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

SPY max pain

Spot (delayed)$764.29
Max pain · Wed, Sep 16$760-0.6% vs spot
Expected move (ATM straddle)±$7.76±1.0% by Wed, Sep 16
Put/Call OI1.1328K puts / 25K calls
Call wall$770largest call OI
Put wall$735largest put OI
IV3012.3%30-day implied vol
Net GEX+$34.2Mper 1% move · flip ≈ $775

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$759-0.7%3d
Tue, Sep 15$760-0.6%4d
Wed, Sep 16$760-0.6%5d
Thu, Sep 17$760-0.6%6d
Fri, Sep 18$755-1.2%7d
Mon, Sep 21$755-1.2%10d
Tue, Sep 22$755-1.2%11d
Wed, Sep 23$757-1.0%12d

The writer-loss curve — where max pain comes from

spot760700721742763784805$116M$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 — 760 — is the max pain price.

Open interest by strike · Wed, Sep 16

spot7607007347487587687783K3K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)SPY open contracts per strike for Wed, Sep 16.

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

spot690731747758769780+3K3K
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: 722 +3K · 779 +2K · 799 +2K · 758 +1K

Volume by strike · Wed, Sep 16

spot7607007347487587687787K7K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Today's traded contracts per strike (delayed).

Implied volatility by strike · Wed, Sep 16

spot70072174276378480533%8%
— call IV— put IVATM ≈ 10.8% · Quoted strikes only; illiquid wings with junk fits are dropped, not smoothed.

Gamma exposure by strike · Wed, Sep 16

spotflip 775700734748758768778+$20.5M$20.5M
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 · Wed, Sep 16

Call ΔCall ΘStrikeΓVegaPut ΘPut Δ
0.75-0.367570.02800.29-0.36-0.25
0.73-0.387580.03010.30-0.38-0.27
0.70-0.397590.03210.31-0.39-0.30
0.67-0.407600.03420.33-0.40-0.33
0.64-0.407610.03620.34-0.41-0.36
0.60-0.417620.03800.35-0.41-0.40
0.57-0.417630.03960.35-0.41-0.44
0.53-0.407640.04100.36-0.41-0.48
0.49-0.407650.04190.36-0.40-0.52
0.44-0.387660.04230.35-0.39-0.56
0.40-0.377670.04220.35-0.38-0.61
0.36-0.357680.04140.34-0.36-0.65
0.31-0.327690.04000.32-0.33-0.70
0.27-0.297700.03800.30-0.30-0.74
0.23-0.267710.03550.28-0.27-0.78

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

spot67072674475877279912K0
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

07-2808-0508-1308-2108-3109-08777.95728.34
— 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

spot50500615690750815531K531K
■ calls (up)■ puts (down)Every expiration combined: 5.4M call contracts, 14.0M 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: SPY workspace · max pain, explained in full · options profit calculator · GEX, defined · pin risk