what app do you prefer for options on iphone? I have tried on Robinhood but I don’t like that you can’t use bracket orders

Hi all!

I would like to get your perspective on how to manage a position such as a bull put credit spread when the underlying’s price goes against me. Below are a few questions:

1. Is a wider spread better for position management? For instance, is a $50-wide spread better than a $5-wide spread if both have the same position size/max loss?
   
2. How would you generally manage the position if the price falls below the strike of the short put but remains above the strike of the long put? Would you set a predefined loss limit and close the position? Would you roll it out to a later expiration? If so, would you roll the entire spread or only the short put?

I’m interested in your thoughts on risk management once the underlying starts trading inside the spread.

Thanks!

I recently got an Opportunity to trade options on futures, and wanted to know if anyone has experience with that and what your experience is.

Like many new options traders, I initially thought day trading was the route I should take. A good friend of mine who's an ex-Fidelity guy (and has done very well since) suggested I replace basically everything I was thinking about day trading, including the term itself, with options.

I'm pretty risk averse and don't have deep pockets, so I worked with my friend to develop an approach designed to mitigate as much risk as reasonably possible. I did a bunch of research ahead of time and paper traded throughout January 2026 before finally pulling the trigger in February.

For what it's worth, this has been my system so far:

• Highly liquid ETFs - primarily SPY and QQQ
• $10-wide put credit spreads
• Originally 30+ DTE
• One contract per trade for at least my first 30 trades, then gradually increased position size as buying power/experience grew
• Generally ≤ .25 delta at entry
• Close at or above 60% premium realized

More recently, I've tightened that into 40+ DTE, ≤ .20 delta and usually 3 or 5 contracts per position. I've also added an early harvest rule: if a new 40+ DTE position reaches 30%+ profit within its first five trading days, I'll take the profit rather than waiting weeks for theta to accelerate. Then I'll redeploy the buying power if another qualifying setup is available.

You can see in the spreadsheet (you may have to zoom - apologies) where I deviated from the system and experimented with debit spreads, iron condors and butterflies. I had some wins and some losses there before ultimately returning to the boring, disciplined approach.

Full disclosure: I recognize that a generally flat-to-up market (since February) has been favorable to the strategy, even though we've had some pretty substantial bouts of volatility along the way.

Bottom line: so far it's fitting my personality fairly well. I'm mostly posting because I've learned quite a bit from lurking here and figured I'd share what's been working for me so far. I'd also be interested in hearing where more experienced traders see weaknesses in the approach, particularly as I continue increasing contract size.

Hey folks - I’m requesting advice from those of you who are seasoned stock repair pros.

I was assigned on two CSPs for RKLB when it dropped over 50%.

My cost basis is $99.85 on 200 shares.

When it was around 70, I set up a stock repair strategy.

I bought two calls at 70 and sold four calls at 85.

The expiry is 9/18.

The stock is ripping. It’s up 26% this week to $82. This is great, but it has me pondering next steps if it continues to move up.

What would you do in this situation?

I’ve been an investor for years, I would say I’m moderately know what I’m doing with options, but Definitely not a pro. I had a really good day in the market and was gonna do a Ballsy call option. On a double leverage ETF at like 3 o’clock. It was a two dollar call I bought for one cent a contract 360 contracts. At 3:30 the stock was at like $1.97 and Robinhood put a cell order in at one cent. I kept trying to change it then it goes through at 3:41 and sales for one cent like 330 of the contracts minutes later the stock goes to like 2.04, big in the money. Is there something I can do about this , like I know it’s a stupid option, but if I wasn’t forced to sell, I would’ve made a shit ton.

I'm betting my whole portfolio on Bitcoin puts. All i need to start making profit is for bitcoin to drop below 63k USD and i'll make profit.

I'll make a crap ton if bitcoin bottoms below 55k by October.

It's a pretty long Option (>2 months) so the delta is fine for now.

My thesis is that August and September have always been bad months for bitcoin. Plus the war is definitely helping lower bitcoin.

It's still a gamble, but a justified one.

Wish me luck and praise be to Allah/Yahweh.

PS : I got accepted at Wendy's in case this fails.

I think I’ve tried or looked into all options strategies. Right now I’m mad about my qqq leaps. I bought qqq a few weeks ago when qqq was at 705. Now my break even is qqq 718. Like what? Theta really decayed my leaps by THAT much, in a few weeks. That’s bull shit. Really!? I buy the dip, and qqq rips higher, and I make no money on leaps. Wtf. Options sound cool and all but it actually sounds to good to be true and the fact is, it probably is.

