Andrew Crowder

Andy Crowder is a professional options trader with 24 years of experience and the founder of The Option Premium. He began his career at Oppenheimer & Co. in New York, learned options trading alongside one of the original CBOE market makers, and later served as Chief Options Strategist for several financial publishers. His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Barron's, and Yahoo Finance, and he has taught his strategies to thousands of traders through live classes, webinars, and coaching. At The Option Premium, Andy publishes probability-based options education and runs seven model portfolios built on cash-secured puts, covered calls, the Wheel strategy, poor man's covered calls (LEAPS), credit spreads, and iron condors. Every trade is published with its outcome, winners and losers alike. Probabilities over predictions.

Strategy Reports

Building a Recession-Resistant Portfolio with Poor Man’s Covered Calls

Oct 13, 2026

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7 min read

Building a Recession-Resistant Portfolio with Poor Man’s Covered Calls

Build a recession-resistant Poor Man's Covered Call portfolio: the stocks that held up in five downturns, the allocation, execution rules, and honest limits.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Liquidity: The Lifeblood of Options Trading

Oct 11, 2026

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6 min read

Liquidity: The Lifeblood of Options Trading

The same credit spread pays $10 of friction in SPY and $120 in an illiquid look-alike. The friction ledger, the four filters, and the honest nuances.

Andrew Crowder

Options Fundamentals

The Bull Put Spread: A Defined-Risk Way to Profit When You Are Mildly Bullish

Oct 11, 2026

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5 min read

The Bull Put Spread: A Defined-Risk Way to Profit When You Are Mildly Bullish

The bull put spread sells a put and buys a lower put to collect a net credit with defined maximum loss. Here is the full structure, strike selection, management rules, and worked example.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

The Daily Options Trader Checklist: A Proven Framework for High-Probability Trades

Oct 11, 2026

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6 min read

The Daily Options Trader Checklist: A Proven Framework for High-Probability Trades

A professional daily scan for options traders: IV Rank and Percentile, put/call extremes, layered RSI, setup clusters, and matching strategy to the regime.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Dividend Aristocrats + PMCC: Blue-Chip Income, 25% of the Capital

Oct 8, 2026

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7 min read

Dividend Aristocrats + PMCC: Blue-Chip Income, 25% of the Capital

The ~15 liquid Aristocrats, the two-leg LEAPS recipe, a fully worked Walmart example, the honest cost ledger, and the ex-dividend risk nobody warns you about.

Andrew Crowder

Mental Capital

Look in the Mirror: Why Your Biggest Trading Edge Is You

Oct 6, 2026

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6 min read

Look in the Mirror: Why Your Biggest Trading Edge Is You

Same strategy, same win rate: discipline earns $15 a trade while self-sabotage loses $64. The psychology of options trading, priced in real dollars.

Andrew Crowder

Options Fundamentals

Credit Spreads: Your First Risk-Defined Options Strategy

Oct 4, 2026

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5 min read

Credit Spreads: Your First Risk-Defined Options Strategy

A credit spread collects premium with defined maximum loss. Here is how the two-leg structure works, the risk-reward calculation, and when spreads make more sense than single-leg positions.

Andrew Crowder

Greeks

Delta Hedging Explained: Manage Risk Without Picking a Side

Oct 4, 2026

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7 min read

Delta Hedging Explained: Manage Risk Without Picking a Side

What delta measures, the sign rule that trips up almost everyone, a full beta-weighted portfolio worked to one number, and the honest cost of neutral.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

The Staggered Iron Condor: A Sturdier Way to Sell Premium

Oct 4, 2026

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5 min read

The Staggered Iron Condor: A Sturdier Way to Sell Premium

Stop selling both condor sides in the same minute: staggered entries, rules-based triggers, a laddered book, and the honest costs promoters never itemize.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Is Inflation Here to Stay? How to Profit with Poor Man’s Covered Calls on Gold

Oct 1, 2026

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6 min read

Is Inflation Here to Stay? How to Profit with Poor Man’s Covered Calls on Gold

Maximize returns with minimal capital: a step-by-step Poor Man's Covered Call on GLD, with the full ledger, the financing bill nobody itemizes, and every number visible at entry.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Selling Lottery Tickets: The Art of High-Probability Options Strategies

Sep 29, 2026

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5 min read

Selling Lottery Tickets: The Art of High-Probability Options Strategies

How to Sell Premium, Manage Risk, and Profit from Market Consolidation with High-Probability Options Strategies

Andrew Crowder

Options Fundamentals

The Collar Strategy: Giving Up Some Upside to Cap Your Downside

Sep 27, 2026

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4 min read

The Collar Strategy: Giving Up Some Upside to Cap Your Downside

The collar adds a covered call to a protective put to offset its cost. Here is how it works, how to choose strikes, when it makes sense, and what the zero-cost collar actually means.

