but coming soon, mike khouw is in los angeles with more. why are gains coming soon? saw unusual activity in trip adviser and expedia. they traded well over three-times the average daily call volume. expedia caught my eye. about four firms have reaffirmed their buy ratings on this stock. we saw buyers of the may 75 calls. paying about $3.75 for those. earnings for this name come the first week of may. and if you're buying these, you're making bullish pbets to the upside, that expedia could be up by the third friday in may. guy adami was talking about priceline earlier. it trades a couple turns richer than expedia, on a valuation basis, it's probably the better bet. that's a stock that had less than $8 in earnings in 2009. will probably do 52 this year. so, obviously, there's some good sentiment. but priceline is the one that's really performed over the long term. >> mike khouw, thank you very much for joining us. i don't know about you guys. i think he's looking kind of -- the best going. the combover. i don't know. i like this today. >> he dresses for where he is. he

mike khouw is here to explain. t or more on car insurance. everybody knows that.now pinocchio was a bad motivational speaker? i look around this room and i see nothing but untapped potential. you have potential. you have...oh boy. geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent ore on car insurance. honestly? i wanted a smartphone that shoots great video. so i got the new nokia lumia icon. it's got 1080p video, three times zoom, and a twenty-megapixel sensor. it's got the brightest display, so i can see what i'm shooting -- even outdoors, and 4 mics that capture incredible sound. plus, it has apps like vine -- and free cloud storage. my new lumia icon is so great, even our wipeouts look amazing. ♪ honestly, i want to see you be brave ♪ ♪ >>> yahoo! shares surged today. and with an ali baba ipo on the horizon, more gains to come. mike, what did you see? >> the stock, along with the market, up nicely today. and the activity we were seeing was in the near-dated weekly 40 calls. those are the ones that will be expiring at the end of this week. that will take us

mike khouw is in florida with the options action for today. hi, mike. >> hi.le different etps. exchange trader products. the one i was looking at today was ewz, which is the brazilian etf. and the activity we saw there, traded about 2.5-times its daily volume. and most of that was on the puts. and the most active of the puts was the april 39 puts. and 50,000 of those traded as a block. looked like an opening buyer trading about 90 cents. what that is not necessarily a bet that it's going down. but a cautionary bet that we might see an increase in volatility in there. if this is basically a hedging activity from obviously a fairly big institutional player. that's $4.5 million worth of premium. $4.5 million worth of insurance that's going to expire the third friday of april. one thing, though, we have been seeing over several days unusual call buying in tlt, which is the 20-year treasury etf. that also would be a cautionary bet, i think. two, different places, unusual activity in the options market. and both are uses the uptick in the market and the decrease in

mike khouw's at the smart board with more on this. >> it was interesting.d see unusual options activity in both of these names. western refining traded more than six-times its average daily volume. and valero is what i want to look at. what we saw were buyers at the september 57 1/2, 65 call spreads. people paying about $2.20 for that. by september, the stock's going to be 59 1/2. that's up here somewhere. you can see the stock's had quite a run. let's look at over a longer time frame. this is ten years worth of price action in valero. around here, this is a stock that wasn't earning any money. but over this entire period of time, this company has made $60 per share. it's averaged $6 -- $6 billion. this is actually trading fairly cheap. i think you could potentially see it get back up to the previous highs. even at that level, it wouldn't be that expensive. but options are a good way to make the bullish bet and not risk if it goes back down to this level. >> thanks, mike. >>> shares of nike, still on the move after its earnings report. we talk to the analys

mike khouw in orlando. what did you see? >> we saw some unusual call activity in cabot oil and gas.f the three, the one i found the most interesting was cabot oil and gas. we saw buyers at $35. above 40 by the third week in april. this is interesting because it follows activity that we saw several months ago in early january. we saw buyers of the same calls. and many others. this is a stock that's been under some pressure. it has exposure to the marcellus shale which bernstein indicated that wow you'd see low natural gas prices. this is a stock that's seen tremendous growth. a lot of analysts see growth here. we're talking about 30% growth. this is a cheap way they're making a bullish bet that the stock could make a move. >> thanks, mike. catch "options action" friday at 5:30. also check out the website. >>> from facebook to twitter, social content seems to be the reigning king. but which companies will join the court? we bring in light speed venture partner, jeremy liew, to sell us silicon valley's next big thing. [ indistinct shouting ] ♪ [ indistinct shouting ] [ male announcer ]

mike khouw is in san francisco with more. what happened? was an interesting trade in tourist backs. we saw a big trade in the spx may 1995 puts. over 15,000 of these traded. now, there's $100 multiplier. that's $13,200 a contract. they made a bearish bet on the s&p. now, if you were looking at this from a hedger's perspective, this is equivalent to shorting almost $2.9 billion notionally, in the s&p 500. so, this is a pretty substantial bet in terms of size. it was substantial because it was in the money. the 1995 strike much higher than the s&p price of 18.60. who trades these on the long side is making a direct bet. >> if any of our viewers want to learn more, we have more on cnbc.com. you can catch options action, friday at 5:30 p.m. >> i want to know more about that rig he has going on. he has the glasses going. >> do you see the view behind me here? i mean, i'm a little nearsighted. but to be able to see that beautiful skyline, i've got to sport the glasses. >> nice poster, mike. >> a beautiful blue screen. has the combover, nerdy geek

mike khouw is at the smart board. >> there's hype around that. making remarks, suggesting that the stock is appropriately priced. and the options traded about three-times its daily volume and three-times the open interest of the may 20 calls, which traded for about $5.35. i think that's kind of interesting. the may 20 calls. this is about $20. that's actually in the money. it's unusual to see that activity. what we need to see is that the stock has to be above the strike plus the price it was paid. the $5.35. that's going to take it up to about 25.35. up a dollar. why would they have traded the maze and traded them in the money. here's part of the explanation. the stock is bouncing around and the options are expensive. this is the price of options in awe implied volatility terms. the may options are less expensive than the ones that are near dated. and cap would mansion to capture, if the april earnings are going to be coming up. one way to mitigate the expense of the ongss. the lower implied volatility when people are expecting big moves, like t