A parade of retailers reported their January same-store sales figures on Thursday morning, and the results were actually much better than expected. The aggregate 4.2% rise in monthly sales easily surpassed analysts' expectations, leading to a solidly bullish session for the SPDR S&P Retail (XRT) exchange-traded fund (ETF).

However, not everyone was won over by January's stronger-than-forecast sales data. Around midday on Thursday, one skeptical options trader initiated a long put spread on the XRT, in an attempt to capitalize on expected weakness in the retail-based fund.

Economic data out of China this week is suggesting a slower pace of growth for the emerging economy, and one options player is trying to capitalize on anticipated weakness in some of China's largest companies. Bright and early Friday morning, a bearish bettor sent a long put spread across the tape on the iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index (FXI).

Specifically, the trader purchased about 11,000 contracts of FXI's November 38 put, and simultaneously sold 11,000 contracts of the November 33 put. With FXI lingering around $40 at the time of the transaction, both of these intermediate-term puts are out of the money.

MannKind Corp. (MNKD) has lately enjoyed a minor winning streak atop former resistance from its 10-day and 20-day moving averages, with the stock notching six consecutive daily closes above this trendline duo. However, judging by a bearish option strategy that crossed the tape on Tuesday, one options trader isn't buying into the equity's rebound.

Specifically, the trader opened a long put spread on MNKD by buying to open 2,000 contracts of the August 7.50 put, and simultaneously selling to open 2,000 contracts of the August 5 put. This bearishly biased spread was initiated for a net debit of $1.60, which is the trader's maximum potential loss on the play.

Semiconductor specialist Cree Inc. (CREE) was targeted by bearish bettors on Tuesday. During the course of the session, put volume on the shares rose to 1.75 times the usual level, with roughly 16,000 of these skeptically skewed contracts crossing the tape.

Data from the International Securities Exchange (ISE) confirms a downbeat bias to the day's options trading. On Tuesday, speculators on the ISE bought to open 3,193 puts on CREE, compared to just 643 calls. The equity's single-day ISE put/call volume ratio stands at 4.97, revealing that bearish contracts were nearly five times more popular than their bullish counterparts.