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Luke Kawa

GameStop surges amid bullish options flows

Shares of GameStop are jumping on no news amid elevated options demand that’s got a decidedly bullish tilt.

(Ah, typing that makes me feel younger!)

As of 3 p.m. ET, more than 233,000 call options have changed hands, already 100,000 above their full-day average over the past 20 sessions. And that’s largely one-way traffic: the stock’s put/call ratio is sitting at 0.1, which would be its lowest for a single session since July 21.

Call options that expire this Friday with strike prices of $23.50 and $24 are among the contracts seeing the most activity.

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Amazon introduces one- and three-hour delivery options in hundreds of new towns and cities

Harder, better, stronger, faster... Amazon, not content with completely altering our expectations for how quickly our goods should arrive, is rolling out one- and three-hour deliveries in new cities in the US as it continues to double down on ultrafast delivery.

Per the company’s press release, one-hour delivery is now available in “hundreds of cities and towns” in the US, and three-hour options are offered in “over 2,000 cities and towns,” both available seven days a week though their regular same-day shopping experience. More than 90,000 products, which are typically available in local supercenters, are currently eligible for delivery under the two plans, and Amazon expects to bring the new scheme to more areas in the coming months.

Delivery fees for Prime members are set at $9.99 for one-hour delivery and $4.99 for three hours, though this price range more than doubles to $19.99 and $14.99, respectively, for customers without a Prime membership.

Regarding the new delivery options, Udit Madan, Amazon’s senior vice president of worldwide operations, said: “we’re excited to say that two decades after Prime launched, we’re still innovating to make delivery even faster, while maintaining the same everyday low prices and vast selection Amazon is known for.”

Indeed, since it launched same-day delivery in 2015, Amazon has been experimenting with a number of ultrafast delivery options, including recently piloting a 30-minute delivery service in selected US cities, built on its network of fulfillment centers and on-demand workers. The e-commerce giant’s latest push also comes as competitors like Walmart started to boost its delivery capacity, touting that it can deliver to 95% of American households in less than three hours.

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Oil’s retreat propels US stocks higher

Front-month West Texas Intermediate futures are down more than 4%, while Brent futures are off more than 2% as of 1:25 p.m. ET as traders glom on to some optimistic signs about the flow of oil through the all-important Strait of Hormuz:

  • A Pakistani-owned tanker passed through the strait this weekend while broadcasting its signal, per Reuters, “indicating ‌that some countries are able to negotiate safe passage for their vessels despite the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.”

  • US President Donald Trump said that some “fairly local” countries would soon be helping ships traverse the strait (while having added that other countries are “not enthusiastic” about the prospect of participating).

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF and Invesco QQQ Trust are both up over 1% amid oil’s retreat.

That being said, the news flow is far from universally positive.

Reuters reports that the UAE’s crude output has been cut in half since the Mideast conflict started; Bloomberg says Kuwait’s production has suffered a similar decline.

  • A Pakistani-owned tanker passed through the strait this weekend while broadcasting its signal, per Reuters, “indicating ‌that some countries are able to negotiate safe passage for their vessels despite the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.”

  • US President Donald Trump said that some “fairly local” countries would soon be helping ships traverse the strait (while having added that other countries are “not enthusiastic” about the prospect of participating).

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF and Invesco QQQ Trust are both up over 1% amid oil’s retreat.

That being said, the news flow is far from universally positive.

Reuters reports that the UAE’s crude output has been cut in half since the Mideast conflict started; Bloomberg says Kuwait’s production has suffered a similar decline.

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