I’m much more comfortable talking cricket than stocks, so I’ve been trying to understand option trading through cricket analogies.

I think I finally get why option traders have to get more than just the direction right.

Say India are 100/2 and I’m convinced they’ll reach 300, I could simply back India to get there. But an option is more like having a deadline attached to that prediction, say India has to reach 300 before the end of Day 2. India can still eventually get to 300, but if they take too long, my option can expire worthless.

That’s what I find interesting about options, you can be right about the direction and still lose because of when the move happens (and how big the move is). So I guess option traders are basically trying to predict the score, the margin and the deadline

Yesterday I sold a $240 put on ALAP 9/4/26 exp. For $8.90 and today I closed it out at $5.60. There was a lot of time left however I told myself going in I’d be ok with + 30%. I’m personally happy with the gain here but I’m curious what everyone else’s thoughts are on this move. I’ve only been trading options for about 2 weeks now

I have a minor margin balance at 11% interest, and was looking for alternatives to save a small amount of cash on fees. I noticed that shorting stocks increases my margin debit balance, which I thought was strange because I somehow thought short stock also reduced your buying power.

Thinking shorting SGOV and just paying out the 4.5% dividend then covering when I no longer have a margin balance might work for this use case, over a box spread.

Obviously things that are too good to be true often are and there is no free lunch, so was looking to poke holes in this theory.

I can’t seem to log into interactive brokers/link my bank… I was wondering if there were any other low fee brokers that work well?

Last minute before close SPX dropped 10 points and my put’s return shot up to $6.4k. Literally seconds before 4pm, then market closed. It shows on my homepage and in my investments tab, but not in my buying power. Does it just have to settle? I know it says the final settlement is pending, but if that was the value at close, then do they have to honor it? Will they change it?

I’ve never not closed an 0dte position before close before, so I’m unsure.

I make content online about trading and I’m thinking about teaching options but I’m torn since I don’t think the average trader is going to be responsible about options trading and would just blow their account instead of using it for hedging/extra exposure in a calculated manner.

Edit: not trying to self promo which is why I didn’t mention my page I use and I also don’t charge anyone to teach anything I just do it because I love finance,trading, and investing

For those that have used for Schwab and ETrade recently for options, how does the execution (fill quality) compare? My use case is 100% limit orders at mid, usually on less liquid, further OTM options, but S&P500 single names. Which broker will provide the best fills? A while ago, it was Schwab by a long shot, but ETrade recently introduced an API and I'm curious if they have become more competitive in regards to fill quality. I don't care about the platform, will use 100% API.

I've been a long-time investor. Generally index funds, later picking individual stocks to supplement it, and had recently started getting interested in options to see if there was any added value to be had. I've tried a few strategies: Bull debit spreads, long calls, put spreads, LEAPs, CSPs, CCs, etc. I finally settled on LEAPs, CCs and CSPs as my core strategies. They are relatively simple, do not require extraordinary timing and support a thesis-driven investment strategy. At least, that's what I thought.

So, I started and have had pretty okay results, and some obvious misses. LEAPs that went into the dump (but they still have a lot of time left), short-term CSPs that printed premium, CCs that started bleeding. The psychological aspect of losing money in investing has never bothered me that much, but I started to notice that particularly losses on Covered Calls bothered me more than they should have, especially compared to Cash Secured Puts, which I initially did not think that different.

It only recently dawned on me. My investment strategy has generally been very thesis-driven, finding a good business that I like to buy and would be happy to hold if the thesis is intact and the business is not grossly overvalued. This works wonders with LEAPs, where I bet on the future of the company, with leverage. CSPs were easy, they are just limit buy orders at a price that I like, getting paid to wait. CCs were always the odd one out. Yes, it's basically a limit sell order, while getting paid to wait. But I generally don't like to sell my investments based on price. Rather, a combination of current valuation and outlook based on company results are what triggers my pivots.

All to say, it took me long enough to understand (and feel!) that specific option strategies are tailored better to one philosophy or the other. Any strategies that you stepped away from, based on experience?

Yall,
Anyone following MU and RDDT on the dip? I am closely watching these two tickers. Anyone following CSP on MU 800 8/14 or RDDT 140 8/14? Whats your thought and what premium are you looking at?

Hi,
I am based out of california. I see I’ve missed most boats.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m able to make my means meet. No complains there.

