What Is the RepeatedHits Options Signal?
Learn what it means when the same options strike gets hit multiple times in a session — a key signal of institutional accumulation and conviction.
What is this?
The RepeatedHits signal fires when the same strike and expiration receive multiple separate trades within a single trading session. This pattern reveals institutional accumulation — a fund systematically building a position by breaking a large order into smaller pieces to avoid tipping off the market.
Why Institutions Break Up Orders
A hedge fund wanting to buy 20,000 contracts doesn't execute one trade — that would immediately move the market against them. Instead, they use algorithmic execution to drip the order in over minutes or hours: 500 here, 800 there, 1,200 more. Each individual trade looks unremarkable, but the pattern of 10, 15, or 20 hits on the same contract reveals the campaign. This iceberg order behavior is distinct from retail activity, which rarely concentrates on a single strike repeatedly.
Identifying the Pattern
RepeatedHits is identified by counting distinct transactions on the same contract (ticker + strike + expiry + option type) within a session. Five or more hits is significant. Ten or more is highly significant. The pattern is even stronger when: each successive trade hits the ask (buyer aggression), trade sizes are consistent (algorithmic execution), and the hits span 30-60 minutes (sustained campaign rather than a single burst).
RepeatedHits vs Single Large Trade
A single 10,000-contract block trade might be impressive, but it could be a hedge, a roll, or part of a spread. Ten separate 1,000-contract trades on the same strike over two hours is almost certainly a deliberate accumulation campaign. The repeated, independent decision to buy more at each price level demonstrates sustained conviction that a one-time block doesn't.
Why does it matter?
RepeatedHits is one of the most reliable institutional behavior signals because it reveals deliberate, sustained conviction rather than a single decision point.
The Conviction Gradient
Think of institutional signals on a conviction gradient. At the low end: a single block trade (could be anything). In the middle: a sweep (shows urgency). At the high end: repeated hits over an extended period (shows a campaign). Each additional hit on the same contract raises the probability that this is informed, directional positioning. By the 10th hit, coincidence becomes implausible.
Why Retail Doesn't Create This Pattern
Retail traders buy options in ones and twos, on different strikes, at different times. Even when retail enthusiasm concentrates on a single stock (meme stock events), the activity spreads across dozens of strikes. Concentrated, repeated activity on a single strike is almost exclusively institutional behavior — which is why it's such a clean filter for separating smart money from noise.
Combining with Other Signals
RepeatedHits becomes most powerful when combined with other conviction indicators: ask-side execution (aggressive buying), ascending fills (paying more each time), volume exceeding open interest (new positions), and no upcoming earnings (not an event bet). When all these signals align on a single contract, the conviction level is at its maximum.
How Flow Proof helps
Flow Proof detects RepeatedHits patterns automatically and integrates them into the conviction scoring system.
Automatic Detection
The platform counts distinct transactions per contract within each session. When the same strike receives 5+ separate trades, the RepeatedHits flag activates. This detection runs in real time — as hits accumulate throughout the day, the conviction score for that contract increases dynamically.
Scoring Boost
RepeatedHits is weighted heavily in the conviction score. A contract with 10+ hits and ask-side execution receives a significant scoring boost that can push it from WATCH to STRONG territory. The scoring reflects the empirical observation that repeated institutional activity on a single contract has a higher directional hit rate than any other flow signal.
Alert Feed Display
In the whale tracker, RepeatedHits alerts are tagged with the hit count (e.g., "12 HITS") and show the total accumulated premium across all hits. This aggregate view reveals the full size of the institutional campaign that individual trade-level analysis would miss.
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