Illegal insider trading has been rather active recently. When an offer was made for Dow Jones (NYSE: DJ) by News Corp (NYSE: NWS), I mentioned some odd option activity. It wasn't long before the SEC was investigating and a Hong Kong couple was investigated. Some estimates of the insider trading show that about 50% of buyouts and mergers have illegal activity.
This morning aQuantive (NASDAQ: AQNT) is up about 77% to 63.64 on a buyout from Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT). It took me about 5 minutes to dig up some "unusual" activity. If you look at the June 40 calls (QBT FH) there is some "interesting activity."
A call option gives the purchaser the right (or option) to buy a stock at a set price. Each option contract gives the right to buy 100 shares of stock. For easy comparison to stock prices, option prices are always quoted in cents per share.
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