Benzinga | Jan 19, 2022 03:04PM EST

This Is What Whales Are Betting On Barrick Gold

Someone with a lot of money to spend has taken a bearish stance on Barrick Gold (NYSE:GOLD).

And retail traders should know.

We noticed this today when the big position showed up on publicly available options history that we track here at Benzinga.

Whether this is an institution or just a wealthy individual, we don't know. But when something this big happens with GOLD, it often means somebody knows something is about to happen.

So how do we know what this whale just did?

Today, Benzinga's options scanner spotted 23 uncommon options trades for Barrick Gold.

This isn't normal.

The overall sentiment of these big-money traders is split between 47% bullish and 52%, bearish.

Out of all of the special options we uncovered, 4 are puts, for a total amount of $208,954, and 19 are calls, for a total amount of $1,465,810.

What's The Price Target?

Taking into account the Volume and Open Interest on these contracts, it appears that whales have been targeting a price range from $13.0 to $27.0 for Barrick Gold over the last 3 months.

Volume & Open Interest Development

In terms of liquidity and interest, the mean open interest for Barrick Gold options trades today is 15340.39 with a total volume of 74,309.00.

In the following chart, we are able to follow the development of volume and open interest of call and put options for Barrick Gold's big money trades within a strike price range of $13.0 to $27.0 over the last 30 days.

Barrick Gold Option Volume And Open Interest Over Last 30 Days

Biggest Options Spotted:

Symbol PUT/ Trade Sentiment Exp. Strike Total Trade Open Volume CALL Type Date Price Price InterestGOLD CALL TRADE BEARISH 01/19/ $13.00 $639.1K 2.9K 835 24GOLD CALL SWEEP BULLISH 05/20/ $22.00 $86.0K 12 1.2K 22GOLD CALL TRADE BULLISH 06/17/ $21.00 $78.4K 22.7K 952 22GOLD PUT SWEEP BULLISH 01/21/ $22.00 $77.7K 34.1K 271 22GOLD CALL SWEEP BEARISH 03/18/ $20.00 $76.1K 22.8K 4.4K 22

Where Is Barrick Gold Standing Right Now?

* With a volume of 26,328,379, the price of GOLD is up 7.89% at $20.02.

* RSI indicators hint that the underlying stock may be approaching overbought.

* Next earnings are expected to be released in 28 days.

Options are a riskier asset compared to just trading the stock, but they have higher profit potential. Serious options traders manage this risk by educating themselves daily, scaling in and out of trades, following more than one indicator, and following the markets closely.

If you are already an options trader or would like to get started, head on over to Benzinga Pro. Benzinga Pro gives you up-to-date news and analytics to empower your investing and trading strategy.