Max pain // Cboe delayed data · as of Nov 9, 6:49 PM ET

NIC max pain

Spot (delayed)$175.72
⊙
EVIDENCE — filed/published fact
SourceCboe delayed quote, underlying price
Fieldcurrent_price
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:49 PM ET
HowAbout 15 minutes delayed.
Open the source document →
Max pain · Fri, Nov 20Not showntoo thin to read
Expected move (ATM straddle)±$7.3
⊙
INFERENCE — derived by arithmetic
SourceAt-the-money straddle midpoint
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:49 PM ET
HowCall midpoint plus put midpoint at the strike nearest spot for the 2026-11-20 expiration = 7.30 USD, 4.2% of 175.72 spot.
Open the source document →
±4.2% by Fri, Nov 20
Put/Call OI1.00
⊙
INFERENCE — derived by arithmetic
SourcePut open interest divided by call open interest
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:49 PM ET
How5 put contracts / 5 call contracts = 1.00 for the 2026-11-20 expiration. Open interest is published once a day, before the open, so it describes the previous session.
Open the source document →
5 puts / 5 calls
IV3024.0%
⊙
EVIDENCE — filed/published fact
SourceCboe 30-day implied volatility for the underlying
Fieldiv30
As ofCboe delayed snapshot Nov 9, 6:49 PM ET
HowAs Cboe publishes it; not computed by us.
Open the source document →
30-day implied vol

Too thin to read: 10 open contracts across 5 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 18too thin39d
Fri, Jan 15too thin67d
Fri, Apr 16$165-6.1%158d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

Too thin to read: 10 open contracts across 5 strikes. Max pain, walls and gamma print from 100 contracts across 5 strikes.

Open interest by strike · Fri, Nov 20

spot15016517017518533
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)NIC 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

spot15015716417117818596%31%
— call IV— put IVATM ≈ 29.9% · Quoted strikes only; illiquid wings with junk fits are dropped, not smoothed.

Greeks by strike · Fri, Nov 20

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
0.93-0.121500.00690.04-0.12-0.07
0.82-0.141650.02060.08-0.14-0.17
0.73-0.151700.03250.10-0.15-0.27
0.55-0.151750.04720.12-0.15-0.45
0.21-0.141850.02720.09-0.14-0.79

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

spot13017518519550
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

spot90115140165190230204204
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 422 call contracts, 21 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: NIC workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · iron condor and credit spread calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk