PESI Butterfly Strategy
PESI (Perma-Fix Environmental Services, Inc.), in the Industrials sector, (Waste Management industry), listed on NASDAQ.
Perma-Fix Environmental Services, Inc., through its subsidiaries, operates as an environmental and technology know-how company in the United States. It operates in three segments: Treatment, Services, and Medical. The Treatment segment offers nuclear, low-level radioactive, mixed waste, hazardous and non-hazardous waste treatment, and processing and disposal services through treatment and storage facilities. This segment is also involved in the research and development activities to identify, develop, and implement waste processing techniques for problematic waste streams. The Services segment provides technical services, including professional radiological measurement and site survey of government and commercial installations; integrated occupational safety and health services; and consulting, engineering, project and waste management, environmental, decontamination and decommissioning (D&D) field, technical, on-site waste management services, and management personnel and services. This segment also offers nuclear services, including technology-based services comprising engineering, D&D, specialty, construction, logistics, transportation, processing, and disposal; offers remediation of nuclear licensed and federal facilities, as well as cleanup of nuclear legacy sites; and owns an equipment calibration and maintenance laboratory that services, maintains, calibrates, and sources health physics, industrial hygiene, and customized nuclear, environmental, and occupational safety and health instrumentation.
PESI (Perma-Fix Environmental Services, Inc.) trades in the Industrials sector, specifically Waste Management, with a market capitalization of approximately $180.1M, a beta of 0.61 versus the broader market, a 52-week range of 8.02-16.5, average daily share volume of 168K, a public-listing history dating back to 1992, approximately 293 full-time employees. These structural characteristics shape how PESI stock options price implied volatility around earnings windows, capital events, and macro-driven sector rotations.
A beta of 0.61 indicates PESI has historically moved less than the broader market, dampening realized volatility and producing tighter expected-move bands per unit of dollar exposure.
What is a butterfly on PESI?
A long call butterfly buys one lower-strike call, sells two ATM calls, and buys one higher-strike call, paying a small net debit for a defined-risk position that maxes out if the underlying pins the middle strike at expiration.
Current PESI snapshot
As of May 15, 2026, spot at $9.75, ATM IV 69.10%, IV rank 14.05%, expected move 19.81%. The butterfly on PESI below is built from the same end-of-day chain, with strikes snapped to listed contracts and premiums pulled from the bid/ask midpoint at a 34-day expiry.
Why this butterfly structure on PESI specifically: PESI IV at 69.10% is on the cheap side of its 1-year range, which favors premium-buying structures like a PESI butterfly, with a market-implied 1-standard-deviation move of approximately 19.81% (roughly $1.93 on the underlying). The 34-day window matched to the front-month expiry keeps theta exposure bounded while still capturing the post-snapshot move; longer-dated PESI expiries trade a higher absolute premium for lower per-day decay. Position sizing on PESI should anchor to the underlying notional of $9.75 per share and to the trader's directional view on PESI stock.
PESI butterfly setup
The PESI butterfly below is built from the end-of-day chain, with each option leg priced at the bid/ask midpoint of its listed strike. With PESI near $9.75, the first option leg uses a $9.26 strike; additional legs (when the strategy has them) anchor to spot-relative offsets. Premiums come from the bid/ask midpoint on the listed PESI chain at a 34-day expiry; the cross-strike IV skew is reflected directly in the per-leg values rather than approximated. Quantity sizing assumes one contract per option leg (or 100 PESI shares for the stock leg in covered calls and collars).
| Action | Type | Strike / Basis | Premium (est) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buy 1 | Call | $9.26 | N/A |
| Sell 2 | Call | $9.75 | N/A |
| Buy 1 | Call | $10.24 | N/A |
PESI butterfly risk and reward
- Net Premium / Debit
- N/A
- Max Profit (per contract)
- Unbounded
- Max Loss (per contract)
- Unbounded
- Breakeven(s)
- None on modeled curve
- Risk / Reward Ratio
- N/A
Max profit equals the wing width minus net debit times 100 (reached when the underlying pins the middle strike); max loss equals the net debit times 100. Two breakevens at lower-wing plus debit and upper-wing minus debit.
