ETFC Stock Shifts Higher Despite Analyst Bear Note

Calls have been preferred in the options pits

Emma Duncan

Managing Editor

Feb 26, 2020 at 10:36 AM

ETFC

Just one week off the buyout that led to its best day since 2009, E-Trade Financial Corp (NASDAQ:ETFC) is trading modestly higher, up 0.6% at $48.81, despite receiving a downgrade to "market perform" from "outperform" at Raymond James. Yesterday ETFC marked its third-straight loss on the charts, but remains well above its recently supportive 120-day moving average. Year-to-date, the equity has added 7%.

Heading into today analyst sentiment was mixed. Six covering firms sport a "hold" or "strong sell" rating, while the remaining five carry a "buy" or "strong buy" rating.

Short interest on the finance name fell 12.6% during the most recent reporting period, but still accounts for less than 2% of the stock's total available float. At ETFC's average pace of daily trading, it would take just over one day for shorts to buy back their bearish bets.

Digging a little deeper, a hefty presence of calls is evident in the options pits. This is per E-Trade stock's 10-day call/put volume ratio of 3.74 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX). This ratio ranks in the 81st annual percentile, meaning calls have been purchased over puts at a faster-than-usual clip of late.

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