So say i have a 60k account recently opened up on tasty. My strategy is to sell 0DTE SPY puts wayyy OTM and collect a small premium. Unfortunately, I only have enough cash to sell 1 contract. How does margin work in Tasty and how can I sell 3-5 contracts daily?

Years ago, when I first got into options trading, I started with naked puts and calls. As you can probably guess, that didn’t go well. I blew up my portfolio a couple of times and realized I needed to seriously change my approach if I didn’t want to lose everything.

That’s when I discovered theta gang, and more specifically, the wheel strategy. It’s been working well for me so far. I’m not aiming for insane returns like WSB folks shooting for 1000%, and I’m definitely not rich — just trying to trade smart and stay consistent.

But here’s the thing… those early losses left me kind of traumatized. So much so that I now have a mental block when it comes to hedging. For example, even when I’m heavy on CSPs, I hesitate to buy puts for downside protection. I know there are plenty of strategies out there, and I know I should be more versatile, but all I can bring myself to do is run the wheel — sell puts, get assigned, then sell covered calls.

Lately, with the market being down so much, I’ve been wishing I had it in me to hedge properly. Even if I’m wrong, at least I wouldn’t be going full YOLO like I did back in the day. But the fear from those past burns still lingers.

Does anyone else deal with this kind of dilemma? How do you mentally or strategically approach hedging without spiraling into the risky behavior of your past? Would love to hear your thoughts — and thanks for reading if you made it this far.

Hello,

I am a meme now or something idk. I have an account value of $60k and I sold naked puts for apple before the volatility happened that were exercised early. My cost basis is $230 after premium is factored in.

Since they got exercised early my account cash balance is -20k. I could sell the stocks immediately and get my account to 0 and that would realize about a $4k loss.

Would it be viable to sell 30 DTE CC's to cover the margin interest? I estimate it will be about $135 ($20k * .0824/12). I will have to sell CC's below my strike price but it will lessen my realized loss if AAPL climbs above the strike, and I don't mind holding apple long term if they don't get realized. If I get margin called and my AAPL position is liquidated I can accept that $4k loss. At this point I'm not looking at a profit for a while, just trying to see if I can survive during this volatility without realizing the loss

Does RH allow selling naked puts with margin?

Keep it friendly and civil; this is not WSB and automod will censor your posts at will for unsavory and unfriendly remarks. Try to keep shit posting and bragging to a minimum.

I’d love to hold into next week but figured I’d lock some profits before earnings

Not sure I’ve got a true hold or understanding, but not gonna lie. I’ve been using ChatGPT to help breakdown and understand a little better.

If I had more contracts, I would definitely hold a couple to see how this all plays out

Highest Premium

These options offer the highest ratio of implied volatility (IV) relative to historical volatility (HV). These options are priced to move significantly more than they have moved in the past. Sell iron condors on these as they may be over priced.

Expensive Calls

These call options offer the highest ratio of bullish premium paid (IV) relative to historical volatility (HV). These options are priced expecting the underlying to move up significantly more than it has moved up in the past. Sell these calls.

Expensive Puts

These put options offer the highest ratio of bearish premium paid (IV) relative to historical volatility (HV). These options are priced expecting the underlying to move down significantly more than it has moved down in the past. Sell these puts.

• Historical Move v Implied Move: We determine the historical volatility (standard deviation of daily log returns) of the underlying asset and compare that to the current implied volatility (IV) of the option price. We use the same DTE as a look back period. This is used to determine the Call or Put Premium associated with the pricing of options (implied volatility).

• Directional Bias: Ranges from negative (bearish) to positive (bullish) and accounts for RSI, price trend, moving averages, and put/call skew over the past 6 weeks.

• Priced Move: given the current option prices, how much in dollar amounts will the underlying have to move to make the call/put break even. This is how much vol the option is pricing in. The expected move.

• Expiration: 2025-05-16.

• Call/Put Premium: How much extra you are paying for the implied move relative to the historic move. Low numbers mean options are "cheaper." High numbers mean options are "expensive."

• Efficiency: This factor represents the bid/ask spreads and the depth of the order book relative to the price of the option. It represents how much traders will pay in slippage with a round trip trade. Lower numbers are less efficient than higher numbers.

• E.R.: Days unitl the next Earnings Release. This feature is still in beta as we work on a more complete list of earnings dates.

• Why isn't my stock on this list? It doesn't have "weeklies", the underlying is "too cheap", or the options markets are too illiquid (open interest) to qualify for this strategy. 480 underlyings are used in this report and only the top results end up passing the criteria for each filter.

Is bro ok?

If I sell a CC or a CSP with let's say 24 months/2 years in expiry, and let's say my lots expire 2 years from now, even then it will be considered Short Term, although I am bound to hold underlying stock( for CC) or collateral( for CSP) for 2 years ?

Not clear from google/chatgpt

Came across this article (pub. in 2013) about the enhanced wheel strategy.

The author takes the classic Wheel strategy and adds a twist: instead of just selling naked puts and covered calls, they layer in ratio spreads—selling multiple puts and buying one further OTM put—to collect more premium with some limited downside protection.

• Sell 2 puts, buy 1 further OTM put (ratio spread) instead of just a cash-secured put
• When assigned, write covered calls like in the standard Wheel
• Potentially generate more income while managing downside a bit better

It’s an interesting blend of premium harvesting and defined risk. Curious if anyone here has tried this? Does the extra complexity pay off in your experience? Or do you think it's better to keep it simple with CSPs and CCs?

I live off of bond payments and saved up 10k for trading. Will any broker let me sell spreads with only 10k and no job? My spreadsheet calculations won’t let me pull out more capital for this level of risk

With the potential negative impact of tariffs on international semiconductors do you think Intel could end up having an edge since they are already well established in domestic production?

Damn.

Down 5%.

RIP.

Who's feeling liberated?????

I bought a 0DTE 10-lot QQQ call spread that expired ITM yesterday (04/02). QQQ closed at 8 bucks in the money (15 bucks ITM at 4:15 ET, 8 bucks OTM 05:30 PM), but the broker only exercised the long option today at 1 AM. I got exercised 1,000 shares, which were sold at pre-market after the after-hours drop. Isn’t that a broken spread? Shouldn’t it have auto-settled for max value based on the 4:00 or 4:15 PM close? I have a huge margin call now. The max loss for the trade was 490 for 10 options but I have a margin call now and the broker sold my all longs with loss of 6 dollar per call (i.e. 6000). I sent email to the broker explaining the situation. Does broker typically fix this automatically or should I call them? Do I still get my credit of 1 dollar per call as the trade expired deep in money?

Edit: corrected for clarity

Sold two Naked Puts and pick'd up three long-awaited high-quality tickers.

Fear is in the air. Buffett time. Happy trading!

Edit to add: 2018, 2020, 2022...the same old song. We've all seen this movie (multiple times) before. gl

Do any of you trade CSP's on SPY, usually 0DTE? I've been playing around with this strategy and has been relatively successful so far. I wait for market to settle and am conservative with my strikes, usually 500 BP or more less than strike px. The biggest downside I've seen is that it requires a relatively large/mid sized account for this

Cheers

Keep it friendly and civil; this is not WSB and automod will censor your posts at will for unsavory and unfriendly remarks. Try to keep shit posting and bragging to a minimum.

Alright folks, who is facing the grim liquidator?

I know there are some of you out there in financial ruin right now. Don't face it silently, let us know and live forever as a cautionary tale!

$110, 351 DTE - assume $20.00 premium.

~18٪ on money locked up + interest from cash. Effective basis of $90 if assigned which is basically pre-covid.

Is the outlook thaaaaat bad?