EXPLANATORY NOTES Options Tables An exchange traded call option provides the right to purchase 100 shares of an underlying stock at a specified price until a specified expiration date. Exchange traded options have a maximum maturity of nine months. The expiration date of an option is the Saturday following the third Friday of the designated expiration month. An option maturity is the collective term for all options with the same expiration month. Options expire quarterly and belong to one of three expiration cycles: (1) January-April-July-October; (2) February-May-August-November; and (3) MarchJune-September-December. At any point in time, options are traded in the nearest three of the four expiration months of a cycle. Nine option maturities may then be traded simultaneously and ten maturities may be traded during a month since a new series is introduced following the expiration date. Table M-90 reports the number and dollar value of contracts sold monthly by each exchange. Contract volume includes both opening transactions (which establish new long or short option positons) and closing transactions (which eliminate long or short option positions). Long positions in options are eliminated through closing sales, exercises, or expirations. Table M-100 presents monthly contract sales in each option maturity. At the top of each column the calendar month identifies the interval over which contract volume is aggregated. Expiration months are arrayed along the left margin. For example, February contract volume in options with a July maturity is located in the cell at the intersection of the February column and the July row. Table M-110 reports the open interest in each option maturity as of the last trading day of the month. Open interest is defined as the number of contracts outstanding; that is, the number of contracts sold that have not been closed out by an offsetting transaction, nor exercised, nor expired. At the top of each column the calendar month identifies the date that open interest is calculated. Expiration |