Burger giant Shake Shack Inc (NYSE:SHAK) is down 3% at $57.69, after Longbow Research downgraded the stock to "neutral" from "buy," saying the equity's gains since November are "modest" relative to the company's fourth-quarter same-store sales beat. This is offsetting a price-target hike to $60 from $54 at Wedbush, though the new target is in line with last night's close.

On the charts Shake Shack stock has been moving higher this year, up 27% since its Dec. 31 close, with support stemming from its rising 30-day moving average. Plus, the $57 level recently emerged as a floor, and roughly coincides with the security's 20-day trendline.

Amid light absolute volume, data from the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX) shows SHAK's 10-day put/call volume ratio at 2.05, which registers in the 88th annual percentile. This suggests puts have been bought to open over calls at a faster-than-usual clip.

This skepticism is seen elsewhere, too. Short interest rose 4.8% during the past two reporting periods, and now accounts for a healthy 19.6% of the stock's total available float. At SHAK's average pace of trading, it would take over nine days for shorts to cover their bearish bets.

Markets are closed at the end of this week for Good Friday, as many get ready to celebrate Easter over the weekend. So, it’s a good time to see how stocks have tended to perform around the holiday. Also, I found an interesting stat on what Easter means for the rest of the year, and finally, I’ll list the best and worst stocks in the week following Easter.

Stocks Performance in Days Surrounding Easter

The table below looks at how the S&P 500 Index (SPX) has performed in the days around Easter over the past 30 years. The day before Easter is a good day for stocks, but it is sandwiched between two underperforming days. Two days before the holiday (today) the index averages a loss of 0.21% and positive just 40% of the time. The day before Easter has been bullish over the past 30 years, averaging a gain of 0.42% and positive 63% of the time. Compare that to a typical day for the index of a gain of 0.04% and positive 54% of the time.

The day after Easter has tended to give back some of those pre-Easter gains. Over the past 30 years, the Monday after Easter has averaged a loss of 0.14% and positive only 47% of the time. Historically, it has been wise to avoid stock exposure over the weekend if you can.

Rest of the Year for Stocks After Easter

I thought the data below was interesting. It suggests that the pre-Easter return in a year is a precursor for what to expect the rest of the year. In the past 30 years, there have been five times when the S&P 500 was positive by double-digits through Easter. The index was positive for the rest of the year every time, averaging a gain of 12.5%. When the S&P 500 has been positive by less than 10%, then stocks were still positive an impressive 86% of the time the rest of the year, averaging a return of 10.5%. When the index has been negative through Easter, the rest of the year averages further losses of 1.9%, with less than half of the returns positive. With the S&P 500 positive year-to-date by well over 10%, hopefully this tendency continues.

Best Stocks for After Easter

Why would certain stocks tend to outperform or underperform in the week after Easter? I really can’t think of a reason that makes sense other than randomness, but I ran the numbers anyway. Looking at S&P 500 stocks over the past 10 years, the first table below shows the stocks that have done the best in the week after Easter. The second table shows stocks that have performed the worst after Easter.

 

One of today's most notable headlines from Wall Street came out of BofA-Merrill Lynch, which initiated coverage on marijuana stocks Aurora Cannabis Inc (NYSE:ACB) and Canopy Growth Corp (NYSE:CGC) with "buy" ratings. Aside from the bullishness of the note, it's also noteworthy because so few Wall Street firms have yet to weigh in either way on the pot industry. For example, only three analysts are covering ACB at the moment, and CGC has just eight brokerages in coverage.

But going back to Bank of America's note, the firm's analysts believe Aurora and Canopy Growth are well positioned to serve the global marijuana market. Aurora, the note said, can benefit from a low-cost business model, while Canopy has shown the ability in Canada to build scale, suggesting it can excel in new areas moving forward.

ACB shares are set to open the day up more than 3%, with BofA setting an $11 price target. The stock closed Tuesday at $8.88, and appears to be in consolidation mode after a recent rejection near the $10 mark. However, the equity could find technical support from the 50-day moving average, which sits right near the site of last month's bull gap.

CGC, meanwhile, received a $52 price target, and is trading up almost 4% in pre-market action, after recently finding support from the 200-day moving average. Canopy Growth is already up 55% in 2019, yet short interest continues to climb, putting four days' worth of buying power into these bears' hands, based on average daily trading volumes. As such, a short-squeeze is something to pay attention to with CGC.

Roku Inc (NASDAQ:ROKU) stock is down 6.2% to trade at $59.81 today, after Citigroup downgraded the streaming name to "sell" from "neutral" on competition concerns. The stock is fresh off its second weekly loss of 2019, and has now racked up four downgrades in the past month. Despite the recent struggles, ROKU call options have been flying off the shelves lately. 

