Not a bad month $3k

Last month was decent for selling some premium. I sold stuff mostly on tech type stocks that were a bit beaten down. I don't try to hit big home runs with options or trade too close to "the money". Im usually trading OTM at around 0.15-0.3 delta depending how confident I am on the trade. Sometimes ill even mix in a sub 0.1 delta if im feeling it that day. Have to spice it up sometimes. Names traded, mostly CSP: NVDA GOOG (CC calls too) MU VRT MRVL OHI (CC calls too) MO (CC calls too) INTC I have been trading the wheel for several years now, and it is pretty damn reliable. Its not about making a massive homerun on any 1 trade imo, and just try to generate yield at all times on your holdings. Market has definitely probably outpaced me this year with SPY/QQQ just ripping, but some years I toast the market as well. This strategy feels a bit safer overall with smaller drawdowns. You guys wheelin a lot nowadays? or just letting market rip for a bit?

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u/Mzungufarmer 1 5 days ago

Nice work! Hard to wheel when options keep expiring worthless. Nice winrate
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Yea that winrate keeps the mental sanity in check for sure.
u/Mean-Ad737 1 4 days ago

Whats your capital
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I trade around 400k
u/GailioBauduin 1 4 days ago

You trade 400k and you made 2300? You're on track to make less than 10% unless im reading this wrong
u/Cool_Fly_2030 1 4 days ago

Shoulda bought the index instead
u/hairytreefarmer 1 4 days ago

To be fair running the wheel when the market is ripping will usually return less. Works best in sideways or slightly down markets
u/iron_condor34 1 4 days ago

Yeah, its a short vol trade. You do well when nothing is going on lol
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

For real. Index is crushing me this year. Few years ago when entire index was red though I beat it by 35% or so. Definitely gave me a ton of steam early in my career.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

It’s not always perfect. Currently have quite a bit of capital that is covered until mid September. Rate will go back up after that.
u/Cool_Fly_2030 1 4 days ago

In my experience I have had better returns using covered calls very sparingly, letting my long (assigned) grow faster than call premium would otherwise. Only writing on exhaustion, clear divergence signals, and when the premium is rich. I’ve been burned hard capping upside prematurely and it drags down potential returns dramatically. Sounds like for the names you’re running (some same as me) you might be upside capped on this next leg up that seems to be forming. We’ll see! Best of luck
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Facts
u/iron_condor34 1 4 days ago

What year did you start?
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

My first real year of trading was around Covid.
u/iron_condor34 1 4 days ago

Great year to start lol You were trading this during covid?
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Yea, I got a bit lucky. Market tanked and my initial $10k dropped like a rock and freaked me out. we have come a long way tho. I swing $10k back and forth in a single day now.
u/DeepRooster7750 1 4 days ago

Wait $3k a month on 400k capital is pretty terrible. I thought it was $3k a week
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

It’s 9% annualized. Definitely not terrible, and in fact not bad at all, as OP accurately stated.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

This guy gets it. Steady gains compound quickly
u/DeepRooster7750 1 4 days ago

Correct it’s called SPy, QQQ, VOO there are plenty of thing that will make the same return for little to no work. Taxes you are paying for short term gains are a lot compared to long term rates. I know you’re trying to make it sound good to us but you are lying to yourself and everyone here, this is bad. You have no alpha.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Haters are a dime a dozen
u/DeepRooster7750 1 4 days ago

“Hater” that’s the best you can do because we don’t agree or think you are doing good at all. Dude your account is $400,000 that’s a lot of money to just make 3,000 a MONTH is terrible. Why would I hate, I don’t know you or care about you. If you make $10k is not going to do anything for me. You are meaningless to me. But hey continue underperforming the market 🤷🏿‍♂️
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Cry more about theta posts in theta sub 😂
u/ModeInternational178 1 4 days ago

9% annualized is barely beating or equal to just buying/holding SPY. And when you account for the short term capital gains tax he’s paying, he’s actually putting in active effort to underperform the broader market lol
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

Yes, with SPY having roughly an annualized 8% return, this barely beats it. Quantitatively, that falls into the category of “not a bad month at all”.
u/Tinominor 1 4 days ago

