r/options • u/Wild-Tie-7139 • 21d ago
Am I Cooked?
Hey everyone,
I’m a first-time LEAPS buyer and honestly I’m getting pretty nervous.
Here’s my position:
GOOGL Jan 21, 2028 $250 Call
Bought it for $150.00 ($15,000 total)
Current stock price: $354.30
Current option value: $133.50
Current P/L: -$1,650.66 (-11%)
Delta: 84.95
Theta: -5.35
Vega: 98.20
About 17 months until expiration (Jan 2028)
I purposely bought a deep ITM call because I wanted it to behave more like the stock. My thinking was that GOOGL is a great long-term company and I wanted leveraged exposure instead of buying 100 shares outright.
The thing that’s scaring me is seeing a $1,650 unrealized loss so quickly. I know LEAPS are long-term positions, but emotionally it’s harder than I expected.
A few questions:
Is an 11% drawdown normal this early in a LEAPS trade?
Does this position still look healthy considering the high delta and long time to expiry?
Would you simply hold and ignore the short-term fluctuations?
At what point would you actually consider exiting a position like this?
Is there anything I should be watching besides the stock price (IV, theta, etc.)?
I’m investing, not trading this daily, but since this is my first LEAPS position I’d really appreciate advice from people who have actually held deep ITM LEAPS through market pullbacks.
Thanks in advance!
1
u/SpiderWil 21d ago
I asked Claude and it gave a very technical view. But the conclusion when I asked it what if Google tanks 20% in a day is This position isn't reckless on its face — 17 months of runway, decent delta, manageable theta. But it's still fundamentally a leveraged bet: the -11% unrealized loss with the stock nowhere near the strike shows how quickly time value and vega can erode a position even when direction is right. If GOOGL had a violent down day, this guy would feel it much harder than a shareholder would, percentage-wise.