U.S. stock futures are in rally mode this morning, with Dow Jones Industrial Average futures up more than 100 points in premarket trading. Tax plan optimism is the big driver heading into the week before the holiday break, as Republican’s now appear to have the votes to pass the much anticipated legislation.
Specifically, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said over the weekend that he has no doubt that the Republican tax plan will make it to the president’s desk this week, after Senators Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fl.) ended their holdouts and said they’d support the bill.
Against this backdrop, Dow futures have soared 0.64%, S&P 500 futures have climbed 0.37% and Nasdaq-100 futures have jumped 0.37%.
On the options front, volume was over the top on Friday, with more than 24.2 million calls and 17.7 million puts changing hands on the session. Traders, it appears, are already preparing to go on break as the holiday season draws to a close. As for the CBOE, the single-session equity put/call volume ratio rose to 0.57, while the 10-day moving average ticked higher to 0.59.
Turning to Friday’s options activity, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd (ADR) (NASDAQ:TEVA) was upgraded at Credit Suisse for announcing layoffs, but Israel’s largest labor union effectively shut the country down for half a day in protest. Elsewhere, Oracle Corporation (NASDAQ:ORCL) drew mixed options activity after a poorly received quarterly earnings report. Finally, Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) rallied following a bullish note on GPU makers and cryptocurrencies.
