Hindsight Markets Small-cap stocks on August 19, 2026
FEMY on August 19, 2026: why it ran
On August 19, 2026, FEMY opened up 36.4% from the previous close of 2.20 and reached 3.69 at 9:33 a.m. ET. The exchange did not halt it.
- Previous close
- 2.20
- Open, 9:30 a.m.
- 3.00
- Gap at the open
- up 36.4%
- Pre-market high
- 3.50 at 9:18 a.m.
- High, 4 a.m. to 4 p.m.
- 3.69 at 9:33 a.m.
- Low, 4 a.m. to 4 p.m.
- 2.07
- After-hours high, 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.
- 2.75 at 4:00 p.m.
- Last trade before 4:00 p.m.
- 2.66
- Volume
- 12.43 million
- Relative volume
- 140.2x
- Float
- 8.28 million shares, from filings as of August 19, 2026
- Shares outstanding
- 8.38 million
- Halts
- none in the halt feed
Replay FEMY's day
It starts at 9:00 a.m. ET with the real Level 2, time and sales and chart, from the same feed the replay plays, stops at 9:03 a.m. and asks what you would do. Or press Play on any moment in How it traded.
The day, step by step
- Small cap
- Momentum
- Main move: pre-market and the open
- Low float
- Gap and fade
- Ask wall pulled
- Lower high
- Float traded about 1x
Pre-market: nothing, then 9:00
The previous close was $2.20. On August 18, 48,653 shares traded. This is a stock with a float of 8.28 million shares and very little normal volume.
The first trade on the 19th was at $2.17 at 4:04 a.m. After that it barely traded. Most minutes had a few dozen shares, and the biggest before 9:00 was 298 shares at 8:18. The last print before 9:00 was $2.19 at 8:21.
At 9:00 a.m. that changed. In one minute it went from $2.23 to $2.71 on 38,696 shares. Then it fell just as fast. At 9:01 it hit $2.07, the low so far.
It climbed back through the next ten minutes and reached $2.69 at 9:11. At 9:13 it was down at $2.40, on 71,247 shares. It was working between $2.40 and $2.69 from 9:11 to 9:16.
Stop It's 9:17. FEMY is at $2.63. Since 9:11 it has traded between $2.40 and $2.69, and $3.00 is above. Would you buy here?
Press play: the real Level 2, time and sales and chart stop at 9:17 a.m. ET for your call, then show what happened. The clip starts at 9:14 a.m. ET.
The 9:17 minute went to $3.31 on 238,170 shares. That was the first trade through $3.00. At 9:18 it reached $3.50, the pre-market high, on 384,307 shares.
It did not hold. At 9:21 it was back at $2.95, and at 9:22 it fell to $2.72. One sell order at 9:22:47 hit the book for 30,460 shares, from $3.04 down to $2.97 across 8 price levels. The pre-market closed with 2.998 million shares traded. From 9:25 to 9:29 it traded between $2.81 and $3.13.
The open and the wall at $3.97
The open was $3.00, up 36% from the previous close. A single 40,042-share trade printed at $2.96 at 9:30:00. That is about 0.5% of the float in one trade.
At 9:31 it ran to $3.62, on 681,185 shares. A buy order at 9:31:28 took 31,815 shares from $3.45 to $3.52 across 8 levels. The next minute it dropped to $3.12 as a sell order took 23,683 shares from $3.37 to $3.29 at 9:32:08.
Here is what a chart doesn't show. At 9:32:25 an ask wall showed up at $3.97, above the market.
Stop It's 9:33. FEMY is at $3.29, after a 9:31 high of $3.62 and a 9:32 low of $3.12. An ask wall has been sitting at $3.97 since 9:32. Would you buy here?
Press play: the real Level 2, time and sales and chart stop at 9:33 a.m. ET for your call, then show what happened. The clip starts at 9:30 a.m. ET.
Here's what happened. In the 9:33 minute it ran to $3.69, the high of the day, on 591,962 shares. It never got to $3.97. The wall was pulled at 9:33:33. Nobody traded through it. The next minute the low was $3.23, and the 9:34 candle closed at $3.54.
The lower highs and the first flush
At 9:35 it pushed to $3.65, a lower high under $3.69. A buy order at 9:35:04 took 31,282 shares from $3.58 to $3.63. At 9:37 it reached $3.60, lower again.
