North American Palladium Draws Bullish Bets

Today’s tickers: PAL, VMED, ADLR & VIP PAL  - North American Palladium, Ltd. –  Shares in the platinum and precious metals mining company rose as much as 6.4% at the start of the session to an intraday high of $4.98 before the broad market soured during Fed Chairman Bernanke’s second day of testimony on Capitol Hill. North American Palladium’s shares currently stand 3.85% lower on the day at $4.50 as of 12:30 pm ET. The rally in the price of the underlying this morning spurred bullish options activity on PAL. Investors positioning for shares in the Toronto, ON-based company to extend gains scooped up more than 2,000 calls at the August $5.0 strike for an average premium of $0.38 each. Call buyers at this strike profit in the event that shares surge 19.6% over the current price of $4.50 to surpass the average breakeven point on the upside at $5.38 at expiration next month. Similar, albeit lighter, bullish interest cropped up at the September $5.0 strike where some 710 calls were picked up for an average premium of $0.54 a-pop. Bulls frequented North American Palladium call options earlier in the week, as well. It looks like open interest at the August $4.0 and $5.0 strike call is largely made up of buyers who paid an average premium of $0.30 and $0.12 per contract for roughly 1,000 call options at each strike. Demand for PAL’s call options may also be elevated ahead of the company’s second-quarter earnings report on August 11. In addition, PAL was raised to ‘Outperform’ from ‘Sector Perform’ with a 12-month target share price of $6.00 at RBC Capital Markets this week. The overall reading of options implied volatility on the mining company rose 11.2% to 62.32% this afternoon. VMED  - Virgin Media, Inc. –  Large prints in Virgin…