Upside Purchased on Patterson-UTI Energy (PTEN)

Shares of Patterson-UTI Energy Inc. PTEN are lower on the session by 2.81%, currently trading at $15.92. The stock has been moving largely higher over the past six months, making higher lows and higher highs. The stock ran into resistance at $16.80, though. Options traders are betting on a break out. A short while ago, the October $17.50 call was purchased 1,000 times on the offer. Open interest on the strike is 3,803 contracts. Call volume is now running at 2.30x the daily average with 95% of all calls traded being purchases on the offer. Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. owns and operates fleets of land-based drilling rigs in the United States. The company's contract drilling business operates primarily in Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and western Canada. As of December 31, 2009, it had a drilling fleet that consisted of 341 marketable land-based drilling rigs. For more great research like this, as well as how to play it through options…please visit Benzinga's Options & Volatility Edge and Benzinga's Cash Generator.