With the wild swings in the stock markets in recent days, there has been a lot of talk of a “Gamma Squeeze”. Gamma Squeeze occurs when the price of the underlying stock begins to rise very quickly within a short period of time. Gamma pressures are often associated with options trading. Let’s understand what Gamma Squeeze is.

In the case of gamma compression, the price of a stock rises rapidly depending on whether traders buy many calls to drive up the prices of certain stocks, as options sellers have to hedge their trades on. the underlying stocks. Thus, gamma compression can occur when there is widespread buying activity of short-term call options in a particular stock.

Gamma is an investment term associated with the Greeks. These terms are used to describe various positions when trading options. Gamma and Delta, along with the others, can be used together to design a strategy for betting on the future movement of a stock’s price. To note,

is the rate of change in the price of options for each change in the price of the underlying stock. Delta is a linear function, which means that it will not change proportionately with the price of a stock. While gamma refers to the rate of change of the delta. As the delta value increases or decreases, its respective curves and option market makers buy or sell options to maintain their hedges.

Traders are watching gamma compression closely after the recent wild moves in the market. As stock prices skyrocketed, traders who had sold the options had to hedge their positions, resulting in gamma compression.

Gamma compression is not the only factor driving the market higher, but it can be one of the factors. Gamma compression could be an opportunity for investors, but it can also be risky depending on what is driving a short press to trigger gamma compression. They can last for days or weeks. Thus, timing plays an important role in determining whether gamma compression results in a profit or a loss for your trade. On the flip side, once gamma compression reaches its peak, price reversals can happen so quickly that a trader can see a sharp drop in stock prices.

(DK Aggarwal is the CMD of SMC Investment and Advisors)