To The Moon

The July FOMC confirmed no rate hike — that's good. The U.S. stock market really can't handle any more turbulence right now. It may seem "reasonable" that only South Korea and Japan are plummeting, but in reality, it's not reasonable at all.

The 100,000-contract IGV weekly call position $IGV 20260731 88.0 CALL$ was closed before Tuesday's close. Although IGV continued to rise today, for weekly options with less than five days to expiration, the trading discipline is exactly that — open on the day, close on the same day or the next. The noteworthy point is that I initially thought this trade was betting on upside from MSFT and META earnings, and that after closing it would at least roll into a new position. But the block trade was closed outright — suggesting that the earnings from these two companies aren't really worth betting on.

$SK hynix(SKHY)$

Bottom-fishing block trades are starting to appear — but ironically, this strategy only deepens suspicion about the bottom.

A block trade bought the December 18-expiry 140 call $SKHY 20261218 140.0 CALL$ and sold double the quantity of the same-expiry 210 call $SKHY 20261218 210.0 CALL$. The problem with this strategy is that selling double the calls exactly covers the cost of the bought calls — meaning if Hynix fails to rally and continues falling, this strategy doesn't lose money at all.

Such cost-conscious order placement suggests that the bulls are not at all confident in the current price. As for the next downside target, I think 115 or 100 might be too large a jump — another 10–20% drop? But considering that such leaps could be driven by deleveraging, there is some logic to it.

Coincidentally, similar block trades have appeared on DRAM: sell put 40 $DRAM 20260821 40.0 PUT$ , buy call 55 $DRAM 20260821 55.0 CALL$ , sell call 65 $DRAM 20260821 65.0 CALL$ . The sell put and sell call exactly offset the cost of the buy call — if DRAM continues to fall, the trader would be obligated to take assignment at a cost basis of 40.

$Intel(INTC)$

The good news: long-dated call options have been opened with buys $INTC 20270319 100.0 CALL$ $INTC 20270617 100.0 CALL$, with notional value exceeding $10 million.

The bad news: the bottom-finding consolidation below 100 is expected to continue through September. The September-expiry 100 sell call opened 27,000 contracts $INTC 20260918 100.0 CALL$.

This can also be seen from the long call roll activity — a September 18 97.5 long call block $INTC 20260918 97.5 CALL$ was rolled to the November-expiry 70 call $INTC 20261120 70 CALL$ . The downward adjustment in strike price suggests that even filling the earnings gap from last quarter is not off the table.

$SpaceX(SPCX)$

The good news: another large buy order has been opened, and it's short-dated — the August 21-expiry 160 call $SPCX 20260821 160.0 CALL$ opened 15,000 contracts.

However, it's worth reminding that large block trades do not necessarily prove the stock will rise — they only indicate that at this price, someone is willing to take a bullish view. A rebound is not guaranteed, but a stabilization is highly likely.

$NVIDIA(NVDA)$

Bearish positioning on NVIDIA offers some insight into the semiconductor pullback path. On Tuesday, someone opened a position selling the August 7-expiry 180 put $NVDA 20260807 180.0 PUT$ , with 60,000 contracts.

Large block openings always have two sides. The direction of the opening suggests the stock is unlikely to break below 180 next week. But the sheer size of the put open interest also indicates that there is indeed a real probability of breaking below 190 next week.