The shares of Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (BRCD: sentiment, chart, options) plummeted on Tuesday in response to the company's earnings report and outlook. The firm stated that earnings rolled in at $33.6 million, or 7 cents a share, down from $35.6 million, or 9 cents a share, a year earlier. The latest results include Ethernet-switch and router maker Foundry Networks, which Brocade bought in December. Excluding stock-based compensation and other items, earnings fell to 15 cents a share, while revenue climbed 31% to $521.8 million. Analysts estimated earnings of 13 cents on revenue of $521.8 million. Looking ahead, Brocade predicted fiscal-year earnings of 56 cents to 61 cents on revenue of $2.25 billion to $2.45 billion. Analysts were looking for earnings of 61 cents a share on revenue of $2.28 billion.

As a result, options trading was brisk on BRCD, as the security saw more than 66,300 contracts change hands. This volume was more than double the stock's average daily trading volume of 27,004 contracts. Furthermore, 79.9% of the volume changed hands on the call side, according to data from WhatsTrading.com.

Digging deeper into the action, the December 9 call added 4,500 new positions, while the December 7 call increased its open interest by 2,500 contracts. Meanwhile, the December 7 put added 3,000 new positions. In the January series, the 7.50 put added 2,300 new positions, while both the January 7.50 and 10 calls added less than 2,000 contracts each.

Overall, calls have been the option of choice on BRCD on the International Securities Exchange (ISE). During the past 10 trading sessions, nearly 10 calls have been purchased to open for every one put purchased to open. This ratio of calls to puts is higher than 67% of all those taken during the past 12 months.