PESI butterfly payoff curve
Modeled P&L at expiration across a range of underlying prices for the butterfly on PESI. Each row is one sampled price point from the computed payoff curve; the full curve uses 200 price points internally before being summarized into 10 rows here.
When traders use butterfly on PESI
Butterflies on PESI are pinning bets - traders use them when they expect PESI to settle near a specific level at expiration (often the prior close, a round number, or the max-pain strike) and want defined-risk exposure to that outcome.
PESI thesis for this butterfly
The market-implied 1-standard-deviation range for PESI extends from approximately $7.82 on the downside to $11.68 on the upside. A PESI long call butterfly is a pinning play: it pays maximum at the middle strike if PESI settles there at expiration, with the wing legs capping both the cost and the maximum loss to the net debit. Current PESI IV rank near 14.05% sits in the lower third of its 1-year distribution, where IV often re-expands toward the mean; this favors premium-buying structures and disadvantages premium-selling structures on PESI at 69.10%. As a Industrials name, PESI options can move on sector-level news flow (peer earnings, regulatory updates, industry-specific macro data) in addition to PESI-specific events.
PESI butterfly positions are structurally neutral / pin (limited-risk, limited-reward); the modeled P&L assumes European-style exercise at expiration and ignores early assignment, transaction costs, dividends paid before expiry on the stock leg (when present), and the bid-ask spread on the listed chain. PESI positions also carry Industrials sector concentration risk; news flow inside the sector (peer earnings, regulatory shifts, supply-chain headlines) can move PESI alongside the broader basket even when PESI-specific fundamentals are unchanged. Always rebuild the position from current PESI chain quotes before placing a trade.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a butterfly on PESI?
- A butterfly on PESI is the butterfly strategy applied to PESI (stock). The strategy is structurally neutral / pin (limited-risk, limited-reward): A long call butterfly buys one lower-strike call, sells two ATM calls, and buys one higher-strike call, paying a small net debit for a defined-risk position that maxes out if the underlying pins the middle strike at expiration. With PESI stock trading near $9.75, the strikes shown on this page are snapped to the nearest listed PESI chain strike and the premiums come straight from the end-of-day bid/ask midpoint.
- How are PESI butterfly max profit and max loss calculated?
- Max profit equals the wing width minus net debit times 100 (reached when the underlying pins the middle strike); max loss equals the net debit times 100. Two breakevens at lower-wing plus debit and upper-wing minus debit. For the PESI butterfly priced from the end-of-day chain at a 30-day expiry (ATM IV 69.10%), the computed maximum profit is unbounded per contract and the computed maximum loss is unbounded per contract. Live intraday quotes will differ as the chain moves through the trading session.
- What is the breakeven for a PESI butterfly?
- The breakeven for the PESI butterfly priced on this page is no defined breakeven on the modeled curve at expiration, derived from end-of-day chain premiums. Breakeven is the underlying price at which the strategy's P&L crosses zero ignoring transaction costs and assignment risk. The current PESI market-implied 1-standard-deviation expected move is approximately 19.81%; if the move sits well outside the breakeven distance, the structure's risk-reward becomes correspondingly tighter.
- When should you consider a butterfly on PESI?
- Butterflies on PESI are pinning bets - traders use them when they expect PESI to settle near a specific level at expiration (often the prior close, a round number, or the max-pain strike) and want defined-risk exposure to that outcome.
- How does current PESI implied volatility affect this butterfly?
- PESI ATM IV is at 69.10% with IV rank near 14.05%, which is on the low end of its 1-year range. Premium-buying structures (long call, long put, debit spreads) are relatively cheap in this regime; premium-selling structures collect less credit per unit risk.