It is funny, think who wrote those calls first. You think retailers wrote
calls to institutions? That's really funny.
You can think this way, the funds longed apple since long time before it got
split, and now the are worrying about the downside possibility, so they
just wrote some very deep ITM calls for protection, and the call expiration
date will be their scheduled exiting date. By doing this, the don't need to
worry about a price cut, yet if the stock price drops to a certain degree,
they still have a chance to buy them back at a discounted price, that's a
strategic play, doesn't necessarily mean anyone is going to manipulate the
stock. Some other institutions think the other way around, they think it is
still a good time to long apple, so they bought the calls. Retailers would
never buy such deep ITM calls at all, it is expensive and it can drop to
zero in value.