In fact, the equity showed up on Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White's list of stocks that have attracted the highest total weekly options volume during the past 10 days, with names highlighted in yellow new to the list. Per the chart below, 113,771 ROKU calls were exchanged over this two-week time frame, as opposed to 92,449 puts.

Today however, the options activity is more balanced. Roughly 33,000 calls have crossed the tape, the same for puts -- with total options volume double the average intraday amount. Most active are the weekly 4/12 50- and 60-strike puts, but there's also new positions being opened at the weekly 4/12 60-strike call.

Whether it's calls or puts, Roku sports relatively inexpensive short-term option premiums right now. The stock's Schaeffer's Volatility Index (SVI) of 56% is higher than just 12% of all other readings from the past year, suggesting ROKU's near-term options are pricing in relatively low volatility expectations at the moment.

Meanwhile, Roku stock's recent pullback could have bullish implications, if history is any guide. Specifically, ROKU closed Friday's session within one standard deviation of its 40-day moving average. There have been four other times the security has pulled back to support at this moving average after a lengthy stretch above it, according to data from Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White, and one month later, Roku was up an average 8.3%.

Apple (AAPL) looked on the verge of a 10-day winning streak today before falling early afternoon and ultimately closing down on the day. That got me curious about stock winning streaks, but looking only at AAPL leaves a small sample size. I could see these situations either way: Maybe it’s a good momentum play, so go long a stock during a winning streak, or maybe the tendency is mean-reversion, so go short. This week I’m looking at how S&P 500 Index (SPX) stocks have fared after winning streaks.

Stocks After Winning Streaks

For the analysis below, I looked at current S&P 500 stocks going back to 2010. Then I looked at the stock’s next day return based on how many days in a row the stock had been up. Once the streak got past 10 days, I grouped the stocks together as 11+ days.

The average next-day return for a stock based on its winning streak has an unmistakable trend. Stocks down one day (zero-day winning streak) average a 0.08% return the next day. The average daily return trends down from there averaging a loss of 0.06% once you get to 11 or more straight days positive. Based on this, stocks look more likely to mean-revert the longer the winning streak.

This chart shows how often the stock was positive based on the winning streak. Stocks are most likely to be positive after a down day. They’re significantly more likely to be down after 11+ winning days. In between, however, it kind of chops around the 50% level with a big spike, for whatever reason, around eight days (most likely randomness).

Here’s another way I looked at it. Below shows how often a stock, based on its winning streak, beat the median S&P 500 stock on that specific day. There’s that strange pop around eight days again, before falling hard past 10 days.

WCG and TWTR the Lone Survivors

After the down day today for AAPL, it leaves only two stocks in the S&P 500 with a winning streak of more than five days. Wellcare Health Plans (WCG) and Twitter (TWTR) have winning streaks of 10 trading days and nine, respectively. Based on the data above, there’s potential for some mean reversion in both names.

Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) has enjoyed a series of higher highs and lows since its October bottom near $112, riding technical support atop the 80-day moving average to trade at $141.70. However, new data suggests CAT stock could due for some short-term turbulence, especially with earnings set to hit next Wednesday, April 24.

Specifically, historical returns from Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White tells us the 320-day moving average should be worrisome for those bullish on the blue-chip industrial name. You can see on the chart below how clearly this trendline has switched from support to resistance. In fact, the prior three run-ups to this moving average have produced an average one-month loss of 7.2% for the shares.

Traders may also be concerned about the upcoming earnings release for CAT, considering how the last year's worth of reports have turned out. Last quarter, Caterpillar shares fell 9.1% the day after reporting, which followed one-day post-earnings losses of 7.6%, 2%, and 6.2% over the previous three quarters.

Those wanting to take the opposite view on the equity could point out the huge build-up of call open interest at the soon-to-expire April 145 call. Clearing out this overhead options open interest could make it easier for the security to make its way up the charts.

Bullish or bearish, it may not be too late to make a speculative pre-earnings bet on CAT. For instance, the options market right now isn't pricing in unusually high volatility expectations, expecting a 5.2% swing the for the day after earnings, which is right in line with the average 5.5% move from the past two years for the stock. What's more, Caterpillar's 30-day at-the-money implied volatility of 28.8% ranks in the middling 50th annual percentile. So while near-term contracts aren't attracting what could be seen as "cheap" premiums, they also aren't seeing the sharp rise in implied volatility we often see with roughly a week left before earnings.

