The Weekly Takeaway:
- The S&P 500 continued its rally and gained 0.55% this week despite losing ground three of the five days. The index is now up 4.67% for the year;
- The Nasdaq-100 gained 2.37% this week as tech and chip makers in particular were strong. The index is now up 8.13% for the year;
- Crude oil futures rose 14.67% this week. They closed at $95.26 and are up 41.00% since the start of the war with Iran;
- S&P 500 VolDex (ticker VOLI) rose by 7.41% to close at 15.61. This is odd when the S&P is higher;
- S&P 500 CallDex finally fell by 16.21% but is up 34.38% in April. You can learn more about CallDex at Learn More About CallDex;
- Every 30-Day volatility metric for the S&P 500 rallied on the week with the exception of 30-Day and 7-Day CallDex. This is very unusual when the S&P 500 has rallied for the week. We discuss this in more detail below;
- S&P 500 VolDex is at the 31st percentile of its 52-week range while S&P 500 CallDex is at the 54th percentile of its 52-week range;
- VolDex on the Nasdaq-100 rose by 6.80% to close at 20.62. That is the 41st percentile of its 52-week range;
- Nasdaq-100 30-Day volatility metrics again echoed those for the S&P 500 in that they all rose with the exceptions of both tenors in CallDex;
- Nasdaq-100 TailDex rose by 10.87% signaling that last week’s selling in deep out-of-the-money puts was overdone. You can learn more about TailDex at Learn More About TailDex;
- The yield on Treasury Notes rose 6.4 basis points this week and closed at 4.310% as investors believe this week’s rally in crude oil will fuel inflation;
- Despite this renewed fear regarding inflation, volatility in Treasury Bonds was generally lower this week although 7-Day VolDex gained as you can see below;
- The individual equities we cover were mixed this week with tech names doing well (AMD +24.94%) and “old economy” names generally falling;
- VolDex on the individual names was generally higher with only AAPL (-1.78%) and TSLA (-12.33%) falling. The decline in TSLA VolDex was a result of the company reporting Q1 earnings on Wednesday. VolDex on AMD and NVDA gained thanks to INTC’s blowout results;
- The Nations Indexes Optimism Index® fell by 4.11% to close at 83.14. Our Optimism Index is always available in real-time on our home page at NationsIndexes.com;
- You can always learn more about all our indexes at Learn More About Our Indexes.
Equity Index Volatility:
The S&P 500 rose 0.55% on the week to close at 7165.08 after making a new all-time high of 7168.59 earlier on Friday. Stocks managed to rally despite crude oil climbing 14.67% for the week. Despite strength in equities, volatility measures rose with the exception of CallDex which fell, signaling that traders are more worried than optimistic for the next 30 days.
S&P 500 RiskDex rallied strongly in March and was a very helpful signal of the weakness that followed in the S&P. It then fell in the second week of April and this time signaled the recent strength in the S&P. What is it saying is next? RiskDex bottomed at 2.77 on April 17 and has since rallied to close at 4.19 on Thursday and 3.77 on Friday. This is the metric to watch right now. Additional strength that lifts RiskDex above 5.00 would trigger short positions in the S&P.
S&P 500 CallDex remains particularly volatile as recent strength, driven by prospects for new highs in the S&P, is starting to give way. CallDex measures the normalized price of the 30-Day, 1 standard deviation out-of-the-money call option; that corresponds to a 16 delta call.
RiskDex rose by 36.38% to close at 3.77 but that matches its long-term average of 3.78 suggesting traders believe implied upside and implied downside are balanced.
Historical metrics (Average, median, 10th percentile, 25th percentile, 75th percentile, and 90th percentile) for all our indexes are available to subscribers at NationsIndexes.com.
Why It Matters…Historical data for all our indexes is available to subscribers at the Everything! level and they allow option traders to understand the context of the current option pricing environment. You have to understand what normal is in order to do so.
Nasdaq-100 VolDex rose by 6.80% and the Nasdaq-100 volatility suite mimicked that of the S&P 500 with vol generally rising but CallDex falling as traders are starting to temper their optimism.
Nasdaq-100 VolDex is at the 41st percentile of its 52-week range.
You can learn more about VolDex at Learn More About VolDex.
Why It Matters…Traders have to have the objective data provided by our indexes to trade in a way that doesn’t rely on hunches or guesses.
Nations Investor Optimism Index®:
The Investor Optimism Index® fell by 4.11% to close at 83.14.
The index takes into account the current levels of S&P 500 VolDex, TailDex, and RiskDex and compares them to their rolling 2-year ranges. It is plotted on a 0 to 100 scale.
Our Optimism Index is now available in real-time on our home page at Nations Optimism Index.