If the passing grade is a C, and you passed with a C is that considered terrible? Lets raise our standards a little if we're inclined to show off.
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

Ironically I think you guys need to lower your standards quite a bit. If roughly 90% of hedge funds underperform relative to SPY, then this guy doing this strategy is by definition doing better than at least 90% of hedge funds. And let’s be honest, none of you degenerates are fully invested in solely the SPY ETF.
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

This is one of the bigger misconceptions I see on here. Retail traders have tons of advantages over hedge funds. Hedge funds have to manage 8-9-10 figures of capital and have strict mandates. They can’t jump in and out of positions. If you gave their traders retail accounts, most of them would outperform the market.
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

That’s simply not true, because retail traders on average perform far worse than Hedge funds, because they don’t have low latency systems or proper risk management strategies relative to mathematical quants. What are you even on about?
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

Your statement is “if hedge funds can’t do it, you can’t do it either”. There is a reason hedge funds struggle to do it. So their performance against the market is kind of irrelevant from what you can expect as a retail trader. It’s harder to beat the market working within the constraints of a hedge fund than it is as a retail trader. Most retail traders struggle because they’re running single stock books or trades that would land them on Wall Street bets. If you learn a reliable strategy and execute it, you have a pretty damn good shot at outperforming the market as a retail trader. Warren Buffet himself has talked about this. Said he could easily make 50% a year if he had a $1M portfolio.
u/Tinominor 1 4 days ago

Ok broski, you can stop projecting now. 400k to make 3k in the last 30 days is not indicative of having "non-negative" month, What are YOU going on about? My 30 days PnL in my wheel-only account with a value of 183k is +6774.76 profits and im still down 23%. The debate had already concluded when you thought "fully invested in solely the spy ETF" was strong argument.
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

Yeah, you’ve lost the plot a bit buddy. Go back through and read a little more slowly and think about what you just said hahaha
u/Tinominor 1 4 days ago

\> fact not bad at all \> I think you guys need to lower your standards quite a bit \> You don’t get to cast judgement on OP for having a non-negative month. Most of you don’t even comprehend how difficult it is to maintain these sorts of gains Where did I lose the plot?
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

\> 400k to make 3k in the last 30 days is not indicative of having “non-negative” month The fact that OP himself is literally claiming that he made $3.7k *last month* in his 400k account, which **is indicative** of him being positive for the month annualized to 9% gains if he were to keep it up? Genuinely asking this - are you mentally challenged and/or cannot read? It’s pretty fucking obvious we’re referring to a confirmed closed NET profit last month.
u/Tinominor 1 4 days ago

You're not actually being real right? If you're realizing short term gain of 0.75% while ignoring a massive July drawdown, you're clearly ignorant. You took my statement "account with a value of 183k is +6774.76 profits and im still down 23%." to mean that I've realized 23% loss? Be honest, because I can't lower my expectation of your comprehension skills anymore than I already have. So tell me then, from my **realized** P&L (once again, $6,774.75 profit) for the month, what does that calculate my annualized return to? Then compare that against his and try again to prove that I'm wrong or where I lost the plot. \> You don’t get to cast judgement on OP for having a non-negative month...
u/hishazelglance 1 4 days ago

Okay yeah I was right, you are indeed just mentally challenged. “**Investment Returns:** If a stock or fund gains 2% in a single month, you can annualize that return to see what the yearly performance looks like ***if that same pace or compounding continues.*****”** **Please let me know if you would like me to multiply 0.75 by 12.**
u/[deleted] 1 4 days ago

[removed] — already gone when the archive first saw it
u/hdplus 1 4 days ago

Unless he’s using invested assets as collateral
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I’m not going for home runs. I have not had any red years tho either. I’m just on a steady climb to the top. I aim for around 10% in option cash flow per year.
u/DailyShawarma 1 4 days ago

Do you consider only the premiums? Because if you are holding stocks, those positions will probably increase in price , if you picked winners.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Yep, I make a total of much more than 10% in many years. Due to dividends/capital gains from holdings too. The option cash flow I aim for somewhere around 10% tho give or take couple percent
u/DailyShawarma 1 4 days ago