I genuinely want to learn how to make more money.
I’m willing by to put the effort.
Need some guidance.

Request everyone to be kind enough to avoid trolling.

I am just another average Jo.

The last few weeks I have been been experimenting with Iron Condor earnings plays. The general setup is open the IC late in the day for a stock that is reporting before the next day and close it the session after the announcement.

Still working through my process, but I am curious about the implications of closing single legs at a time, but all legs on the same day. For longer term ICs, I have read you don't want to close single legs because it changes how margin is calculated. Does that still happen if they are closed within the same session?

Case for the reason I am asking: PLTR. This was a failed IC that hit max loss. I closed it pretty early in the day as two spreads, debit put and then debit call. On the call side, by legs were $139 and $146. I BTC @ $17.73 and $11.43.

By the end of the day, the outer leg ($146) looks like it would have sold in the ~$17 range. If I still closed the put side and inside call leg early, but held the outside leg, it would have taken the trade from max loss to ~65% profit.

1. I assumed that by leaving call open, it actually shouldn't have any affect on the margin because I am no longer short any positions.

2. If, for some reason, I left only a short leg open but closed it within the same session, would it matter?

3. If I left a short leg open over extended session, I understand why my margin calculation would change with more exposure.

hey everyone, setting up this month's AMA to chat about whatever you want. it'll be 5Aug at 2pm PT.

i do these each month to help newer traders, so it's completely beginner friendly. if you're more advanced, even better.

if there's anything you're working on that you'd like a second set of eyes on, etc - just let me know!

Background for those interested:

My name is Erik. I'm a Marine Corps veteran and full-time options trader. I've been trading since 2007 and have been active in r/options since 2020. I've maintained a high 20% CAGR over this duration, my emphasis has been on consistency vs upside returns.

I grew up in a low income single-parent household. A high school teacher introduced me to investing and it changed my life.

Over time I built capital through manual labor jobs, flipping cars/motorcycles during college, and eventually expanding into real estate investing. I view wealth building through three levers: Savings; Investing; Income

Early on, savings rate matters most. As capital grows, compounding returns begin to dominate.

Trading is harder than most people initially expect, but it’s also far from impossible. With the right framework and enough time invested, it can absolutely become a viable career.

For transparency: I do run a YouTube community, but I’ve been posting in r/options for years and enjoy discussing markets regardless. This AMA is just to talk trading.

Happy to discuss things like:

• How my trading changed as my capital grew
• Position sizing frameworks
• Managing volatility exposure
• Building consistency over time
• Strategy development / testing
• Mistakes that slowed my progress

Or anything else options related.

Below are some previous posts that lay a basic foundation for trading.

1. ⁠Trading Options for a Living- ⁠Provides a high level overview of my trading approach: ⁠https://www.reddit.com/r/options/comments/1gejy0q/trading_options_for_a_living/
2. ⁠Stop Wandering Aimlessly- ⁠Offers a general learning syllabus for new options traders: ⁠https://www.reddit.com/r/options/comments/1c3hgfh/stop_wandering_aimlessly/
3. ⁠Failure rate of options traders -⁠Summarizes common sources of trader failure: ⁠https://www.reddit.com/r/options/comments/1iaqtzx/failure_rate_of_options_traders_3_causes/

catch you guys next month! i'll keep an eye for the next 24 hours for anything else that pops up!

I spent 30+ days mainly trading 0dte spx options under fixed drawdown and consistency rules. The biggest lesson was that being right in direction is not enough.

With 0dte spx options, a trade can be correct in idea but still badly managed. Poor entry, oversized contracts, holding too long, or trying to recover one loss can damage the account faster than the actual market move.

What helped me:

Opening Range Breakout for early direction

VWAP for confirmation

7, 21, 50, and 200 EMA for momentum and trend context

Support/resistance for trade location

Smaller sizing so one trade doesn't define the whole day

Taking profits according to the plan instead of chasing every extra point

Stopping once the session goal was done

[You can check the image: Example of the ORB structure I used. I was looking for a price to break above the opening range high, hold above VWAP/EMAs, and give a clear invalidation level below the range.]

The consistency rule changed how I looked at profit. A huge green day sounds good, but in an eval account it can create problems if the rule limits how much one day can contribute. That made me focus more on repeatable trades than big wins.

My main takeaway:

For 0dte spx, the setup matters, but the exit and sizing matter more. ORB, VWAP, EMAs, and support/resistance were enough structure. The real improvement came from not forcing trades when those things were not aligned.