Then it fell. The 9:39 candle went down to $2.92 and 9:40 hit $2.65, on over 300,000 shares in each minute. In the 9:45 minute two sell orders hit the book: 26,616 shares from $2.81 to $2.75, then 26,049 shares from $2.73 to $2.65. The 9:49 low was $2.53.
By 10:04, counting pre-market, more shares had traded than exist in the whole float (8.28 million).
One more try at 10:12
From $2.79 at 10:01 it worked back up. A buy order at 10:09:58 took 23,662 shares, $2.99 to $3.01. At 10:12 it hit $3.27, and a buy order at 10:12:44 took 25,073 shares from $3.20 to $3.24.
At 10:13:22 a single 36,966-share trade printed at $3.08, at the bid. In the same second a 39,036-share buy order ran from $3.08 to $3.14. The 10:13 high was $3.28. The 10:16 minute (high $3.22) was the last one above $3.20. By 10:26 it was at $2.63.
The rest of the day
From 10:27 to 11:07 it sat between $2.61 and $2.87 on thin volume. At 11:08 it broke down, from $2.73 to $2.54 on 83,830 shares. It kept sliding to $2.27 at 11:19, the low after the open.
It bounced to $2.51 by 11:27 and then spent the afternoon mostly between $2.46 and $2.82.
At 1:36 p.m. Benzinga ran: “Femasys Secures FDA Pathway for Non-Surgical Contraceptive.” The stock was around $2.73 to $2.75. In the next five minutes it traded between $2.69 and $2.78 on small volume.
It closed at $2.66, 28% under the $3.69 high of the day. After hours another 130,679 shares traded.
By the close, 9.30 million shares had traded in the regular session, a bit more than the float. For the whole day it traded about 140 times its normal volume.
What to take from it
- A big ask wall can disappear without being traded through. The $3.97 wall was pulled at 9:33:33 and the stock topped at $3.69, below it.
- After the top, the next pushes stopped lower. $3.69 at 9:33, $3.65 at 9:35, $3.60 at 9:37, then $3.28 at 10:13.
- Most of the move was gone by the close. It closed at $2.66, 28% below the high, and it traded between $2.69 and $2.78 in the five minutes after the 1:36 p.m. headline.
Why it ran
News and SEC filings for FEMY published between the previous session's close and the first minute FEMY traded 20% above it, at 9:00 a.m. ET, newest first, from the same feeds the replay shows.
No news found before the move.
How it traded
Gap, run and fade. It gapped up 36.4% to 3.00 at the open, ran from the open to the high of 3.69 in 3 minutes, then gave back 149% of that move by 4:00 p.m., trading at 2.66.
| Time (ET) | What happened | Watch it |
|---|---|---|
| 9:00 a.m. | First trade 20% above the previous close of 2.20 | |
| 9:18 a.m. | Pre-market high, 3.50 | |
| 9:30 a.m. | The open: 3.00, up 36.4% from the previous close | |
| 9:33 a.m. | High of the day to the close, 3.69 | |
| 10:04 a.m. | Volume since 4:00 a.m. passes the whole float, 8.28 million shares | |
| 3:59 p.m. | Last trade before the 4:00 p.m. close, 2.66, 27.9% below the high |
The shape is a fixed rule, not a judgement: gapped 10% or more at the open, ran 10% or more from the open to the high, and faded if it gave back 30% or more of that move by the close.
The day in numbers
- Volume, from the one-minute bars: 3.00 million shares before the 9:30 a.m. open (24%), 5.18 million in the first 30 minutes (42%), and 4.26 million in the rest of the day to 8 p.m. (34%).
- Float rotation, the volume since 4 a.m. against the float of 8.28 million shares: past it once at 10:04 a.m.
- In our recaps, this is the only day FEMY met the small-cap rule.
Halts
The exchange's halt feed shows no halts for FEMY that day.
On this date the LULD plan ran under Amendment 18, in force from February 24, 2020: no band doubling at the open, and the closing doubling only for Tier 1 stocks and Tier 2 stocks whose previous close was at or below three dollars. See LULD halts or work out a band with the LULD calculator.
Trade this day
Replay FEMY on August 19, 2026 in Hindsight Markets: the real tape, the order book and the halts, on a clock you control, and see where your orders would have filled.