Paper sold 7000 HCA March 34.5 Puts for $.55 (8.4 times usual volume) when stock was trading $36.06
Paper sold 5000 ELN July 11-12 Call Spread for $.30 (2.6 times usual volume) when stock was trading $10.50
Paper bought 3189 ATVI Feb 13 Calls for $.62 (2.1 times usual volume) when stock was trading $13.55
Paper bought 4500 ARMH Jan 2014 55-65 Bull Call Spread for $1.35 (3.1 times usual volume) when stock was trading $43.58
Paper bought 8000 NUAN April 18 Puts for $.60 (2.1 times usual volume) when stock was trading $19.22

MHP is the owner of Standard and Poor’s, the largest bond-rating agency.
According to analysts, S&P is a large cash generating machine and
considering the low interest rate environment…many corporations are
rushing to the fixed income market in order to lock in the Federal Reserve’s
artificially low rates. This plays directly into the hand of MHP, for they
naturally have to rate all these bonds. According to analyst Peter Appert,
the ratings segment is, “extraordinarily robust.” This is the segment,
however that is getting them in trouble.

The stock has a pending lawsuit hanging over it. The USA department of
Justice is alleging that Standard and Poor’s mislead investors in various
exotic asset backed securities during and before the financial crisis. The
DOJ is seeking 5 billion in the lawsuit, which is more than 5 years of profits
for the company.

The company took a hit on on earnings as a result of a fee from the sale of
their education business to Apollo Global Management. This resulted in an
expected loss, but revenues were better than expected. Specifically, the
company suffered a loss of 216 million.

Salerno.mark.a@gmail.com

Earnings tomorrow include Coca Cola before the open, with consensus estimates at $0.44 EPS on revenue of $11.5B. Over the first three quarters of 2012, Coca Cola has shown healthy top-line growth driven by rising sales of the company’s beverage lines in emerging economies. There is an interesting relation between growth in emerging markets and developed markets, because the latter is down on a steady pace over the last 5 years whereas emerging markets are up majorly.

—

Sven Van Tongeren 
KOTM Contributor
Sven@KeeneOnTheMarket.com

Paper bought 1000 CYNO Feb 25 Puts for $0.50 ( it was 201 times usual volume) stock was trading at $26.95
Paper bought 9300 MTG March 2 Puts for $0.12 ( it was 4.2 times usual volume) stock was trading at $2.62
Paper bought 3112 FE Feb 38 Puts for $0.05 ( it was 3.5 times usual volume) stock was trading at $40.05
Paper bought 992 WTW Feb 50 Puts for $1.34 the stock was trading at $54.42