Ford Up 2% As Option Traders Remain Heavily Bullish

Ford Motor Co F is up over 2% today, finding solid intraday support around $20 as option traders remain heavily bullish on the stock.

What Happened: While there have been rumors about Ford being named as a new swing trade buy alert by Investor's Business Daily, option traders have remained aggressively bullish on the stock heading into the new year.

SEE ALSO: Ford Named Investor's Business Daily Swing Traded Buy

Looking at the option flows on the day, Ford has traded approximately 396,000 options with over 278,000 calls and 117,000 puts (image below).

Of the approximately 396,000 options traded, 70% of them have been calls, which suggests option traders are heavily bullish on the stock.

Why It Matters: Prior to trading on Monday, Ford had about 3.7 million calls and 2.7 million puts, for a total of 6.4 million options. That shows approximately 57% of all the options are calls, which is less than the 70% of calls traded today.

Hence, the option trading activity today is particularly bullish.

What's Next: Looking ahead to the Jan. 21 expiry next month, there is a dearth of volume and open interest between the $20 and $22 strikes (image below).

Looking at the option chain, the largest strike by volume is $21, but this only has half the open interest of the $22 strike (~132,000 contracts) and about a third of the open interest at the $20 strike (~200,000 contracts). 

Considering how much stronger the call open interest is versus the put open interest for this strike, it suggests option traders remain aggressively bullish and expect the stock to be supported at $20 with a potential run-up to $22, maybe even $23 by the Jan. 21 expiry.

Meanwhile, pullbacks in the stock could find support between the $19 and $18 strikes, which has solid open interest looking ahead.

Related Link: Ford Delivers First Locally Made Mustang Mach-Es In China As It Looks To Compete With Electric Rivals Tesla, Nio