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Marcellus Osceola Jr., Holly Tiger, Mike Tyson, and Rick Ross place their first bet (John Parra/Getty Images)

Traders will soon have 3x as many opportunities to punt short-term options on the biggest US stocks

And that means 3x the opportunities for gamma/pin risk in the largest US stocks (and the biggest bitcoin ETF).

Fantastic news for people who like trading short-term options with not much time to expiry:

The Nasdaq has received approval to list Monday and Wednesday options for a group of single stocks and one ETF, in addition to its normal weekly Friday expiries.

The initial group of companies that will enjoy more listing includes the BATMMAAN group (or the Magnificent 7 plus Broadcom, if you prefer) along with the iShares Bitcoin Trust. Most of these qualifying securities will begin to have their Monday and Wednesday options listed on January 26.

From a market structure perspective, more expiries can mean more gamma, or the potential for more violent intraday volatility in a stock around certain levels. Or, most likely in practice, the exact opposite.

To turn to the Greeks: gamma measures how much more or less sensitive an options price will become to changes in the prices of the underlying asset. Gamma is highest for options that are close to or at their strike prices and increases the closer an options contract gets to expiry. Ergo, more frequent expiries equal more opportunities for potential gamma squeezes.

Imagine you (and half the world) is long Nvidia call options expiring today with a strike price of $180. That’s going to create the potential for much more volatility if news pushes the stock decisively above that level than if there weren’t a lot of open interest at that strike expiring today.

Conversely, it can (and probably will) actually lead to more pinning — the tendency for stocks to close around strikes where there’s a ton of open interest, levels where, loosely speaking, options sellers win and options buyers lose.

If I’ve learned anything over the past few years, it’s that Say’s Law — the idea that supply creates it own demand — actually holds when it comes to speculative activities, whether that’s short-term options, sports betting, or prediction markets.

Or, more precisely, supply and regulatory loosening enable latent demand to be realized.

For instance, the addition of zero days to expiry index options to Robinhood’s trading platform last year contributed significantly to the growth in volumes for these instruments.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions.)

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United Airlines rallies after Q4 earnings and Q1 profit guidance top estimates

Shares of United Airlines are rising after the bell on Tuesday, following the release of the carrier’s fourth-quarter and full-year earnings report.

United posted adjusted earnings per share of $3.10 in Q4, above the $2.92 per share expected by Wall Street analysts polled by Bloomberg. Sales of $15.4 billion were roughly in line with the consensus estimate.

The airline also:

Forecast full-year earnings per share between $12 and $14, bracketing Wall Street’s call for $13.04. For Q1, management sees EPS between $1.00 and $1.50, the midpoint of which is above the $1.16 expected by Wall Street.
Booked $13.93 billion in passenger revenue on the quarter, up nearly 5% year over year.

“Strong revenue momentum has continued into 2026,” according the company’s press release. “The week ending January 4th was the highest flown revenue week in United history, and the week ending January 11th was the highest ticketing week and the highest week for business sales in United history.”

UAL’s premium ticket revenue climbed 9% compared to a 7% increase in basic economy revenue. The “K-shaped economy” has become increasingly visible in travel trends at major US airlines. Last week, Delta’s revenue from first-class and business passengers eclipsed its main cabin revenue for the first time.

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POET Technologies nears multiyear high on strong call demand after flagship product wins award

POET Technologies is surging on heavy volumes and high call demand after announcing that it won a Product Innovation Award at China’s Infostone awards.

The honor went to the optical communications company’s flagship product, the Teralight, which uses light to move data between chips.

“Unveiled less than a year ago at the 2025 OFC Conference, POET Teralight has driven commercial interest in the Company because of its highly integrated design and complete optical system-on-chip architecture that simplifies module development,” per the press release.

This award may be the latest excuse to buy the stock, which is up over 40% year to date.

Call activity is elevated, with nearly 37,000 having changed hands as of 10:55 a.m. ET, well above the 20-day average of 28,030 for a full session. Shares are approaching their multi-year high of $9.41.

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Intel bucks market slump after Wall Street upgrades

While the market slid early Tuesday, Intel soared as the American chipmaker received a pair of upgrades:

HSBC analysts lifted their rating on the stock to “hold” — essentially “neutral” — from “reduce,” Wall Street-speak for “sell.” The analysts nearly doubled their price target for the shares to $50 from $26. (That’s essentially where the stock is currently trading.)
Seaport Global also boosted its rating to “buy” from “neutral,” with a $65 price target.

Improving demand for CPUs — Intel’s bread-and-butter processors — is behind HSBC’s newfound enthusiasm for the shares. Analysts at the bank wrote:

“We had been cautious on Intel mainly given overall uncertainty on customer pipeline and execution headwinds in their foundry business while the core business was also lacking visibility on growth drivers. However, we now turn more positive as we expect the traditional servers (DCAI) to get back on a growth trajectory. We expect there is an overwhelmingly increasing demand for server CPUs driven by rising agentic AI... While the stock has moved up 19% YTD (vs S&P 500 up 1%), we believe there is further [data center and AI group] upside still not fully priced in. Hence, we upgrade Intel from Reduce to Hold.”

HSBC seems to be slightly understating the extent of the gains for the stock so far in 2026, as its share price has risen nearly 30% since the end of last year. But the gains are even more impressive if you date them to the partial nationalization of the ailing American chip giant, which was announced on August 22. Almost a month later, Nvidia announced a strategic partnership with the company, giving it a massive shot in the arm. Since then the stock is up more than 90%.