Max pain // Cboe delayed data · as of Sep 12, 3:44 AM ET

SPX max pain

Spot (delayed)$7,657
Max pain · Mon, Sep 21$7,700+0.6% vs spot
Expected move (ATM straddle)±$112.45±1.5% by Mon, Sep 21
Put/Call OI2.0432K puts / 16K calls
Call wall$7,875largest call OI
Put wall$6,200largest put OI
IV3012.1%30-day implied vol
Net GEX−$440.0Mper 1% move

Event risk before this expiration: FOMC decision Wed, Sep 16 — macro releases historically overwhelm pinning effects; max pain reads weakest in event weeks.

Max pain levels

ExpiryMax painvs spotDTE
Mon, Sep 14$7,675+0.2%2d
Tue, Sep 15$7,675+0.2%3d
Wed, Sep 16$7,675+0.2%4d
Thu, Sep 17$7,675+0.2%5d
Fri, Sep 18$7,500-2.1%6d
Mon, Sep 21$7,700+0.6%9d
Tue, Sep 22$7,680+0.3%10d
Wed, Sep 23$7,675+0.2%11d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

spot7700480054406080672073608000$7.0B$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 — 7700 — is the max pain price.

Open interest by strike · Mon, Sep 21

spot77004800690074007625771078205K5K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)SPX open contracts per strike for Mon, Sep 21.

Open-interest change · 2026-09-102026-09-11

spot480068007400760077007810+529529
Net contracts opened (up, green) or closed (down, red) per strike since the previous snapshot — where the walls are building and where they’re unwinding. Biggest moves: 7635 +529 · 6700 +442 · 7590 +396 · 7700 +262

Volume by strike · Mon, Sep 21

spot7700480069007400762577107820476476
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Today's traded contracts per strike (delayed).

Implied volatility by strike · Mon, Sep 21

spot65006800710074007700800041%6%
— call IV— put IVATM ≈ 11.2% · Quoted strikes only; illiquid wings with junk fits are dropped, not smoothed.

Gamma exposure by strike · Mon, Sep 21

spot670072757510766077407850+$107.4M$107.4M
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 · Mon, Sep 21

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
0.68-2.8875900.00234.57-2.88-0.32
0.66-2.9176000.00244.67-2.91-0.34
0.60-2.9576250.00264.90-2.95-0.40
0.59-2.9576300.00264.93-2.95-0.41
0.57-2.9476350.00274.96-2.94-0.42
0.56-2.9476400.00274.99-2.94-0.44
0.54-2.9176500.00285.03-2.91-0.47
0.51-2.8876600.00285.05-2.88-0.49
0.48-2.8276700.00295.04-2.82-0.52
0.46-2.7976750.00295.03-2.79-0.54
0.42-2.6876900.00294.95-2.68-0.58
0.39-2.5877000.00294.87-2.58-0.61
0.36-2.4777100.00294.75-2.47-0.64
0.33-2.3577200.00284.61-2.35-0.67
0.31-2.2977250.00284.52-2.29-0.69

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

spot5800742575757685776078758K0
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.

Max pain history — nearest expiry vs price

07-2808-0508-1308-2108-3109-0877997316
— max pain (nearest expiry)- - delayed closeOne point per snapshot day since 2026-07-28; unobserved days are gaps, not guesses.

All expirations combined — total open interest

spot600520064007200770083001.3M1.3M
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 10.0M call contracts, 13.9M 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: SPX workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk