ROBO / LOBO Put/Call
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Definition
Put/call ratios segmented by trade size and opening flow: ROBO (Retail-Opened Buy-to-Open, small traders) versus LOBO (Large-Opened Buy-to-Open, big traders), isolating who is doing the option buying.
How to read it
ROBO and LOBO decompose put/call activity by the size of the opening buy-to-open order. ROBO captures small/retail opening trades, LOBO captures large/institutional opening trades. This separation matters because retail and institutions often position oppositely: retail call-buying near tops (ROBO complacent) can coincide with institutions hedging (LOBO defensive). By focusing on buy-to-open flow, these ratios strip out closing trades and market-maker noise that muddy a raw volume ratio.
How practitioners use it
Used as context among multiple indicators — never as a standalone signal to act.
Less common professional uses
The highest-value signal is the ROBO/LOBO spread: retail exuberance (low ROBO put/call) against institutional hedging (high LOBO put/call) is a classic late-cycle divergence. Buy-to-open filtering excludes sell-to-open (premium selling), so a covered-call or put-selling wave can be invisible; the ratio then understates a genuine income-selling regime. Trade-size cutoffs defining 'small' vs 'large' are methodology choices; different vendors draw the line differently, so levels are not portable across providers. 0DTE retail activity has swollen ROBO call volume; de-trend and compare to its own recent range before calling complacency. These are derived from tape-reconstructed opening flow, which has a same-day-to-next-day compilation lag; they are not live positioning.
Sources & provenance
Options tape reconstructed by opening flow and trade size (ROBO/LOBO methodology)
This page is educational content published by Pachira Aquatica Global LLC. It is not investment advice and not a recommendation.