The shares of Altaba Inc (NASDAQ:AABA) -- formerly Yahoo -- touched a record peak of $73.25 about a month ago. Since then, the tech concern has pulled back to its 40-day moving average -- a technical signal that's preceded gains for AABA stock in the past. Below, we take a closer look at Altaba shares to see if they could be flashing "buy," and examine how options traders are speculating on the equity.
The security, which began trading under AABA at $54 in mid-June, recently came within one standard deviation of its 40-day trendline, after a lengthy stint above the moving average. In the past, similar pullbacks have generated positive one-month returns 78% of the time, according to Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White. Further, AABA stock has averaged a one-month gain of 4.47% after signals.
Since the aforementioned June 19 "debut" at $54, the security has advanced a healthy 33%, and was last seen trading at $71.81 -- up 1.3% on the day. Another 4.47% bump from current levels would place Altaba shares around $75, in record-high territory.
Recent options traders are already in the bulls' corner, though. On theInternational Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), the stock's 10-day call/put volume ratio of 4.83 indicates nearly five AABA calls were bought to open for every put in the past two weeks. This ratio is higher than two-thirds of all other readings from the past year, underscoring a healthier-than-usual appetite for bullish bets of late.