Andrew Crowder

Expected Move

The Final Checklist: 6 Gates Before Every Options Trade

Sep 27, 2026

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5 min read

The Final Checklist: 6 Gates Before Every Options Trade

A systematic pre-trade checklist for options traders: IV Rank, sizing, exits, context, liquidity, and the 100-trades question, with the numbers attached.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Why I Rarely Buy a Stock at Its Current Price: The Smarter Way to Invest

Sep 27, 2026

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5 min read

Why I Rarely Buy a Stock at Its Current Price: The Smarter Way to Invest

Selling cash-secured puts pays you to wait for your price. Real AMD math, a 15.5 percent discount, and the one scenario where a limit order honestly wins.

Andrew Crowder

Greeks

10 Essential Principles Every Successful Options Trader Should Master

Sep 24, 2026

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6 min read

10 Essential Principles Every Successful Options Trader Should Master

A Practical Guide to the Core Concepts Every Options Trader Must Understand to Succeed in Today’s Market

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

Mastering the Iron Condor: A Step-by-Step Guide to a Defined-Risk Options Strategy

Sep 22, 2026

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7 min read

Mastering the Iron Condor: A Step-by-Step Guide to a Defined-Risk Options Strategy

The complete iron condor guide: set strikes with the expected move, a fully priced SPY example where every number reconciles, and three management rules.

Andrew Crowder

The Wheel Strategy

Sep 20, 2026

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7 min read

How to Pick the Best Stocks for the Wheel Strategy: A Professional Trader's Guide

How to pick Wheel Strategy stocks: five filters with the statistics underneath, the 98.6 percent assignment math, and an honest AAPL versus PLTR comparison.

Andrew Crowder

Probabilities

Sep 20, 2026

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8 min read

The Law of Large Numbers in Options Trading: How Probabilities Create Your Statistical Edge

The math behind 70 to 85 percent options win rates: the theorem stated exactly, the error bars, exact streak odds, and the peer-reviewed variance premium.

Andrew Crowder

Strategy Reports

The SPY Collar, Step by Step: How to Lock In Gains and Limit Risk Without Selling Your Position

Sep 20, 2026

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6 min read

The SPY Collar, Step by Step: How to Lock In Gains and Limit Risk Without Selling Your Position

A step-by-step SPY collar walkthrough: sell the call, buy the put, price the band, and finance the hedge, with every trade-off stated honestly.

Andrew Crowder

Bear Call Spread

Sep 17, 2026

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5 min read

Using Bear Call Spreads to Protect Your Portfolio

How to use bear call spreads as a defensive hedge after strong rallies: setup rules, current QQQ example, management, and honest limits of the overlay.

Andrew Crowder

Building an Options Portfolio

The Options Paycheck: Four Steps to Structuring Income Like a Business

Sep 15, 2026

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6 min read

The Options Paycheck: Four Steps to Structuring Income Like a Business

How to structure an options portfolio for consistent income: sell premium, layer strategies, size like a business, and stagger expirations into a paycheck.

Andrew Crowder

Law of Large Numbers

Sep 13, 2026

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8 min read

High Probability Options Strategy: Why the Law of Large Numbers Is the Bedrock of Consistent Trading

Why a 75 percent win rate guarantees losing streaks, how sample size reveals your real edge, and a fully priced 79 percent probability trade on SMH.

Andrew Crowder

Greeks

Rolling High-Probability Vertical Spreads: The Delta Playbook for Protecting Your Edge

Sep 13, 2026

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6 min read

Rolling High-Probability Vertical Spreads: The Delta Playbook for Protecting Your Edge

How to know when a threatened credit spread deserves a reset, how to execute the roll, and the honest accounting most rolling articles skip.

Andrew Crowder

Risk Management

Three Bearish Options Hedges: Calm Tape, Cheap Fear, and a Useful Moment to Be Boring

Sep 13, 2026

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6 min read

Three Bearish Options Hedges: Calm Tape, Cheap Fear, and a Useful Moment to Be Boring

Three defined-risk ways to hedge a long portfolio: put spreads, bear call spreads, and VIX call spreads, with current numbers and how each honestly breaks.

Andrew Crowder

Cash-Secured Puts

Three Options Strategies Backed by Decades of Research (And What the Studies Actually Found)

Sep 10, 2026

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7 min read

Three Options Strategies Backed by Decades of Research (And What the Studies Actually Found)

Covered calls, cash-secured puts, and collars: what decades of academic research actually found, with exact numbers, and the fine print the hype machine skips.

Andrew Crowder