IV, implied volatility, is basically the reflection of current and future market bias direction. -- It's more or less the same thing to his question he's referring to.
These aren't correct prices. Did you just invent them?? 7 days till maturity correct? So that's about 35% annual interest rate. Dividends work the other way... unless it's a negative dividend, that will be a first. Neither lending issues, since that goes the other way as well... The pricing difference is just too big... that won't last 3 seconds. So either stale prices/wrong prices from yahoo or a very wide spread in either the spot and/or options. Or OP just thought I'll throw some numbers around that don't work.... My guess the latter... Re the question whether the pricing of a synthetic can tell market bias... no... it's derived from the spot, not the other way around. I don't know anywhere the options trade in a way that they are leading the underlying. You could possibly say something about bias when you look at skew... but not a synthetic.
+1. Agree with the above. Prices are off. That spread can only exist in a fringe market. If you buy a conversion to arb it, you might get the underlying called away and be stuck with the puts. You'd be long vol and no longer hedged, and potentially stuck on that position with no bids or borrow. You should look for the calls to early exercise -- such as due to XO dividend. That's your main risk in this scenario cause it can leave you naked on your conversion. Could also be an underlying with negative carry such as CHF, but with 7 days left it would have to be huge.
Right, the skew in the IV smile says the market is projecting one outcome more than another. You could also look at it as the markets fears one outcome over another. However, that's a probabilistic outcome. For example, a negative skew in the IV smile does not mean the price will go down over the time period you are evaluating.
It means I short the call, buy the shares, buy the put, and pocket $200 (more likely $140 after spreads / commissions / etc). That parity relationship is routinely violated by market forces, but once that violation gets larger than the transaction costs, it's arbitrage by someone with faster computers and larger rebates than you. With rebates in the mix, you can only get a penny or two (if that) past parity before this happens. You can see implied market direction in options, but it's far more discrete than just looking at the price.
%% Agree; not really bullish based on your bid/ask example, Kerry Newman. BUT if so inclined ,you could get a pretty good signal based on put call ratio, long story short. IBD[investors.com , for example put$ that put call ratio under its charts, in IBD newspaper, anyway] But I have enough indicators= so I seldom study put call ratio anymore, but it can be helpful........
If you get called away at those levels, there's no problem really... since you've sold the call at a premium to the put. So, that would be minimum of 2 dollars pocketed at full assignment... plus whatever is left in the put. No problem there.... bring it on. Negative carry isn't possible either, since the conversion is priced at 35% carry... negative carry would mean that call is priced below the put. Neither can this be an issue with European style options. In general, there's no way possible in which a conversion is priced very rich... if you can borrow cash normally. I only know of scenarios where it could be priced low, usually involves lending issues. The only time you would see something like this, is when we'd be looking at index options... and a stock in the index is halted due to a takeover where the options (and futures) are pricing in a higher level for that stock. The index spot would still be calculated with last traded price, but derivatives will add a premium. But, you should price those options of the futures anyway.