Options Flow & Block Activity — Week of May 4–8, 2026
Five-session retrospective: $14.91B in total options premium across 62,238 flow rows. Eight names anchored every session. Plain-English overlay applied throughout.
How to read this Weekly Pulse →
Sections: KPI strip → 3-question framing → 5-day premium sparkbar → top 15 weekly options flow → MPI scorecard → regime card → sector heatmap (12 sectors x 5 sessions) → accumulation table → distribution table → persistent-names tracker → notable data points → observations ledger → methodology footnote.
The KPIs: total weekly options premium, calls vs puts ratio, block-trade prints, persistent-names count, Market Pulse Index Friday close, broad-market index context.
What this is: a five-session aggregation of where premium concentrated and which names anchored every day. Not a forecast. Not a recommendation.
Three QuestionsWhat · Why · What’s next
What happened?
Five sessions of consistent call buying, anchored by the same handful of tickers. Semis (MU, NVDA, AMD, INTC), Tesla, and weekly S&P 500 index calls drove the tape every single day. The week’s 2.85-to-1 call/put ratio is well above a typical week, and the persistence — eight names appearing in the top 15 every session — is more notable than any single day’s spike.
Why does it matter?
Persistence beats magnitude in flow analysis. A one-day premium spike can be a single fund repositioning. Five days of the same names showing up tells you a wider set of institutions is converging on similar exposure. The semi cluster is especially noteworthy: MU, NVDA, AMD, and INTC don’t typically all run hot at the same time — when they do, it tends to reflect a sector-wide thesis rather than name-specific catalysts. The IWM put bid running 3.8-to-1 on the week is the cleanest counter-signal: small-cap protection accumulated even as mega-cap calls stacked. That divergence is the market’s quiet hedge.
What to watch next?
Three things. First, whether the eight persistent names hold their leaderboard slots into next week or whether the rotation broadens — broadening would strengthen the bullish read; narrowing would weaken it. Second, whether the IWM and GLD put bids fade or intensify. Third, whether SPXW weekly call dominance continues at the $600M-plus daily pace or whether premium starts shifting to longer-dated SPX. A shift to longer expiries would suggest institutions are extending duration on their bullish bets — a quietly more confident signal.
Daily Premium — 5-Day Sparkbar$M total premium
Wednesday’s $5.18B session was the week’s standout — driven by a $2.35B single-day SPXW print that pulled the daily call/put ratio to 4.92×. Thursday cooled to a more balanced 1.67×; Friday re-accelerated to 3.69×. Block-print counts climbed every single session — 4,112 → 4,207 → 5,785 → 5,050 → 6,049 — institutional block activity strengthened through the week.
Top 15 — Weekly Options Flowby 5-day total premium
Detail table archived
Descriptive flow narrative only. Detailed strike-level and ticker-level data tables have been archived. Methodology overview at aztmm.com/methodology.
Market Pulse Index — Subindex ScorecardFriday close
Regime CardWeek-end close
The regime label held Bull across all five sessions with confidence stable in the 82–87% band — never wavering even on Thursday’s softer 1.67× reading. SPY closed up +1.4% on the week, VIX held at 17.19 with the futures term structure in mild contango, and the persistent eight-name leaderboard provided the cleanest weekly conviction signal observed in recent months.
Sector Heatmap — Call Share by Day12 sectors × 5 sessions
Detail table archived
Descriptive flow narrative only. Detailed strike-level and ticker-level data tables have been archived. Methodology overview at aztmm.com/methodology.
Information Technology call share climbed every session this week, ending at 78% Friday — a steady accumulation pattern. The Index/ETF bucket spiked to 89% Wednesday on the SPXW dominance, then re-spiked to 83% Friday. Industrials was the week’s volatility name, swinging from 76% calls Monday to 32% Thursday and back to 78% Friday. Real Estate also saw extremes (26% Monday, 92% Tuesday) but on tiny absolute volume.
Accumulation Table — Weekly Call-Heavy Names$50M+ premium
Detail table archived
Descriptive flow narrative only. Detailed strike-level and ticker-level data tables have been archived. Methodology overview at aztmm.com/methodology.
Distribution Table — Weekly Put-Heavy NamesPut-led across the week
Detail table archived
Descriptive flow narrative only. Detailed strike-level and ticker-level data tables have been archived. Methodology overview at aztmm.com/methodology.
Persistent Names Tracker — All 5 Sessions8 tickers in top 15 every day
Detail table archived
Descriptive flow narrative only. Detailed strike-level and ticker-level data tables have been archived. Methodology overview at aztmm.com/methodology.
Notable Data Points16 items
- MU $1.12B weekly total premium (#1 individual equity): $751M calls vs $374M puts — 2.0-to-1 weekly call lean. MU appeared in the top 15 in all 5 sessions, with Tuesday’s $219M call session the week’s single-name peak.
- NVDA $790M weekly total premium: $685M calls vs $105M puts, a 6.5-to-1 weekly ratio — the cleanest single-name call dominance among top-20 weekly names with meaningful notional. Five consecutive sessions in the top 15.
- AMD $444M weekly total premium: $309M calls vs $135M puts, 2.3-to-1 call lean. Five consecutive sessions in the top 15. Notably more balanced than NVDA — suggesting some hedging activity paired with the call buying.
