This is especially true in the last hour of trading on quad witching day, which is usually referred to as the quad witching hour. While the first assumption would be that this added trading volume will lead to added market volatility, that’s not always the case. Contract expirations generally do not lead to over-dramatic price action in the underlying stocks. Some would argue that options trading, in general, doesn’t typically affect the stock price, except for extraordinary situations like a gamma squeeze. There tends to be a lot of frenzy in the days leading up to a quadruple witching day. But it’s unclear whether the actual witching leads to increased market gains.
Since quadruple witching doesn’t seem to have a direct impact on market volatility, it doesn’t necessarily affect the prices of the underlying stocks. Since these are derivatives and mostly futures contracts, quad witching doesn’t add volatility to the stock market like some would assume. This activity happens against the normal backdrop of trading activity, including trading on shares rather than derivatives.
There are certain dates throughout the calendar year that hold more significance than others. For example, every month has an OPEX or Options Expiration day which is generally the third Friday of each month. From https://www.forex-world.net/ 2001 until 2018 full-time independent trader and investor, trading both prop (Series 7) and retail. In the chart below the average of the last 50 observations indicate that the hypothesis is indeed correct.
Typically, increased trading volume is a good thing for traders since it translates to increased liquidity and is often accompanied by volatility. Pinning a strike imposes pin risk for options traders, where they become uncertain whether or not options with strike prices near the market price will finish in the money and be exercised. The next quadruple witching day in 2022 is scheduled for Friday, June 17th, for the close of the second quarter of the year. Following June 17th is September 16th for the third quarter and December 16th for the fourth quarter later this year.
In contrast with stock options, index options are cash-settled. Now that you know what quadruple witchings are all about, let’s take a look at the four classes of contracts that can expire on these dates. An additional factor is quarterly index rebalancing, also known as reconstitution, taking place on the “witching” day. That means portfolio managers tracking rebalancing indexes including those from S&P Dow Jones in the U.S. and FTSE in the U.K.
There are most likely many myths and wrong perceptions about the quadruple witching day. Stock index options are similar to single stock options, except that they represent an entire stock index such as the S&P 500 instead of an individual stock. Have you ever seen a stock exhibiting normal trading behavior and then all of a sudden the stock price drastically drops out of nowhere? This type of price action could be related to the announcement of a shelf offering or the execution of an “at-the-market” sale from…
This is in March, June, September, and December – four times per year. Quadruple witching happens four times per year during the options expiration week. The options expiration week is when the options expire https://www.dowjonesanalysis.com/ and this happens on the third Friday every month. Friday, March 15, 2019, was the first quadruple witching day of 2019. As with any other witching day, there was hectic activity in the preceding week.
The first quad witching date of 2022 has already passed and it took place on Friday, March 18th. Quadruple witching days occur on the third Friday of the third month in each quarter. This means that the quad witching takes place on the third Friday in the months of March, June, September, and December.
Stock futures are contracts that obligate the owner to buy or sell a specific stock at a predetermined price on a preset date in the future. When a futures contract expires, the holder is obligated to take ownership of the shares and the contract issuer is obligated to provide the shares. Stock futures contracts expire on the third Friday of every third month. Single stock futures are obligations to take delivery of shares of the underlying stock at the contract’s expiration date at a specified price.
As with stock options, index options don’t confer an ownership interest. Monthly stock options contracts expire on the third Friday of every month. While these events can create higher trading volume, the effect of the options market on the underlying stock is limited. Although it hasn’t been proven that quad witching regularly causes market volatility, if you’re spooked, it’s easy to just avoid trading options or stocks on these four days each year. Supposedly, the expiration of all these contracts creates volatility and high volume due to repositioning.
There are 117 trades, the average loss per trade is 0.1% and the win rate is 51%. For comparison, the average overnight gain on any random day is about 0.05%. We have never tested the volatility on such a https://www.investorynews.com/ day, except for stocks. Typical was that the NQ and ES futures made some moves in the last two minutes before the opening bell after the imbalances were distributed (that happens at 0928 New York time).
Traders must execute or sell their options on or before that date. Profitable (in-the-money) options are automatically executed at expiration. Contract owners don’t have to take delivery on the expiration date.
According to a Reuters report, trading volume on U.S. market exchanges on that day was “10.8 billion shares, compared to the 7.5 billion average… over the last 20 trading days.” A higher trading volume can mean there is a higher than normal number of buyers or sellers. If a stock has more of either of these, then the price can be volatile.
