Max pain // Cboe delayed data · as of Nov 9, 6:11 PM ET

AP max pain

Spot (delayed)$6
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EVIDENCE — filed/published fact
SourceCboe delayed quote, underlying price
Fieldcurrent_price
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:11 PM ET
HowAbout 15 minutes delayed.
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Max pain · Fri, Nov 20Not showntoo thin to read
Expected move (ATM straddle)±$1.28
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INFERENCE — derived by arithmetic
SourceAt-the-money straddle midpoint
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:11 PM ET
HowCall midpoint plus put midpoint at the strike nearest spot for the 2026-11-20 expiration = 1.28 USD, 21.3% of 6.00 spot.
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±21.3% by Fri, Nov 20
Put/Call OI1.68
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INFERENCE — derived by arithmetic
SourcePut open interest divided by call open interest
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:11 PM ET
How42 put contracts / 25 call contracts = 1.68 for the 2026-11-20 expiration. Open interest is published once a day, before the open, so it describes the previous session.
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42 puts / 25 calls
IV30115.7%
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EVIDENCE — filed/published fact
SourceCboe 30-day implied volatility for the underlying
Fieldiv30
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:11 PM ET
HowAs Cboe publishes it; not computed by us.
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30-day implied vol

Too thin to read: 67 open contracts across 4 strikes. Max pain, walls and gamma print from 100 contracts across 5 strikes.

Event risk before this expiration: CPI release Tue, Nov 10 — macro releases historically overwhelm pinning effects; max pain reads weakest in event weeks.

Max pain levels

ExpiryMax painvs spotDTE
Fri, Nov 20too thin11d
Fri, Dec 18$7.5+25.0%39d
Fri, Mar 19$7.5+25.0%130d
Thu, Jun 17too thin220d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

Too thin to read: 67 open contracts across 4 strikes. Max pain, walls and gamma print from 100 contracts across 5 strikes.

Open interest by strike · Fri, Nov 20

spot57.51012.53939
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)AP open contracts per strike for Fri, Nov 20.

Open-interest change: building vs unwinding

Needs two observed snapshot days for this expiration; the comparison appears automatically once the next weekday snapshot lands. We diff real observations only; nothing is estimated.

Volume by strike · Fri, Nov 20

Implied volatility by strike · Fri, Nov 20

spot578101113384%97%
— call IV— put IVATM ≈ 166.1% · Quoted strikes only; illiquid wings with junk fits are dropped, not smoothed.

Greeks by strike · Fri, Nov 20

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
0.80-0.0250.18770.00-0.02-0.20
0.27-0.037.50.18660.00-0.03-0.73
0.16-0.03100.09580.00-0.03-0.85
0.12-0.0312.50.06440.00-0.03-0.89

Quoted contract greeks from the delayed feed (not modeled here); the highlighted row is nearest to spot. Δ per $1 of underlying · Θ per day · vega per IV point.

Stacked — layer the expirations

spot2.57.512.517.54960
Call open interest per strike, stacked across the checked expirations — each color is one expiry. Strikes are pruned to the liquid center of each chain.

All expirations combined — total open interest

spot2.57.512.517.522.5496496
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 2K call contracts, 89 put contracts open.

Reading this honestly

Max pain is arithmetic, not prophecy: the settle price that would minimize what option writers pay out at expiration, computed from open interest alone. Prices sometimes gravitate toward heavy strikes into expiry — dealer hedging is a real flow — but the evidence that max pain predicts settlement better than chance is mixed, and we are not going to pretend otherwise. Use it as a map of where positioning is stacked, next to the fundamentals and the earnings calendar, not as a target.

Max pain, walls and gamma print only when an expiration holds at least 100 open contracts across 5 strikes, and max pain also needs to stay within 5% of spot when its single heaviest strike is removed. Below that the expiration reads as thin rather than printing a level one trade could move.

Data: Cboe delayed public feed (~15 minutes), refreshed here about every 15 minutes. Open interest itself updates once daily, before the open. Educational information, not investment advice.

Keep going: AP workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · iron condor and credit spread calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk