Close-up Of Snow-Dusted Zugspitze Massif Peaks In The Wetterstein Mountains In Tyrol

A snow-dusted peak, leading to a valley of who the heck knows (Michael Nguyen/Getty Images)

Options markets signal “optimism peaks” for Magnificent 7 stocks

“The number of stocks in the S&P top 100 trading with inverted call skew (a sign of extremely bullish sentiment where the OTM call trades at a higher volatility than the ATM call) has surged to a high of ~20% (vs. historical average of just 3%),” per Cboe.

Luke Kawa

11/3/25 11:21AM

Of all the many ways to measure investor sentiment — surveys, futures positioning, and more — one of my favorites might be through the answer to this question: how much are traders willing to pay for options that offer upside in stocks compared to those that protect against downside?

Cboe’s head of derivatives market intelligence, Mandy Xu, noted that about three weeks ago, skew in the S&P 500 spiked amid renewed market jitters over a fraying of America’s trade relationship with China. Skew, in this case, tracks the ratio between the implied volatility of puts versus calls, a proxy for the relative demand for bearish versus bullish options. Now, that’s completely flipped on its head, for the index in general and for its largest components in particular.

She wrote (emphasis added):

“The decline in skew over the past few weeks has been notable: SPX 1M skew (25-delta ratio) has fallen from the 99th percentile high three weeks ago to a 6th percentile low early last week, before steepening at the end of last week following the Fed meeting to now the 48th percentile. Longer-dated skew screens even cheaper, with SPX 6M skew now in the 16th percentile low. The flattening in index skew is consistent with the pickup in bullish sentiment we’ve observed in single stock options. The number of stocks in the S&P top 100 trading with inverted call skew (a sign of extremely bullish sentiment where the OTM call trades at a higher volatility than the ATM call) has surged to a high of ~20% (vs. historical average of just 3%). While the metric is not yet at the extremes we saw in 2021 or late last year, it certainly signals a high level of investor optimism going into year-end.”

Zooming in on a similar measure, Goldman Sachs analyst Cullen Morgan shows that sentiment is particularly ebullient for the so-called Magnificent 7: the cohort of Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla.

In an October 31 note, he wrote:

“Coming into earnings this week, put-call skew in the Mag7 complex inverted for the first time since December of last year (i.e. implied volatility of calls traded over puts). This phenomenon has only happened a handful of times. The move implies investors are overwhelmingly positioned for continued upside. Historically, such low skew readings have tended to coincide with short-term consolidation or reversals as optimism peaks.”

Goldman on put-call skew inversion — Source: GS Research, GS FICC & Equities, Bloomberg as of Oct 31

Matt Phillips, Tasha Matsumoto

Stocks sink as the war escalates; Russell 2000 enters correction territory

The S&P 500 closed lower for the fourth consecutive week as the US deployed more troops and warships.

Alaskan Brown Bears (Ursus horribilis) fighting in a river

Matt Phillips5h

Exxon and Chevron surge as oil rises; gold keeps getting clobbered

Exxon and Chevron jumped again on Friday, the two largest positive contributors to the S&P 500 as of midday, even as the broader market remained mired in the red.

The two giant US energy companies are also on track to notch another in a series of new all-time highs as well Friday, and for obvious reasons.

Energy continues to be the bright spot for the S&P 500 since the start of the Iran war. (It is the only gainer of the 11 separate sectors that compose the blue-chip index, rising more than 7% in March.)

But energy’s gain has come with pain elsewhere. Since rising gas prices work mechanically as a tax on other forms of consumer spending, staples stocks have been hit hard, with the sector down more than 6% this month alone. Meanwhile, the inflationary pressure pushing the Fed away from further rate cuts continues to hit precious metals and miners. SPDR Gold Shares ETF and iShares Silver Trust futures both fell further on Friday; they’re down roughly 10% and 15% for the week, respectively, and producers like Newmont and Freeport-McMoRan also continue to drop.

David Crowther6h

Investors have been drawn to software stocks since the Iran war started — Figma has been an exception

Since the Iran war started, risky assets have been in the crosshairs. Stocks have sold off as oil prices spiked, the odds of rate cuts later this year have been slashed, and even the usual safe havens like gold and silver have been unreliable ports in the growing storm.

