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Poor Man's Covered Call (PMCC)

LEAPS-based alternative to covered calls

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What is Poor Man's Covered Call (PMCC)?

Poor Man's Covered Call (PMCC) A diagonal spread that mimics a covered call using a deep in-the-money LEAPS call instead of 100 shares of stock. You buy a long-dated deep ITM call (high delta, ~0.80) and sell a near-term OTM call against it. Requires significantly less capital than a traditional covered call while maintaining similar risk-reward characteristics.

Complete definition

A diagonal spread that mimics a covered call using a deep in-the-money LEAPS call instead of 100 shares of stock. You buy a long-dated deep ITM call (high delta, ~0.80) and sell a near-term OTM call against it. Requires significantly less capital than a traditional covered call while maintaining similar risk-reward characteristics.

Example

Instead of buying 100 AAPL shares at $150 ($15,000), buy a $120 LEAPS call for $35 ($3,500) and sell monthly OTM calls against it.

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By Ryan Silk & Lawrence Polatchek Last reviewed . Methodology is published in full.

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