- INTC $318M weekly total premium: $232M calls vs $87M puts, 2.7-to-1 call lean. Five consecutive sessions in the top 15. The steadiest of the four semi anchors — never spiked to a session high but never dropped out of the top 15.
- TSLA $669M weekly total premium: $486M calls vs $182M puts, 2.7-to-1 call lean. Five consecutive sessions in the top 15. Dominant Consumer Discretionary name every session and Friday’s alert leader (24 alerts).
- SPXW weekly index calls $3.34B vs puts $39M (85-to-1 ratio): The single most lopsided positioning in the entire data set. Wednesday’s $2.35B SPXW print produced nearly half the week’s call total in one session.
- MSFT $217M weekly total premium: $156M calls vs $61M puts, 2.5-to-1 call lean. Notable for joining the top-tier semi names in a sustained call bid — broad mega-cap tech leadership rather than narrow semi concentration.
- AAPL $201M weekly total premium: $120M calls vs $81M puts, 1.5-to-1 call lean — the most balanced of the mega-cap tech names this week. Quietly accumulated rather than aggressively bid.
- GOOGL $228M weekly total premium: $199M calls vs $30M puts, 6.6-to-1 call lean. Sustained mega-cap call dominance across five sessions.
- LITE $158M weekly total premium (puts-led): $44M calls vs $114M puts, 2.6-to-1 weekly put lean — the cleanest single-name bearish positioning of the week. The lone Information Technology name that consistently leaned bearish.
- IWM small-cap weekly premium $160M (puts-led): $34M calls vs $127M puts, 3.8-to-1 weekly put lean. The week’s most consistent concentration-risk hedge — small-cap protection accumulated every session even as mega-cap calls stacked.
- GLD gold ETF weekly premium $129M (puts-led): $51M calls vs $78M puts, 1.5-to-1 weekly put lean. Notable as a counter-signal to the broad equity bullishness — institutional positioning fading the gold trade across the week.
- SPY ETF weekly premium $603M (puts-led): $269M calls vs $334M puts, 1.2-to-1 weekly put lean. Lighter put bias than IWM but persistent — SPY functioned as the week’s primary broad-index protection layer alongside SPXW call dominance.
- Block-trade prints 25,203 across the week: ~40% of all 62,238 flow rows were block-type. Block-print counts climbed every single session — 4,112 → 4,207 → 5,785 → 5,050 → 6,049. Building, not peaking.
- Wednesday May 6 was the week’s outlier session: 4.92-to-1 call/put ratio, $4.30B in call premium — nearly 50% of the week’s total in one day. Driven primarily by the $2.35B SPXW print. Without Wednesday, the week’s call/put ratio compresses to roughly 1.9-to-1 — still bullish but materially less extreme.
- Friday’s alert feed closed bullish: 90 of 121 alerts (74%) flagged bullish patterns. The repeater bullish flow pattern alone fired 39 times — sustained institutional repeat buying rather than one-off prints. Clean week-end confirmation of the directional read.
Observations LedgerWeekly reads
- The persistent eight-name leaderboard is the week’s defining signal. MU, NVDA, AMD, INTC, TSLA, QQQ, SPY, SPX all appeared in the top 15 every session. Five-day persistence at this level is rare and tends to reflect cross-fund convergence rather than single-actor positioning.
- Information Technology call share climbed monotonically. 61% (Mon) → 69% → 71% → 67% → 78% (Fri). Steady accumulation pattern rather than spike-and-fade. Five names — MU, NVDA, AMD, INTC, MSFT — combined for $2.89B in weekly premium with calls running roughly 4-to-1.
- Index/ETF unsectored bucket carried 46% of weekly notional. $6.80B total premium with 79% call share. SPXW dominance on the call side paired with SPY put-side activity — institutions used different index products for different directional bets.
- The hedging pattern is consistent every session. Short-dated SPXW calls and individual semi calls on one side; IWM, GLD, and SPY puts on the other. Same playbook every day — paying up for upside on leaders, paying for downside on breadth.
- Wednesday’s $2.35B SPXW print defined the directional tape. Without that single session, the weekly call/put ratio compresses from 2.85× to roughly 1.9× — still bullish, but materially less extreme. One day did half the work.
- Block-print counts strengthened through the week. Every session printed more blocks than the prior — institutional block activity was building, not peaking. Friday’s 6,049 was the weekly high.
- LITE was the lone IT name running consistently bearish. Three of five sessions put-led, weekly puts 2.6× calls. Worth tracking into next week as the cleanest single-name bearish thesis on the tape.
- IWM small-cap put bid was the week’s cleanest counter-signal. 3.8-to-1 weekly put lean while mega-caps stacked calls. Concentration-risk hedge accumulated even as the leaders ran hot.
- Health Care drew the most balanced flow. Lower-volume sector with the week’s most balanced call/put profile — health care continues to draw less directional flow.
- Industrials swung the widest. 76% Mon → 32% Thu → 78% Fri. A put-heavy Thursday session that fully reversed the next day. Real Estate also saw extremes (26% → 92%) but on tiny absolute volume.
Methodology FootnoteTwo honest caveats
Method note
Flow and dark-pool data sourced from our analytical pipeline. MPI score and regime classifier are our internal composite; daily synthesis is AI-assisted from those inputs.
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