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The surprise jobs report gave the markets an early boost that may be tough to hold on to throughout a summer Friday when many folks tend to cut the work-day hours. July nonfarm payrolls slumped by 23,000 jobs, a big miss from an expectation of an 83,000 gain, and June and July’s numbers were significantly revised downward.
The markets seem to be mostly taking a breather after an active period of trading prompted by earnings results. Most were stronger, but some offered forward guidance that seemed to disappoint investors, leading to downward pressure.
U.S. equities were mixed in July as leadership narrowed after June's small-cap rotation. The S&P 500® Index was fractionally lower on the month, near 7,490, while the Russell 2000® Index (RUT) fell 3.1% to 2,931, giving back much of June's 4.3% gain but remaining up just over 18% year-to-date. The Cboe S&P 500 Equal Weight Index (SPEQX) rose 0.9% and the Cboe Magnificent 10℠ Index (MGTN) added 0.6%.
At 1/10th the size of SPX, XSP offers very similar notional size, weekly expirations, and PM-settlement to SPY, but with even more potential benefits.
Many trading strategies, such as covered-call or spread trading, involve options writing (selling), where the primary risks are market movement and volatility. But there's another risk if you happen to be writing options on dividend-paying equities like SPY ETFs: early assignment.
There are a number of different types of options contracts available on broad-based U.S. equity indexes. Some of the most actively traded products include options on SPY, SPX and XSPSM (Mini-SPX). They all track the S&P 500® and both SPY and XSP options have the same notional size, making them somewhat interchangeable. A key difference, however, is settlement style.
Cboe’s market activity increased in June with a record Average Daily Volume (ADV) of 23.3 billion, a high not seen since March 2020. Cboe's share of addressable market share increased to 21.9%, attributable to the continued adoption of premium products and Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) listings.
In June 2026, Cboe FX Spot Average Daily Volume (ADV) reached $59.6 billion, a 23.4% increase versus June 2025's ADV of $48.3 billion. Cboe SEF ADV1 topped $4.6 billion, representing a 59.0% increase from $2.9 billion in June 2025.
European equity trading volumes continued to soften during May following the high-volatility period at the start of the year, with activity shifting from continuous trading to Closing Auctions following the MSCI rebalance. Cboe Europe was the largest equities exchange by market share, supported by its diversified trading mechanism offering.
