Wall Street will be closely watching the Federal Reserve and Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday afternoon, creating an environment for knee-jerk market moves. That can create an opportunity for options investors, according to Goldman Sachs. The investment firm’s derivatives research team, led by Vishal Vivek, said in a note to clients on Wednesday that Fed decision days are becoming a bigger source of volatility, including among certain bank stocks. “Among stocks, options in CMA , ZION and STT screen as most attractive relative to historical one-day moves on FOMC days,” the note said. Here’s a look at some of the bank stocks on Goldman’s list and their average moves on Fed decision days in recent years, led by Comerica. The options market was pricing in lower-than-average volatility in these stocks, creating an opportunity for investors, Goldman said. Bank stocks can be particularly sensitive to Fed decisions because their business models are closely tied to interest rates and the state of the economy. Conventional wisdom holds that rising interest rates are good news for bank stocks, as that can translate into a higher net interest margin for the financial companies. But bank stocks have been hit hard in 2022, even as rates have spiked. The Financial Select Sector SPDR Fund is down 16% year to date, outperforming the S & P 500 but certainly not proving to be safe haven for investors. However, the direction of a stock’s move doesn’t matter for investors using straddle options. Those derivatives consist of a paired put and call option with the same strike price and expiration date. Straddles serve as a bet on high volatility, regardless of whether the stock climbs or falls. The Fed is expected to hike its benchmark interest rate by 0.75 percentage points on Wednesday, its third-straight such move. Some of the top bank stocks on Goldman’s list saw notable moves after the last two hikes. Comerica rose 1.81% after the July hike and 2% after the June hike. Zions saw gains of 1.54% and 2.51%, respectively. State Street has seen even larger moves, gaining 2.87% in July and 2.83% in June. — CNBC’s Michael Bloom contributed to this report.