Option Window®:
S&P 500 Option Window fills in the blanks between TailDex, PutDex, VolDex, and CallDex and reveals how trade flows were driving option prices. Since Option Window calculates normalized option prices at fixed points of moneyness any changes are driven by option flows rather than movement in the underlying S&P 500.
Option prices were higher across the bulk of the skew with the strongest buying taking place approximately 1.5 standard deviations below at-the-money. As of Friday’s close that would be approximately 6550.
Term Structure:
The Nations TermDex® measure of VolDex term structure illustrates S&P 500 VolDex for various tenors. It provides insight into both near-term and longer-term expectations for volatility in the S&P 500.
Term structure at the close on Friday (in red) is now upward-sloping from left to right. This suggests only moderate concern for the S&P 500 over the next 7 days.
1DTE Options:
S&P 500 1-Day VolDex rose by 15.75% and closed back above 10.00.
Very short-dated volatility measures which use a variance swap methodology, as 1-day VIX does, inject significant error into the resulting measure because of the way out-of-the-money options trade in the hours before expiration. The VolDex at-the-money methodology is particularly suited for these very short-dated tenors.
Other Asset Volatility:
Treasury Bonds and Notes:
Bond futures fell as crude oil rose this week as traders’ hopes for unhindered flow of crude oil faded. Treasury Bond futures are down approximately 3.39% since the start of the war which is a relatively muted response given the cost of the war to the U.S. treasury coupled with the 41.00% increase in crude oil prices which is certain to be inflationary.
Treasury Bond VolDex fell again this week and closed at 10.11, the 11th percentile of its 52-week range. Any close below 10.00 should be considered an opportunity to express directional trades via at-the-money bond options.
Treasury Bond CallDex closed at just 21.98, the 5th percentile of its 52-week range and Treasury Note CallDex closed at just 10.72, the bottom of its 52-week range.
Traders who are bullish Treasuries should strongly consider expressing that point of view by buying out-of-the-money call options given these low vol metrics.
Precious Metals:
Precious metals fell on the week with gold giving back 2.97% and silver falling 6.71%. This week was the reverse of last week with higher interest rates making precious metals less attractive. Gold CallDex fell 17.83% while PutDex rose slightly.
Equities:
We have expanded the list of single names we cover to include not only the most dynamic stocks in the S&P 500 and the stocks with the highest option volume, but also the largest names in the S&P 500.
AMD was the big gainer this week, adding 24.94% following INTC’s results and improving sentiment for AI. It has gained 70.97% since the end of March. AMD volatility metrics rose in response, including PutDex, while RiskDex fell by 15.26% to just 0.82. While that is low, the lowest RiskDex reading for AMD over the previous 3 years is 0.63 reached in October 2025. You can see the 1-Year chart for AMD RiskDex. It shows optimism but not euphoria for AMD’s prospects.
NVDA gained 3.27% for the week and closed with a market cap of $5.06 trillion, more than $900 billion ahead of second place GOOG.
Both CallDex and PutDex ramped in NVDA as the 30-day window now catches the company’s earnings release on May 20.
TSLA was the big loser, giving back 6.07%. TSLA RiskDex is again below 1.00 offering hedging opportunities for shareholders who want to take advantage of the rally from the recent low.
You can learn more about RiskDex at Learn More About RiskDex.
We’ll continue to comment during the week via our X account, @Nations_Indexes.
Scott's Weekly Commentary:
Crude oil is up 41.00% since the war started. Despite higher inflation and the prospect of a slowing economy, the S&P 500 is up 4.16% over the same period. That is an incredibly impressive display of confidence on the part of investors who have learned to buy every dip.
Importantly, our volatility metrics describe a market that is probably slightly more optimistic than it should be but not egregiously so. AI is once again a bright spot and those of us who are putting it to use understand its power if not its full potential. It can be annoying at times but the ability to create a project once and then deploy it repeatedly is a huge productivity boost even if the initial development takes some time.
Unfortunately, this means that the ability to write prompts that get your AI platform to do exactly what you want is more important than understanding anything about the technology. It’s like trying to guess the secret code.
It’s time to start looking for those companies that are going to be most impacted by higher oil prices and to look for bearish structures even if the broad market continues to do well. UAL is down 12.51% since the start of the war and with the action in the Strait of Hormuz I don’t believe this is the low. It is striking that JB Hunt and FedEx are both near 52-week highs. They’ve added fuel surcharges so higher costs are being passed on to customers but how long can that last?
But I come back to the sneaky rally in the Nasdaq-100 which is now up 8.13% for the year. Enjoy, but watch the vol metrics for confidence giving way to euphoria. That will be the moment to change course.
Everyone at Nations Indexes hopes you have a profitable week and that all American service members have a safe one.
Scott