 

The U.S. stock market is higher today, thanks to a dovish Fed and well-received Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) earnings. Among other stocks making notable moves are chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD), "Battlefield V" creator Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:EA), and streaming name Roku Inc (NASDAQ:ROKU). Here's a quick look at what's moving the shares of AMD, EA, and ROKU.

AMD Stock Seems Ripe for Bull Notes

Advanced Micro Devices stock has shot up 2.7% to trade at $28.08, after a Wired report indicated AMD chips are "at the heart of" Sony's (SNE) PlayStation 5. This positive price action is just more of the same for a security that's up 52% so far in 2019. And while the shares have pulled back from their April 3 year-to-date (YTD) high of $29.95, they have found a foothold atop their rising 20-day moving average.

A round of overdue bull notes could keep the wind at AMD stock's back. While half of the 20 covering analysts continue to maintain a "hold" or "strong sell" rating on the outperformer, the average 12-month price target of $25.29 is a discount to current trading levels.

EA Stock Hit By News of an Origin Bug

Buzz about the latest PlayStation iteration and reports of a potential security flaw are weighing on Electronic Arts today. More specifically, EA stock is down 4% at $93.93, after TechCrunch reported on a bug in the company's Origin online gaming platform that left users vulnerable to hackers. The issue has already been fixed.

EA stock has been charting a series of lower highs since hitting its YTD peak of $108.80 on Feb. 15. However, the video game stock remains up 19.1% on the year, and is finding support at its 80-day moving average. Several options traders are likely hoping for a big bounce from here. The June 110 call is home to peak open interest on EA, and data from the major options exchanges confirms buy-to-open activity here.

Analyst: Disney+ Could Be Big Driver for Roku

Needham reiterated its bullish outlook on Roku, with analyst Laura Martin maintaining her "buy" rating and $85 price target, and calling the stock a top pick for 2019. Plus, Martin said the launch of Walt Disney's (DIS) Disney+ streaming service this fall could be the "next $1 billion upside driver" for Roku.

It's been a tough month for the stock, down 10.5% so far. However, the selling appears to have stalled near ROKU's 60-day moving average, and the shares are still boasting an 88% YTD lead, last seen trading up 2% at $57.74.

Short sellers have been hitting the bricks amid this longer-term surge, with short interest dropping 40% between the mid-January and late-March reporting periods. ROKU is still heavily shorted, though, considering the 8.7 million shares still held by bears represents 11.4% of the stock's available float.

Shoemaker Skechers USA Inc (NYSE:SKX) is slated to report first-quarter earnings before the market opens, Thursday, April 18. The security has been moving higher in recent weeks, and was last seen back above the $34 mark. Another notable trendline the shares have utilized is the 320-day moving average, which has been support since mid-February. At last check, SKX is up 0.8% at $35.10 in today's trading, and from a broader standpoint has added 53% year-to-date.

Looking at Skechers' earnings history, the California-based company's stock has closed higher the day after reporting in five of its past eight earnings, including a 15.2% surge last report, and an incredible 41.4% jump in October. Over the past two years, the shares have swung an average of 16.2% the day after earnings, regardless of direction. This time around, the options market is pricing in a higher-than-usual 19.9% swing for Thursday's trading. 

On the options front, data from the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX) shows a 10-day put/call volume ratio of 1.40, in the 87th annual percentile. In other terms, puts have been purchased over calls at a faster-than-usual clip. During this time frame, the May 34 and 35 puts have been most active, meaning put buyers expect the stock to stay at or below its current price point until options expiration on Friday, May 17.

Lastly, short interest has increased 15.8% on SKX during the past two reporting periods, and now accounts for 7.6% of the stock's total available float. At the equity's average pace of daily trading, it would take shorts more than four days to buy back their bearish bets.

Many weed stocks are higher today, after sector leader Canopy Growth's (CGC) CEO reportedly projected revenue of $744 million this year. However, one cannabis name sitting out today's uptrend is Village Farms International Inc (NASDAQ:VFF), down 14.4% to trade at $10.84, after a scathing report from notorious short seller Citron Research, which called on the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to investigate the company. Against this backdrop, VFF put options are trading at an annual-high clip.

Citron also set a price target of $1 for VFF shares, and said Village Farms "has used investors’ enthusiasm for cannabis to create shady joint ventures with unrealistic projections." In response to the note, VFF's usually quiet options pits have come to life with a bearish tilt.

More specifically, nearly 18,000 VFF put options have changed hands today -- 24 times the expected intraday amount and more than four times its former annual high of 4,646 puts traded in a single session. Leading the charge is the April 12.50 put, but not far behind are the April 11 and 10 puts, with new positions being opened at all three. Buyers of these puts expect Village Farms shares to sink below the strikes through the close on Thursday, April 18, when the options expire.. 

