Max pain // Cboe delayed data · as of Aug 18, 5:48 PM ET

NMAD max pain

Spot (delayed)$4.21
Max pain · Fri, Aug 21$4-5.0% vs spot
Put/Call OI4.6714 puts / 3 calls
Call wall$5largest call OI
Put wall$4largest put OI
IV30130.1%30-day implied vol
Net GEX−$228per 1% move · flip ≈ $4

Max pain levels

ExpiryMax painvs spotDTE
Fri, Aug 21$4-5.0%3d
Fri, Sep 18$3-28.7%31d
Fri, Oct 16$3-28.7%59d
Fri, Jan 15$5+18.8%150d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

spot4334455$1M$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 — 4 — is the max pain price.

Open interest by strike · Fri, Aug 21

spot43451414
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)NMAD 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

spot434511
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Today's traded contracts per strike (delayed).

Greeks by strike · Fri, Aug 21

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
1.000.0030.01570.00-0.00
0.87-0.0140.96010.00-0.01-0.13
0.07-0.0150.29490.00-0.01-0.93

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

spot3451210
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

spot1357198198
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 631 call contracts, 34 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: NMAD workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk