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Options

This category is for people who want to collect premium without turning the account into a lottery ticket. Covered calls. Cash-secured puts. Defined risk. The short version first, then the reason. You get paid to stand ready. You may buy shares you already liked. You may sell shares you already own. That is a job with a payoff schedule, not a personality, and not a screenshot of a yearly rate.

The danger is rarely the mechanic. The danger is the story you tell about the paycheck. A 2 percent premium is not a 24 percent year. Annualizing a short cycle as if you can stack it twelve times without a gap is how accounts get sized for a calm month and then meet a crash. Idle cash, assignment, fees, and a single ugly week all refuse to live inside that multiplier. Report the cycle you actually ran. Build a year from a year, not from a costume.

I will not name a broker. I will not pick a live ticker for you. Examples use a fictional name and hypothetical figures, labeled as such. I will not tell you a good annualized return to target. Higher premium usually means more risk, a closer strike, less time, or richer implied volatility. Those are settings. They are not a raise. The scanner on this site scores a cash-secured put or a covered call against rules from The Premium Collector. It is educational. It is not a recommendation to buy or sell anything.

Read this if you want the arithmetic in plain language. Then run a ticker you already like through the scanner. Confirm every number at your own broker before you sell. Leave a margin in the account so one bad week does not end you. Be the house, not the lottery ticket. The house still has a bad night. Size for the night.

In this category

  1. 01OptionsAnnualized return is the number most option sellers get wrongA 2 percent premium is not a 24 percent year. Here is the arithmetic on a cash-secured put.6 min read

Short answers

What trades do you write about?
Covered calls and cash-secured puts with defined risk. Not lottery tickets. Not undefined short premium.
Why is annualized return misleading?
A short cycle is not a year. Multiplying a 2 percent premium by twelve ignores idle cash, assignment, fees, and losing months.
Do you recommend tickers or brokers?
No. Examples use a fictional ticker and hypothetical figures, labeled as such. Confirm every quote at your own broker.
Is this financial advice?
No. Educational only. The scanner is a calculator. It is not a broker and not a recommendation to buy or sell any security.

Educational only. Not financial advice. Not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Not a broker. Disclosures.

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