Consistently, one of the more popular stocks people enter into their stock options watchlist at Stock Options Channel is Chevron Corporation (Symbol: CVX). So this week we highlight one interesting put contract, and one interesting call contract, from the September expiration for CVX. The put contract our YieldBoost algorithm identified as particularly interesting, is at the $115 strike, which has a bid at the time of this writing of $1.10. Collecting that bid as the premium represents a 1% return against the $115 commitment, or a 3.4% annualized rate of return (at Stock Options Channel we call this the YieldBoost ).
Selling a put does not give an investor access to CVX's upside potential the way owning shares would, because the put seller only ends up owning shares in the scenario where the contract is exercised. So unless Chevron Corporation sees its shares decline 7.6% and the contract is exercised (resulting in a cost basis of $113.90 per share before broker commissions, subtracting the $1.10 from $115), the only upside to the put seller is from collecting that premium for the 3.4% annualized rate of return.
Turning to the other side of the option chain, we highlight one call contract of particular interest for the September expiration, for shareholders of Chevron Corporation (Symbol: CVX) looking to boost their income beyond the stock's 3.4% annualized dividend yield. Selling the covered call at the $125 strike and collecting the premium based on the $2.91 bid, annualizes to an additional 8.3% rate of return against the current stock price (this is what we at Stock Options Channel refer to as the YieldBoost ), for a total of 11.7% annualized rate in the scenario where the stock is not called away. Any upside above $125 would be lost if the stock rises there and is called away, but CVX shares would have to climb 0.4% from current levels for that to happen, meaning that in the scenario where the stock is called, the shareholder has earned a 2.7% return from this trading level, in addition to any dividends collected before the stock was called.
The chart below shows the trailing twelve month trading history for Chevron Corporation, highlighting in green where the $115 strike is located relative to that history, and highlighting the $125 strike in red:
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
