Ahead of F8 Conference, Facebook, Inc. (FB) Puts Pick Up

Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) will hold its annual F8 developers conference today and tomorrow, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg kicking off the event with a keynote address at 1 p.m. ET. Ahead of the speech, shares of FB are sitting 0.9% lower at $84.58. As such, put volume has accelerated to nearly double the expected intraday rate.

Weekly options are in high demand, as nine of the 10 most active strikes belong to either the weekly 3/27 or 4/2 series of options. Seeing the most clear-cut buy-to-open activity is the weekly 4/2 70-strike put, as speculators roll the dice on -- or hedge against -- FB breaching the round-number $70 level by next Thursday's close, when the series expires.

That these may be protective puts is a real possibility, considering the stock would need to plummet more than 17% in just over a week for the contract to expire in the money. What's more, Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) yesterday touched a record high of $86.07 -- amid reports the social network may begin hosting news content -- and hasn't traded south of $70 since July. In fact, delta on the put is a tiny negative 0.006, signifying a less than 1% probability the option will be in the money at expiration.