Weekly credit spreads and LEAP calendars, by the rules

The underlying screen

• Price above the 200-day EMA — you are not fighting a downtrend.
• An uptrend intact over roughly two years, not two weeks.
• Typical weekly range under about 5% — calm names, not lottery tickets.
• Liquid weekly option chains with real volume, so you can exit.
• No earnings inside the expiry window.

Put credit spreads

Sell a put below support, buy a further-out put as the wall. Your credit is the income; the difference between strikes minus that credit is the worst case. Two numbers decide whether the trade is worth it: the credit relative to the width, and where the short strike sits versus the nearest support or overlap zone. If the credit is thin because implied volatility is dead, skip the week — there is no rule that says you must trade.

LEAP calendars (PMCC)

Buy a long-dated call deep enough in the money that it behaves like the shares, then sell a short-dated call above it each week. The LEAP is your insurance and your capital saver; the weekly call is the paycheque. The failure mode is a fast rally through your short strike, so the short strike must sit above a level you're happy to sell at.

Sizing and the honest risks

Size from the maximum loss, never the credit. A run of small wins followed by one unmanaged gap is the classic path to a negative year. Assignment, early exercise around dividends, widening spreads in a selloff, and the temptation to widen strikes for more premium are all part of the strategy, not exceptions to it.

How Economove runs this

The weekly cash-flow scanner applies the screen above across index ETFs and large-cap names, prices candidates from real prints where available (labelling estimates when they aren't), sizes to the budget you set, and filters by the minimum return per trade you choose. Every candidate shows credit, maximum loss, and the levels involved — so you approve or reject with the numbers in front of you.