By Krystal Hur and Gunjan Banerji
Options traders are betting that market volatility is here to stay.
The Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, known as Wall Street's "fear gauge," rose to 28.25 Thursday afternoon.
Traders are betting it has more room to run. In recent days, some of the most actively-traded VIX contracts were tied to the index jumping to 40 and 45, according to Cboe Global Markets Data.
"There is scope for the VIX to increase further if recession fears escalate and we see stock correlations surge," wrote Mandy Xu, Cboe's head of derivatives market intelligence, in a Thursday note.
Meanwhile, the ratio of options contracts often used to protect against big market declines, versus those meant to place bullish bets, surged to their highest level since August 5, according to Cboe.
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 03, 2025 15:13 ET (19:13 GMT)
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