Tesla stock has pivoted sharpy lower since its late December peak
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) is down 1.5% to trade at $288.42 today, succumbing to broad market weakness despite Morgan Stanley reinstating the electric vehicle (EV) stock a "top pick" in U.S. autos.
Since a Dec. 18 record high of $488.54, Tesla stock has taken a 41% haircut, carving out a channel of lower lows. Year-over-year though, the equity remains 42% higher, and the pivot is currently testing its 1,000 day moving average.
TSLA has remained popular among options traders amid the sharp pullback, once more landing on Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White's list of stocks with the highest options volume in the past 10 days. In this period, over 14 million calls and over 12 million puts were exchanged, the second-most active security behind chip powerhouse Nvidia (NVDA). The weekly 2/28 290-call was the most popular, while the February 350 put was a close second.
Options look like a good route, too. TSLA has tended to outperform options traders' volatility expectations over the past year, per its Schaeffer’s Volatility Scorecard (SVS) of 82 out of 100.