Gold Fields (GFI: sentiment, chart, options) has shaken off a downgrade this morning to rally more than 8% this afternoon. The shares were knocked lower at UBS from "buy" to "neutral," but investors have paid little attention to the downgrade. The security is rebounding from Monday's loss of more than 17%. However, from a longer-term perspective, the stock remains locked in a long-term downtrend under its 10-week and 20-week moving averages. In fact, since mid-November 2007, GFI has logged only 2 weekly closes above these intermediate-term moving averages.

Overall, Wall Street is skeptical of the shares. According to Zacks, GFI has earned 2 "buy" ratings, 2 "holds," and 2 "sells." With the stock locked in a downtrend, more downgrades could be on the way.

Pessimism could also be on the rise among options players. While the Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio for GFI stands at a paltry 0.22, the International Securities Exchange (ISE) has witnessed an increase in put trading. During the past 10 sessions, there has been an average of 3.6 puts purchased to open for every 1 call bought to open. This ratio of puts to calls is higher than 99% of all those taken during the past year, indicating extreme levels of growing pessimism.