Clip: “Brent Kochuba Says the Trade That Usually Pins the Market Didn’t Show Up” — watch on tastylive.
Brent Kochuba, founder of SpotGamma, joined tastylive for Gamma Guy to walk through the S&P 500 gamma map under the 7,600 risk pivot, the put wall at 7,400, the flattening VIX curve, and an AMD earnings structure he worked out with members.
Oracle traded up about 6% on Tuesday morning, CoreWeave and Meta bounced with it, and the S&P 500 followed the hyperscalers higher. Brent Kochuba, founder of SpotGamma, joined tastylive for Gamma Guy to explain why the 0DTE condor flow that usually damps the session did not arrive, leaving the index to bounce with little underneath it.
The 0DTE Condor Didn’t Print
The S&P 500 gamma map showed a wide band of negative gamma across the strikes expiring Wednesday through Friday, with only a pocket of positive gamma above roughly 7,750 to 7,800. When dealers sit short gamma their hedging runs with price rather than against it, so they sell weakness and buy strength and ranges widen. Heavy 0DTE condor selling usually arrives around 10:00 a.m. ET, and the positive gamma it creates leans against intraday movement through the afternoon, but that flow did not appear on Tuesday and the live 0DTE strikes carried almost nothing. Strip 0DTE positions out of the curve and the exposure runs negative across the strike range, building down toward 7,400.
7,600 Is The Pivot Back To Stability
The risk pivot sits at 7,600. A recovery above it would likely bring 0DTE traders and put sellers back in, and that returning supply pads the market underneath. Until it is reclaimed, rallies can prove transient and reverse. The downside reference is the put wall at 7,400, where dealers are long a large put strike because someone sold size there, and that long dealer gamma tends to slow price as it approaches. If the rally does carry, 7,750 to 7,800 is the likely sticking point, where the positive gamma pocket flips hedging back against the move.
A Flat VIX Curve Builds Risk
The VIX term structure has flattened, with futures across forward expirations sitting around 20 to 21. Earlier in the month, with VIX near 15, front futures were closer to 16 to 17 while longer-dated futures sat near today’s prices, a steep contango that priced in very little near-term risk. Risk-off episodes lift the whole curve toward 24 to 25 and invert it, so flat sits between those two states and suggests risk building rather than subsiding. The index has now gone roughly 102 sessions without a 2% down day.
Flows Are Light, Options Are Rich
HIRO showed about $1.3 billion of positive delta in the S&P 500, driven by call buying, with put flow flat near negative $90 million. Single-stock equity flow measured only $130 million against a range that can reach $3 billion, light numbers that fit an oversold bounce more than broad re-risking. IV rank frames the cost of expressing a view: QQQ near 80 against SPY around 39 and IBIT at 13, which favors call spreads over outright long premium in tech. Brent is not yet comfortable selling puts while the debt question around the hyperscalers stays open.
AMD: Relatively Few Buyers For Calls
The options market priced roughly a 7.5% implied move for AMD into earnings, landing the stock near 525, while the heaviest open interest and the largest long dealer gamma strike sit at 550, the level most likely to cap a rally. Call skew measured about 10% against an IV percentile of 80, so relatively few traders are paying up for AMD upside. Brent walked through a call diagonal: sell the November 6 550 call, buy the November 11 550 call, roughly $230 debit with risk capped at that debit.
What Would Confirm The Read?
We encourage traders to watch two things: whether Oracle, CoreWeave and Meta hold Tuesday’s gains, since giving them back would point to risk-off sentiment returning, and whether the VIX curve steepens from flat. Reclaiming 7,600 changes the lean; failing to hold keeps 7,400 in view.
Gamma Guy runs Tuesdays at 10:00 a.m. CT on tastylive.
Brent Kochuba founded SpotGamma and contributes to tastylive. He was previously a portfolio manager at Seven North Capital Management, building options-based strategies, and a derivatives broker at Wolverine Execution, Credit Suisse and Bank of America.