Max pain // Cboe delayed data · as of Aug 5, 11:13 PM ET

GS max pain

Spot (delayed)$1,060
Max pain · Fri, Aug 21$1,000-5.7% vs spot
Expected move (ATM straddle)±$60.83±5.7% by Fri, Aug 21
Put/Call OI0.9726K puts / 27K calls
Call wall$1,100largest call OI
Put wall$1,050largest put OI
IV3033.9%30-day implied vol
Net GEX+$17.6Mper 1% move · flip ≈ $1,115

Event risk before this expiration: Jobs report Fri, Aug 7 · CPI release Wed, Aug 12 — macro releases historically overwhelm pinning effects; max pain reads weakest in event weeks.

Max pain levels

ExpiryMax painvs spotDTE
Fri, Aug 7$1,030-2.9%2d
Fri, Aug 14$1,050-1.0%9d
Fri, Aug 21$1,000-5.7%16d
Fri, Aug 28$1,055-0.5%23d
Fri, Sep 4$1,035-2.4%30d
Fri, Sep 11$1,055-0.5%37d
Fri, Sep 18$955-9.9%44d
Fri, Oct 16$1,000-5.7%72d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

spot1000560738916109412721450$966M$0
■ put-side pain■ call-side painTotal payout option writers would owe at each settle price (both sides, all open interest, ×100 shares) — low settles hurt put writers, high settles hurt call writers. The minimum — 1000 — is the max pain price.

Open interest by strike · Fri, Aug 21

spot1000560840920975103011404K4K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)GS open contracts per strike for Fri, Aug 21.

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, Aug 21

spot100056084092097510301140167167
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Today's traded contracts per strike (delayed).

Implied volatility by strike · Fri, Aug 21

spot560738916109412721450125%32%
— call IV— put IVATM ≈ 34.2% · Quoted strikes only; illiquid wings with junk fits are dropped, not smoothed.

Gamma exposure by strike · Fri, Aug 21

spotflip 1115760860945100010651200+$15.2M$15.2M
Net dealer gamma per strike, in dollars per 1% move, assuming the standard convention (dealers long calls, short puts) — an assumption, not an observation. Above the amber flip level hedging tends to dampen moves; below it, to amplify them.

Greeks by strike · Fri, Aug 21

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
0.77-0.7310100.00390.68-0.75-0.23
0.75-0.7710150.00410.71-0.78-0.26
0.72-0.8010200.00430.74-0.81-0.28
0.70-0.8310250.00450.77-0.84-0.30
0.68-0.8610300.00470.80-0.87-0.32
0.63-0.9110400.00490.84-0.92-0.37
0.58-0.9410500.00510.87-0.95-0.42
0.53-0.9510600.00520.88-0.96-0.48
0.50-0.9610650.00520.89-0.97-0.50
0.45-0.9510750.00520.88-0.96-0.55
0.42-0.9410800.00510.87-0.95-0.58
0.33-0.8611000.00470.81-0.87-0.68
0.27-0.7811150.00430.73-0.79-0.74
0.24-0.7511200.00410.70-0.76-0.76
0.18-0.6211400.00340.58-0.63-0.83

Quoted contract greeks from the delayed feed (not modeled here); the highlighted row is nearest to spot. Showing 15 strikes around the money — all 60 are in the CSV. Δ per $1 of underlying · Θ per day · vega per IV point.

Stacked — layer the expirations

spot54080092010051082.511554K0
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

spot4507709059901100132012K12K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 250K call contracts, 218K 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.

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: GS workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk