Triple-Witching Day: Are Options Markets Being Manipulated?

ETJ

ETJ

Triple-Witching Day: Are Options Markets Being Manipulated?
Mark Hulbert - Barron's
Be on your guard against market manipulation on Friday, Sept. 15, which is a triple-witching day.
"Triple witching" refers to those four days each year—the third Fridays of March, June, September, and December—in which stock options, stock index futures, and stock index options all expire. It's widely known that such days often experience unusually heavy volume and volatility. But what has been less well-known is that prices on these days display a puzzling and costly pattern, according to a just-completed academic study. Retail options traders are the victims.
/jlne.ws/3sPAdS9
 
ETJ said:
Triple-Witching Day: Are Options Markets Being Manipulated?
Mark Hulbert - Barron's
Be on your guard against market manipulation on Friday, Sept. 15, which is a triple-witching day.
"Triple witching" refers to those four days each year—the third Fridays of March, June, September, and December—in which stock options, stock index futures, and stock index options all expire. It's widely known that such days often experience unusually heavy volume and volatility. But what has been less well-known is that prices on these days display a puzzling and costly pattern, according to a just-completed academic study. Retail options traders are the victims.
/jlne.ws/3sPAdS9
More...

As a legacy of forward contracts, they also fall close to the seasonal solstices and equinoxes +/- a week.
 
Related at the same site:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/t...s-set-to-expire-friday-a61dcbd9?mod=home-page
"
Triple witching day: analysts brace for volatility as $3.4 trillion in stock options set to expire Friday
Last Updated: Sept. 15, 2023 at 7:17 a.m. ET. First Published: Sept. 14, 2023 at 3:15 p.m. ET

Friday could be a historic day for the U.S. options market, according to a derivatives strategist at Goldman Sachs Group.

As trading in U.S. stock options, especially extremely short-dated zero day to expiration options, continues to boom, contracts attached to $3.4 trillion worth of U.S. stocks, exchange-traded funds and equity indexes like the S&P 500 are set to expire Friday during September’s expiry for monthly and quarterly options, according to the latest figures from John Marshall, head of derivatives research at the investment bank that were accurate as of midweek.

That is on track to be the largest September expiry on record, raising the possibility that markets could finish the week on a volatile note.

In a breakdown of notional value due to expire, Goldman showed that nearly $2 trillion of S&P 500 index options are due to expire Friday morning, while single-stock options with a notional value of $555 billion will expire later in the day, along with a host of other contracts.

[...]
"
 
Not j
ETJ said:
Triple-Witching Day: Are Options Markets Being Manipulated?
Mark Hulbert - Barron's
Be on your guard against market manipulation on Friday, Sept. 15, which is a triple-witching day.
"Triple witching" refers to those four days each year—the third Fridays of March, June, September, and December—in which stock options, stock index futures, and stock index options all expire. It's widely known that such days often experience unusually heavy volume and volatility. But what has been less well-known is that prices on these days display a puzzling and costly pattern, according to a just-completed academic study. Retail options traders are the victims.
/jlne.ws/3sPAdS9
More...
Not just TWD. It seems like in general the markets are being manipulated. The popular consensus is that the markets are highly overvalued, and I think there's a valid argument for that. Thus, IMO valuations should have continued to go down last October instead of reversing. This bear market rally we've been experiencing ever since isn't based on fundamentals. So, one can only surmise that the market's being rigged by the Fed.
 
Bodrey said:
Not j

Not just TWD. It seems like in general the markets are being manipulated. The popular consensus is that the markets are highly overvalued, and I think there's a valid argument for that. Thus, IMO valuations should have continued to go down last October instead of reversing. This bear market rally we've been experiencing ever since isn't based on fundamentals. So, one can only surmise that the market's being rigged by the Fed.
More...

You believe in a lot of bs that is going to absolutely kill any chance of success trading longer term. You need to unlearn this shit as soon as possible and unfortunately a lot of people on here will enforce this kind of thinking not discourage it ( eg see KCalhoun ).
 
OK... so, what specific BS do I need to unlearn? Do you have a system for identifying high probability trades that win consistently that you're willing to share with me in a PT?
 
Bodrey said:
Not j

Not just TWD. It seems like in general the markets are being manipulated. The popular consensus is that the markets are highly overvalued, and I think there's a valid argument for that. Thus, IMO valuations should have continued to go down last October instead of reversing. This bear market rally we've been experiencing ever since isn't based on fundamentals. So, one can only surmise that the market's being rigged by the Fed.
More...

Well, if it's being manipulated it certainly isn't being done through index futures volume, I can assure you of that. Yesterday, the big-bad evil TWD had relatively no volume impact at all on them. In fact, volume was historically lower than usual by my estimation.

Normally when you see such a huge down day like that, the volumes are elevated. But the NQ didn't even hit 700K last I saw ~2 hours before closing.
 
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