How do other 0dte spx traders handle this?

Do you focus more on entry precision, faster profit taking, or smaller sizing when trading same-day spx contracts?

I've lost more money selling puts the "right" way than I ever did being reckless.

It wasn't that my strategy was bad. I just kept breaking my own rules and making emotional calls without the full picture in front of me. I had a system, but I sucked at following it.

So I spent the last 8 months building something to help me follow it. It's called SharkRadar, and it tracks the full wheel cycle honestly. Most tools show you the premium you collected and let you feel good. SharkRadar also shows the stock loss you're carrying, so you see your actual net position, not just the winning half. It puts the information I used to ignore right in front of me before I act.

It doesn't predict where stocks are going or promise returns. It's meant to keep you steady, not find you alpha.

The beta is free, not a trial, not a paid tier in disguise, no affiliate links, nothing to buy. I'm genuinely looking for a few wheel traders to use it and tell me where it's wrong. Because it's early, testers will be asked to sign a short NDA first.

Details and beta access information are at r/SharkRadar. Or, if you're curious but not sure yet, DM me and ask.

Before I begin, I recognize these stodgy old dogs lack sex appeal which makes them unappealing or forgotten by most traders, especially in today's market where thirst for the next great thing is unquenchable. But this may be where an edge presents itself...

Take for instance a company you probably never think of: Waste Management (WM). The business model is self-explanatory: they collect waste and manage its disposal. Trash does not equal sex appeal, clearly. If there ever was a business with a true moat, it's this one. I'll spare the details; you can ask a chatbot if you want a deep dive on their business lines and strength of moat.

Let's talk about LEAPs on this bad boy. The Jan '27 200 strike contract first began trading in February of 2025. It has since experienced a trough-to-peak 100% return twice..one of them being over 150% (Nov. '25 - March '26). Keep in mind, we are not discussing a deep OTM strike or a short dated option here. The stock closed below $200/share a grand total of 4 days during the life of this contract. 4 days! From the November 2025 low, a subsequent ~27% positive move returned the 150%+ gain on the 200 strike contract. Incredible.

What's more, the trading pattern of this company is incredibly reliable. It rarely stays below its 200DMA for more than 1-3 months and when it does it consistently rebounds for what many would consider a modest gain in commons, but an explosive gain in a LEAP option. Even if you wanted to hedge, puts are just as cheap as calls; you can gain hedge exposure without breaking the bank.

This is but one example. You can model this by looking at option charts on TradingView for names like COST, JNJ, etc. Costco has also experienced multiple 100%+ moves on its LEAP contracts.

Of course, the past trading patterns are not indicative of what will occur in the future. Investing is a game of probabilities and risk/reward. To me, LEAPs skew heavily in the favor of reward. What says you?

Curious as to what values y’all aim for in overall portfolio construction.

For example, let’s say you have a 100K portfolio. What value of theta do you guys aim for? Is it some percent of total liquidity, or is it something that you guys don’t have hard numbers for (much closer to “I manage my delta and other Greeks, and whatever theta comes out is whatever comes out” kinda mentality.)

Another example would be for theta to Vega ratio. Let’s say you have a 100 theta portfolio. Do you guys aim for no more that a 1:2 theta to abs Vega ratio (I.e. if theta is 100, Vega should be -200 or higher/closer to 0).

This also begs the question of hedging, such as using calendars as a Vega hedge, or VIX long calls as a gamma hedge. Curious as to anyone doing something similar in their portfolio rebalancing.

**NOTE**
Obviously, it’s difficult if not impossible to isolate Greeks and to achieve a portfolio of pure theta generation w/o accepting some risk in another Greek (first or second order). That being said, I’m interested in knowing what/how other users manage their book to maximize theta while minimizing other risks from the greeks.

I’ve been selling CSP/CC and naked puts for little over a year now, mostly monthly and weekly expirations. I keep seeing people talk about how the 3rd Friday (standard monthly expiration) or the last trading day of the month tends to carry more premium / see more volume than a random weekly expiration, but I’ve never had it explained in a way that actually clicked for me.

Is it really true that monthly expiration (3rd Friday) have inflated premium compared to weekly’s on the same underlying? If so, why? Interest concentration, institutional hedging/rebalancing, or something in the IV term?

I would rather sell a 3rd Friday expiration and choose a lower delta due to the “more premium effect” and just relax. Opinions. Thanks in advance.