One port of refuge, however, has been in software stocks. As noted by my colleague Matt Phillips recently, a number of high-profile software names — the same ones that some pundits doomed to obsolescence because of AI just a few short weeks ago — have held up well. Design company Figma, however, has not been one of those names.

Figma’s stock has dropped 19% since the close of trading on February 27, while the iShares Expanded Tech Software ETF has gained 2%.

Though still notching very respectable top-line growth, with sales up 40% last year, Figma is far from the “cash cow” stage of its life — perhaps why it’s been hit harder than peers such as Adobe, Workday, or Salesforce. Indeed, on a GAAP basis, Wall Street still expects the company to lose $477 million this year, as heavy stock-based compensation weighs on its profitability.

Figma’s pain was then compounded when Google announced a major update to Stitch on Wednesday — a product described as “an AI-native software design canvas that allows anyone to create, iterate and collaborate on high-fidelity UI from natural language.”

Debate is still raging on Reddit and other social media platforms as to whether Stitch, or other vibe-coding platforms and tools, will meaningfully eat into Figma’s core business. One user said that it “offers very little to experienced designers. It removes the tools Figma offers and delegates everything to AI. Figma at least has all the capabilities plus AI for people who want to use AI.” Another — complaining about the newly prohibitive cost of credits in Figma’s own AI-powered tool, Figma Make — was more bearish on Figma’s usefulness, saying that the number of credits the designer would need to use would cost $16,000 under Figma’s new pricing model.

For now, investors aren’t giving Figma the benefit of the doubt, with the stock down 12% in the last two days alone.

Matt Phillips7h

Chip-smuggling charges against Super Micro cofounder boost rival server maker Dell

Dell is up in early Friday trading after rival Super Micro Computer plunged on news that one of its cofounders had been charged by US prosecutors with allegedly illegally smuggling AI chips to China.

Dell, Super Micro, and HP Enterprise are all what’s known as “system makers”: they sell ready-to-roll rack servers, storage systems, and the other hardware that’s needed to fill all those data centers that hyperscalers are so desperate to build.

Dell and Super Micro both sell systems built around Nvidia GPUs, so the US government’s allegations against key personnel tied to Super Micro could jeopardize the company’s access to Nvidia products and give Dell a leg up in that crucial AI-related server market.

Super Micro dives after cofounder charged with allegedly smuggling AI chips to China

Matt Phillips9h

Planet Labs soars after earnings beat and positive analyst commentary

Planet Labs held on to huge post-earnings gains early Friday as analysts that cover the retail favorite issued largely upbeat reviews of its Q4 report released Thursday after the bell. Here’s some of their commentary on the satellite services company:

Wedbush (rating: “outperform,” price target: $40): PL is seeing major tailwinds in the geopolitical space, continuing to drive mission-critical demand globally. Total RPO came in at ~ $852 million (up ~106% y/y) with backlog of ~$900+ million (up ~79% y/y) highlighted by 9- figure deal with the Swedish Armed Forces which was the third 9-figure Satellite Services contract over the past 12 months totaling $500+ million across Sweden, Japan, and Germany, with management noting on the call that both deal count and average size in the satellite services pipeline has grown appreciably.”

Citizens (rating: “market perform,” price target: N/A): “In our view, Planet’s solid performance in the quarter and the significant revenue acceleration implied for FY27 reflect the company’s success in shifting to a satellite services model and leaning (heavily) into the needs of Defense & Intelligence segment customers. We believe this is the correct area of focus (for management and investors) and view some of the flashier announcements around Project Suncatcher (space-based data centers), or more recently, AI enabling a renaissance within Planet’s Civil and Commercial businesses as somewhat of a distraction.”

Clear Street (rating: “buy,” price target: $34): “While F2026 revenue grew 26%, non-defense verticals have lagged. Management signaled an inflection point, with use cases such as maritime awareness data poised towards gaining traction across finance, insurance, and supply chain, supported by a more tailored approach with LLM partnerships like Anthropic (private).”

There’s a reason the stock has built a strong retail following: it had already surged more than 500% over the past year, even before jumping another 20% after last night’s earnings.