Narration: AI voice.
One file, two numbers
Max pain and the put call ratio, for Bank Nifty and Nifty. Both come from one place: NSE end-of-day data. One file, after the close. Levels for the next session. First, the method. Then the published numbers, from the October 15, 2026 close. And what they don't tell you.
Where the data comes from
Every number on these pages comes from NSE's end-of-day F&O file. It's published after the market closes at 3:30 p.m. India time. SquawkFlow reads it once, after publication, and computes levels for the next session. Nothing on the pages updates during the session. Open interest is the settled end-of-day figure. Counted in units, not lots, because lot sizes get revised.
Max pain, the method
Max pain belongs to one expiry. Start with the open interest at every strike. Now treat one strike as the settlement price. Add up what every in-the-money call and put would pay its holder. Repeat for every strike. The strike with the smallest total is max pain. Two inputs only. Open interest and strikes. No option prices. No volatility. And no assumption about who holds what. Two settlement facts. NSE index options are European style and cash settled, with automatic exercise at expiry. Nobody exercises early. And the final settlement price comes from the index's official close on the last trading day. So when you compare max pain with an outcome, compare it with that close.
PCR, the method
PCR on these pages is the open interest version. Total put open interest, divided by total call open interest, in units. It's published two ways. Across all listed expiries, and for the nearest one. It describes positioning at the close. It is not a signal. A ratio says how many puts are open against calls. Not who holds them. Not why.
Reading the Bank Nifty page
Here's the Bank Nifty page. Top line, the source: NSE end-of-day data, October 15, 2026. These are levels for the session of Friday, October 16. The close: 55,810.5. Max pain: 55,800. Now read the line under it. That figure is for the Tuesday, October 27 expiry. PCR: 1.03 across all expiries. 1.08 for the nearest. The PCR page shows the arithmetic. Put open interest: 1,80,25,230 units. Call open interest: 1,74,74,490. Divide one by the other and you get 1.03. Below that, one row per expiry, each with its own ratio. And a history table. One row per session, added after each close. A dated record, not a signal. The levels page also lists every expiry with its own max pain. The nearest, Tuesday, October 27, is 12 days out: max pain 55,800, PCR 1.08. The next, Monday, November 23: max pain 57,000, PCR 0.77. Same index. Same close. Different numbers. The headline figure uses the nearest expiry. So read the expiry before the number.
Nifty runs on a different calendar
Now Nifty. The two indices run on different calendars. A SEBI circular of 1 October 2024 allowed each exchange weekly expiries on only one benchmark index, from 20 November 2024. NSE kept weekly options on Nifty 50. Bank Nifty went monthly only. Then an NSE circular of 25 June 2025 moved Bank Nifty's expiry from the last Thursday to the last Tuesday of the month. Today Nifty weeklies are listed on Tuesdays. And when an expiry day is a trading holiday, the contract expires on the trading day before. Here's the Nifty page, from the same October 15, 2026 close. Close: 22,997.35. Max pain: 22,900. The line under it says Monday, October 19. A weekly, 4 days out. The rule says Tuesday. Read the date printed on the page, not the rule. PCR: 1.37 across all expiries. 1.66 for the nearest. Put them side by side. Same close. Nifty's headline max pain, 22,900, is for a weekly 4 days away. Bank Nifty's, 55,800, is for the monthly, 12 days away. A book that far from expiry keeps changing every session. Same word. Two horizons. Don't read them as one.
Limits
The limits. These are end-of-day levels. Open interest changes through the session; these numbers don't. Settlement prices for illiquid strikes are theoretical prices computed by the exchange. And the idea that the index gets pulled to max pain at expiry? SquawkFlow's write-up knows of no comparable published study for Bank Nifty. The claim that option writers steer the index there on purpose is the weakest part of the folklore. Max pain is a positioning reference. Not a forecast.
Wrap
So. One end-of-day file. Two numbers. Two calendars. Read the data date first. Then the expiry. Then the figure. Max pain and PCR describe positioning at the close, nothing more. Full write-up and sources on the learn page linked with this video. Education, not advice.
Full write-up with sources: /learn/max-pain-bank-nifty-explained
Educational content, not investment advice.
Levels shown are as captured on 2026-10-15 16:00 ET; they are not current.