IBM Surges on C-Suite Exit

IMB's CEO Ginni Rommetty will be replaced by its cloud business head Arvind Krishna

Dow name and chip concern IBM (NYSE:IBM) is moving 4% higher in electronic trading, set to open near $142.22, after news broke that the company's CEO Ginni Rometty will step down in April. Rometty will be replaced by the company's cloud business head Arvind Krishna, who last year headed the company's $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat in 2019.

Fresh off last week's earnings post-earnings surge, IBM yesterday gapped lower and back below the 100-day moving average. Today however, the shares are easily in recovery mode, and remain just above breakeven both year-to-date and year-over-year.

Digging deeper, in the options pits sentiment has been optimistic, evidenced by IBM's 10-day call/put volume ratio of 2.53 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX). This ratio sits in the 89th annual percentile too, indicating a much bigger appetite for long calls of late.

This is echoed in the security' Schaeffer's open interest ratio (SOIR) of 0.71, which sits in the 28th percentile of its annual range. This means short-term options players have been picking up calls at a much quicker than usual clip.