Contrarian Strategists Dominate XLF Options

  Today’s tickers: XLF, COH, OXY & SH Higher than estimated initial jobless claims of 429,000 compounded a revision higher to prior data in a sign the economic recovery remains anemic. Lowered growth forecasts and some earlier words of caution from central bankers Trichet and Bernanke reminded investors of what many already knew to be true: strong headwinds such as the European debt crisis, stubbornly high U.S. unemployment, and data showing manufacturing is slowing in the U.S. and Europe – just to name a few – represent serious threats to growth. Even the pace of China’s manufacturing appears to be slowing, possibly rising at its slowest pace in nearly a year, as weaker demand translates into fewer export orders amid the central bank’s efforts to combat inflation with interest rate hikes and higher reserve requirements. Add to all of that the International Energy Agency’s most recent announcement and it’s no wonder global markets are on the decline. The opening bell in U.S. trading on Thursday saw the VIX spike well above 10%, crossing the psychological 20-level for the 5th time in the past 7 trading sessions, as renewed fears drove sellers to the marketplace. XLF  - Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF –  Contrarian strategists are out in numbers today while other market participants watching the broad-market decline accelerating are opting to head for the hills. Financials are not the worst performing sector today, but shares in the XLF, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the performance of the Financials sector of the S&P 500 Index, did decline as much as 2.2% this morning to $14.67. Options volume on the financials ETF jumped after a massive bullish transaction was initiated in the September contract. It looks like one or more traders purchased a call butterfly spread, buying a total of 27,000 calls…