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Dealer Flow
How the Gamma Flip Behaves on FOMC Days
The gamma flip is your regime line every day — but on an FOMC day it's a moving target, and knowing when it moves keeps you on the right side of the 2pm whipsaw.
NoVo Options Trading · 2026
The gamma flip — the price where dealer hedging switches from dampening to amplifying — is a live estimate that shifts with positioning. On a Fed day, positioning does something specific, so the flip behaves in a recognizable pattern worth planning around.
Into 2pm: coiled and defensive
Ahead of the announcement, traders hedge and the tape often pins in a tight range — a positive-gamma, low-conviction drift as the market waits. Implied volatility is elevated and the flip tends to sit where it can, but the whole map is provisional: it's built on positioning that's about to be repriced. Trading the pre-2pm chop as if the levels are firm is the classic mistake.
After 2pm: the rehedge
Once the statement and press conference hit, the actual move repositions the entire options book — new strikes get bought, old hedges unwind — and the flip can jump to a new level. Cross it and the regime genuinely changes: a market that was dampened all afternoon can flip to amplifying in minutes. The 2:00–2:30 window is where the day's real structure is set, not the hour before it.
The pre-Fed map is a placeholder. The map that matters is the one that prints after the market has repriced the news.
How to trade it
Respect that pre-2pm levels are soft, and don't marry a flip computed on stale positioning. Many scalpers stand aside through the first violent minutes and trade the structure that forms once the dust settles — reading the fresh flip and walls rather than the ones the market just invalidated. A live-updated dealer map matters most on exactly these days, because the version from an hour ago is already wrong.
More on this: The Powell Testimony Days: Trading SPY Around Congressional Q&A
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NoVo is a software tool for market analysis and for executing trades you initiate, not financial advice. This article is general education, not investment advice. Options trading involves substantial risk of loss, up to and including your entire capital. NoVo makes no guarantee of profit, win rate, or performance, and past results do not predict future outcomes. You are responsible for your own broker account, configuration, and trading decisions.