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Calendar Spread

neutral Capped loss

Sell time decay against a longer-dated option.

When to use it

LOW IV environment expecting sideways-to-gradual movement. Sell a near-term option, buy the same strike further out. Profits from faster front-month decay.

Max profit

Near expiry of the front leg, if price sits at the strike.

Max loss

The net debit paid.

Payoff at expiry
illustrative shape — not to scale
profit zone loss zone X axis = stock price at expiry →
How it's built

Strikes shown low→high. Sell = collect premium · Buy = pay premium for protection or upside.

Hermes hasn't found a per-ticker setup clearing the sample floor for this strategy yet. It's evaluated every optimizer run — check back after the next scan.