?
 
Quote from The Big D:

Did we really just have a 9 page thread only to find out that Option Trader doesn't get the concept of a bid/ask gap? Seriously?
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He's now confident and ready to trade on a simulator :)
 
Quote from The Big D:

Did we really just have a 9 page thread only to find out that Option Trader doesn't get the concept of a bid/ask
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Apparently so. He seems to believe he can trade illiquid options at the bid/ask midpoint (or "median" as he miscalls it).
 
This might be more interesting if the options sold in penny increments and had a narrow spread, but as it stands now you could get killed by the spread.

If you bought the option combo when CTIC was .60 and sold it when CTIC was .80, how much could you have made?
 
I think I now have the answer to my question:

In as much as there are bears who would pay huge carry costs to short the stock, some would rather buy the puts; however, that is VERY expensive, hence they sell the calls as well of the same strike price, (and even offer a synthetic long stock position to others at a reduced cost). The net result is they benefit from the downside for a cheaper price than shorting the stock. Hence, they are currently offering e.g. to buy the June 1 calls at $.20 (or $.25), and bidding to buy them at $.60 (or $.55), meaning they are offering their counterparty to get the upside for $.60 to $.70 instead of the current market price of $.737.
 
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