This runs in accord with the options trend seen in recent weeks. At the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), VFF sports a 10-day put/call volume ratio of 1.98, which indicates long puts have outnumbered long calls by a nearly 2-to-1 ratio. 

On the charts, Village Farms stock tapped a record high of $18.10 on March 22. But in April so far, VFF has finished in the black only four times, and is well on its way to a second-straight weekly loss of 10% or more. Today, the security is pacing for its worst session since January 2018.

Medical device maker Boston Scientific Corporation (NYSE:BSX) is in hot water today, after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ordered the company to halt the sale and distribution of its transvaginal surgical mesh implants, questioning the safety of the product. The FDA is giving Boston Scientific 10 days to formulate a formal plan to withdraw the product from the market.

Looking at the charts, another FDA-related bear gap on March 18 had the stock plummeting from its 14-year high of $41 earlier that month, and downward pressure from its 20-day moving average kept a tight cap on any subsequent rallies. Today, the security is down 4% at $36.27 -- trading beneath its 200-day trendline for the first time since early January. 

The dramatic dip has options bears swarming the equity. Nearly 20,000 put contracts have crossed the tape today -- 21 times the average intraday volume, and a new annual high. The April 37 put is the most popular, and it looks like new positions are being purchased here for a volume-weighted average price of $0.60, making breakeven for the put buyers $36.40 (strike less premium paid). 

An unwinding of optimistic positions could add even more headwinds for the stock. BSX sports a 50-day call/put volume ratio of 10.85 on the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), which ranks in the 88th annual percentile, meaning calls have been bought to open over puts at a quicker-than-usual pace.

Boston Scientific could fall prey to a slew of analysts' downgrades, too. The stock is incredibly popular among the brokerage bunch, currently sporting 17 "strong buy" ratings, and one "hold." Plus, the consensus 12-month target price of $44.35 sits in territory not charted since June 2004. A round of bear notes could pressure the shares even lower.

It's a busy morning on Wall Street, and while most eyes are on a batch of blowout bank earnings, Walt Disney Co (NYSE:DIS) is making plenty of waves, too. The entertainment giant unveiled details for its highly anticipated Disney+ streaming service, which will be available in the U.S. beginning Tuesday, Nov. 12, for $6.99 per month, below rival Netflix's (NFLX) monthly fee and the $7.50 per month Wall Street was expecting.

In reaction, DIS stock has shot up 11.5% to trade at $129.98, fresh off a new record high of $130.26, and pacing for its best day since May 6, 2009, when it jumped 11.8%. This push higher has the shares extending a late-March bounce off its 80-week moving average -- located near $108 -- and on track for a third straight weekly win.

Analysts have already expressed optimism toward both Disney+ and DIS stock. Currently, nine of 10 covering brokerages maintain a "buy" or better rating, with not a single "sell" on the books.

And earlier today, J.P. Morgan Securities resumed coverage with an "overweight" rating and $137 price target -- projecting a "steep initial ramp in subscribers" -- while MoffettNathanson boosted its price target by $7 to $141. The average 12-month price target of $131.22 is a just chip-shot away from Disney's current price, though, suggesting some additional price-target hikes could come down the pike.

DIS options traders are active this morning, too. Already today, 147,000 calls and 42,000 puts have changed hands -- nine times the equity's average daily volume. The April 140 call is most active with more than 12,908 contracts traded, and it looks like new positions are being purchased here for a volume-weighted average price of $0.15. If this is the case, breakeven for the call buyers at the close next Thursday, April 18, is $140.15 (strike plus premium paid).

Streaming giant Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) is getting ready to face some major competition. Entertainment heavyweight Walt Disney (DIS) will enter the on-demand video arena with its new Disney+ service in mid-November. Disney said its family-friendly streaming service will be priced below Netflix's current rates, and it has already received glowing predictions from a slew of analysts. As a result, Netflix is down 3.4% at $355.17 today. 

NFLX stock has recovered from its Dec 26 annual low of $231.23, but recently stalled out in the $380 region -- an area that has stifled the equity's rally attempts since last August. What's more, today's drop has the security set to close below its 50-day moving average for the first time since early January. 

The majority of the brokerage bunch have remained optimistic on the streaming stock, with nearly 75% of analysts giving NFLX a "buy" or better rating, and only one saying it's a "strong sell." The consensus 12-month price target of $381.79, however, is a mere 7.5% premium to current levels. 

Optimism abounds in the options pits, too. In the last 10 days, 1.74 calls have been bought to open for every put on the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX). This ratio sits in the 90th percentile of its annual range, hinting at a much healthier-than-usual appetite for bullish bets over bearish of late.