QCOM Stock: Unusual Options Activity Flags Bearish Hedge and Near-Term Upside Bet as Shares Trade Near 52-Week Lows
By TrendSpider Editor
Unusual options activity hit QUALCOMM Incorporated on Tuesday, with two contracts totaling $1,028,992.90 in combined premium drawing attention from traders. QCOM currently trades at $131.74, up 1.82% on the session, but remains under significant pressure when measured against its 52-week high of $20
QCOM Stock: Unusual Options Activity Flags Bearish Hedge and Near-Term Upside Bet as Shares Trade Near 52-Week Lows
Unusual options activity hit QUALCOMM Incorporated on Tuesday, with two contracts totaling $1,028,992.90 in combined premium drawing attention from traders. QCOM currently trades at $131.74, up 1.82% on the session, but remains under significant pressure when measured against its 52-week high of $205.55. With the stock sitting just above its 52-week low of $120.8019, the options flow reflects a market that is actively positioning around whether QCOM can mount a recovery or continues to grind lower.
Key Drivers of the QCOM Stock Move
- Main Catalyst: Two unusual options contracts were flagged today, a PUT at the $100 strike expiring January 21, 2028, carrying $550,000 in premium with an open interest percentage of 192%, and a CALL at the $140 strike expiring September 18, 2026, carrying $478,992.90 in premium with an open interest percentage of 248%. Both contracts are out of the money and reflect elevated conviction relative to existing open interest.
- Bull Case: The CALL contract at $140 expiring September 18, 2026 suggests at least one large participant sees QCOM climbing above $140, roughly 6.3% above the current price of $131.74, within the next six months. At 248% of open interest, this is not a routine position, and the $478,992.90 in premium behind it reflects real capital commitment to the upside thesis.
- Bear Case: The $550,000 PUT at the $100 strike represents the larger of the two trades by premium and targets a price roughly 24% below current levels. At 192% of open interest and with an expiration extending out to January 2028, this contract reads as a long-duration hedge or directional bet that QCOM has meaningful downside risk over the next two years. The stock is already trading 35.9% below its 52-week high of $205.55, and the $100 strike would mark a significant new low.
The forward setup for QCOM is complicated. The stock has been unable to sustain any meaningful recovery from its 52-week low of $120.8019, and today's 1.82% gain, while welcome, leaves shares still deep in a longer-term downtrend relative to where they stood at the $205.55 peak. The divergence between the two options trades today tells a story of a market that cannot agree on direction. One participant is paying up for a near-term bounce through the September 2026 expiration, while another is spending even more premium to protect against, or profit from, a much deeper decline through early 2028. Until QCOM can reclaim levels closer to $140 and neutralize the bear case reflected in the longer-dated put, the stock is likely to remain a battleground between recovery optimism and macro and competitive concerns weighing on the semiconductor space broadly.
QCOM Unusual Options Activity
- Contract 1: PUT | Strike: $100 | Expiry: January 21, 2028 | Volume/Size: 500 | Open Interest Percentage: 192% | Out of the Money
- Contract 2: CALL | Strike: $140 | Expiry: September 18, 2026 | Volume/Size: 439 | Open Interest Percentage: 248% | Out of the Money
Total unusual contracts flagged: 2. Total combined premium across both contracts: $1,028,992.90. The PUT contract at $100 represents the larger premium outlay at $550,000, while the CALL at $140 accounts for $478,992.90. Both contracts show volume well in excess of existing open interest, which is the defining characteristic that flagged them as unusual.
QCOM Seasonality
Mid-March has historically been a transitional period for semiconductor stocks, sitting between the Consumer Electronics Show catalyst window in January and the next major earnings cycle. For QCOM specifically, the March period often reflects positioning ahead of the company's fiscal second-quarter earnings report, which tends to draw options activity as traders calibrate expectations around mobile chipset demand and licensing revenue trends.
QCOM Relative Performance
QCOM's current price of $131.74 represents a decline of approximately 35.9% from its 52-week high of $205.55, a significantly steeper drawdown than the broader semiconductor sector has experienced over comparable periods in most cycle histories. While today's 1.82% gain is a positive session, the stock remains in a position of relative weakness, trading only about 9% above its 52-week low of $120.8019, leaving the recovery story largely unwritten as of mid-March 2026.