Bulls double money in $UBER

Option traders turned quick profits on upside positions in Uber (UBER) today.

On Nov. 12, Market Rebellion’s Unusual Activity Service found that 2,500 Weekly $29 calls expiring tomorrow afternoon were bought for $0.30 to $0.35 with shares at $27.35. Open interest in the strike was 1,472 contracts before the trades occurred, indicating that this was new positioning.

Those calls have traded for as much as $0.75 today, more than twice their purchase prices. The stock rose 8.12% in the same time frame, illustrating the kind of leverage that can be achieved with options.

Long calls lock in the price where a stock can be purchased, gaining with a rally and providing leverage to the underlying shares. The contracts can quickly lose value if the stock stalls or pulls back but also carry less risk than owning the shares themselves.

UBER is up 5.03% to $29.44 this afternoon. Shares rose in extended-hours trading last night on news that the ride-sharing service’s CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, had purchased 250,000 of the company’s shares for about $6.7 million.