Procter & Gamble Stock Surges on Quarterly Outperformance

Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble Co (NYSE:PG) is one of the first blue chips to kick off earnings season, beating profit expectations but missing on revenue for its fiscal second quarter. Annual outlook also took a hit, as the company did a write-down of its Gillette unit back in December. At last glance, PG is up 5.3% to trade at $155.67.

On the charts Procter & Gamble stock has struggled to maintain stability, with yesterday's pullback captured by its 360-day moving average. The shares are clinging to a modest 4% year-over-year lead and are eyeing a possible fifth weekly gain in six.

However, in the options pits, traders seem to be maxing out on calls, leaving put traders a prime opportunity to enter the ring. PG's 10-day put/call volume ratio of 2.88 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX) ranks higher than 82% of readings from the past year, showing options bears chiming in at a much faster-than-usual rate. 

Echoing this is the stock's Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio (SOIR) of 1.18, which stands in the highest percentile of readings from the past 12 months. All of this to say, puts have been extremely popular of late.

Albeit amid lighter absolute volume, 15,000 calls and 6,700 puts have crossed the threshold, coming in at 10 times the average intraday volume. Most popular are the weekly 1/26 155- and 160-strike calls, where the latter is being sold-to-open.