STI / Wilmar / UOB Warrant Flows

STI / Wilmar / UOB Warrant Flows: Macquarie Warrants note that Put warrants over recent outperformers have been very popular amongst investors looking to profit from short-term pullbacks of stocks rallying to their recent highs. Put warrants which saw trading and buying interest on Wednesday were hence over outperformers, UOB and Wilmar. A total of 2.3M of UOB puts were bought as the stock outperformed the STI's flat close with its 1.9% rally to trade near its August 2011 high. During the day, Fitch Ratings affirmed the AA- default rating and stable outlooks on all three Sing banks. The buying in UOB put warrants was seen predominantly in UOB MB EPW130902 (S1VW, strike $19.20) which fell 14.5%. 1.8M was bought. The other 600k was bought in the short-dated UOB MB EPW130603 (R8SW, strike $19.50) which tumbled double of S1VW at -28% as a result of its higher effective gearing. Wilmar put WILMAR MB EPW130903 (R5OW, strike $3.40) was the most active single stock warrant and up till the last five minutes of the market close, it was the day's most heavily bought put warrant with 4M bought by investors in the morning. However, with the warrant slated to close down 4.8% as Wilmar failed to retreat from its open (it closed up 0.9% for the day), investors sold out of the 4M position. Also exiting on their put positions were the 430k sold out of STI put STI 3250 MB EPW130628 (RQ3W). The STI closed unchanged for the day.