PepsiCo Inc (NASDAQ:PEP) stock is down 5% to trade at $135.34 this morning, after the Coca-Cola (KO) rival shared mixed second-quarter results. Earnings of $2.24 per share missed estimates, while its revenue exceeded expectations at $21.18 billion. The company also reaffirmed its annual guidance and shared a Q2 sales beat.
Today's pullback marks PEP's worst daily drop since May 2022 and has pulled the shares back below the year-to-date breakeven mark. An attempted breakout last week was thwarted by the 260-day moving average, with the shares now trading within a chip-shot of its July 2025 lows.
Despite its underperformance on the charts, call traders were circling ahead of earnings. This is per the 50-day call/put volume ratio of 2.63 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), which ranks in the 91st annual percentile. Echoing this is the stock's Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio (SOIR) of 0.39, which ranks higher than 4% of readings from the past year.
Options traders look to be changing their tune, however. In the first hour of trading 13,000 puts have been exchanged, four times the average intraday pace. Most popular looks to be the weekly 7/10 140-strike put.