Yeah, got it. I think people commenting hatefully are not getting the fact that you own stock and your not 100% cash. Not sure what tickers you have, but I believe that you beat the S&P500 easily if you consider those
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

you definitely see the full picture here
u/EngineerDirector 1 4 days ago

Shh you can’t say that here. Dude you can sell a year out PUT and outperform 80% of the excel warriors here.
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

You’re underperforming the average S&P 500 yearly market return. You should tweak something.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I definitely am not beating market this year. I beat it by 35% a few years back when everyone else was red though. It’s back and forth.
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

Right but if this is a successful month for you you’re almost better off just buying a muni bond for what your net return after taxes ends up being.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

How would I beat market by 35% ever again sitting on sidelines though? Seems like a bad idea. I don’t want to earn less and also have no chance at more. Doesn’t sound super exciting. You should try the wheel… it’s very consistent and cash is always coming in.
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

I run the wheel and I’m running like a 20% average return over the last 6 years. If I was averaging 10% I would not be running the wheel.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

nice job, we cant all be as smart as you tho
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

Look you can do whatever you want. If you do it because you enjoy it - by all means go for it. But if you are trying to maximize money in your wallet, what you shared is not the way to do it.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I do 10-20% every year on average, it works pretty well.
u/SufficientAverage796 1 4 days ago

as long as u havent lost it ur doing fine
u/Mean_Office_6966 1 4 days ago

During bear years, may I know how was it? You were assigned with which tickers and you slowly CC it? The ‘beat it by 35%’ was great!
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I actually was able to beat it by keeping a really big weighting in the energy sector back when gas went negative. This was like 4-5 years ago I believe. EPD and DMLP carried me greatly over the years with huge capital appreciation and dividends too.
u/UnnameableDegenerate 1 4 days ago

Define 'big drawdown'. Because if it's more than 10% from peak... lol.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

For example in 2021-2022 time period when market was down. I beat it by around 35% with my defensive plays. I own lots of energy type stuff. It just doesn’t swing as much as the market does usually. Less down and less up.
u/UnnameableDegenerate 1 4 days ago

That doesn't matter. You're professing around 0.5 beta, therefore your drawdown MUST be less than 10% for active management to be worth it.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I don’t take even close to 10% drawdowns.
u/jrmsk 1 4 days ago

I mean outperforming SP500 is not necessarily always the goal. It depends on the risk and on the overall strategy - if the OP is more onto some consistent income via cash-secured puts/covered calls as stated in the post I would not say you should be doing something else.
u/fuzz11 1 4 days ago

If that’s what you want then you should just buy SPY and sell pieces of it when you want income. Same result.
u/Bluebird-9641 1 4 days ago

Honestly that's awesome and all those who say YoU'rE NoT BeAtInG ThE iNdEx are just haters. They should show their p&l. Excellent job and thanks for the motivation.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I am used to the haters for sure haha. Can’t keep them all happy. I’m just here to show my progress, definitely not a trading guru tho. I just keep it on track 🤘
u/Yosh-44 1 4 days ago

As long as it's a bull market should be good
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

For sure. I love bull trends
u/Moist-Construction59 1 4 days ago

Stop with the humble bragging already.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

Just sharing the stuff I wheel and how it goes. I didn’t even beat the market lol, it ain’t insane or anything.
u/chroner 1 4 days ago

'win rate' good god.
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

You heard it here first folks! 🚀
u/Stup517 1 4 days ago

What brokerage are you using that shows P&L that cleanly?
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

I just use ThetaPal. It syncs my charles schwab automatically every day. has a really clean options dashboard as well with very nice sortability features. saves me 5-10 minutes every day for sure you can use over 25 different brokerages with this app.
u/eggn00dles 1 4 days ago

the wheel is a terrible strategy, but if it makes you feel like a real deal 'trader' by all means underperform the market
u/TastyTrading OP 1 4 days ago

It’s not always about beating the market bud
u/Rud3l 1 4 days ago

Is this showing on „all“ or why are there so many people who apparently dislike the wheel on sub called thetagang? I started my own run in mid June, backed mostly by a Claude project for picking stocks based on fixed variables. So far it works well, aiming for 1.5-2% interest / month though (including the 3%/yesr IBKR pays on the cash deposit and before taxes).