AMD iron condor, priced on the real chain
Semi-cycle beta with a liquid chain and IV that trades a clear 10–20 point premium to the index. It moves in sympathy with NVDA, which means correlated risk if you are short premium in both.
An iron condor is two credit spreads: a put spread below the market and a call spread above it. On AMD at $476.15, the Aug 28 condor sells the $395 put and $615 call, buys the $375 put and $640 call, and collects $634. You keep it all if AMD finishes between the short strikes 27 days from now — the engine puts that at 69%.
The trade, priced from the chain
27d to August 28, 2026| Leg | Qty | Price | Δ | IV | Cash |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SellAug 28 $395 put | 1 | $9.43 | -0.17 | 78% | +$943 |
| BuyAug 28 $375 put | 1 | $5.95 | -0.12 | 80% | −$595 |
| SellAug 28 $615 call | 1 | $9.53 | 0.16 | 87% | +$953 |
| BuyAug 28 $640 call | 1 | $6.67 | 0.12 | 86% | −$667 |
Every leg above is priced at the chain’s own quote — the identical number the builder will show you when you click through (last traded price), captured August 1, 2026 with a 15-minute delay. Only strikes whose print survives an implied-volatility check (within 20% of its own IV) and a no-arbitrage check across the ladder are priced here. Full methodology. Greeks, breakevens, max profit/loss and probability of profit are computed by OptionTracker’s engine at r = 4.2%. Educational analysis, not investment advice.
Yield on the capital this actually ties up
Annualized figures assume the same trade repeats every 27 days at the same premium. Nothing does. Use them to compare strikes and tickers, not to forecast a year.
How a iron condor works
Four legs, one idea: you are selling the market's estimate of how far AMD can travel. The short strikes ($395 / $615) define the range you're renting out; the long wings ($375 / $640) cap what a violent move can cost you.
Both spreads cannot lose. AMD finishes on one side of the market, so at most one vertical goes in the money — which is why max loss is the width of ONE spread minus the credit, $1,866, not double it. Max profit is the $634 credit, earned by doing nothing.
Breakevens land at $388.66 and $621.34. Outside that band the position loses; between it, it wins. That band is 48.9% wide relative to spot, against 81% implied vol over 27 days.
Return on risk is $634 against $1,866 — roughly 34% if it works. You need a high hit rate to justify that ratio, which is exactly what the 69% probability is telling you.
When it makes sense
- You expect AMD to chop rather than trend for the next 27 days, and nothing on the calendar argues otherwise.
- IV is elevated and you expect it to fall. At 81% ATM, AMD is the 2nd richest of the 20 underlyings on this site; condors are short vega, so a vol crush pays you before time decay does.
- You want defined risk. Unlike a short strangle, the worst case here is a known $1,866.
- The position survives the worst single session in this underlying's recent history at the size you are about to put on.
Where the risk actually is
The risk shape is a plateau with two cliffs. Anywhere between $388.66 and $621.34 you make money; past the long wings you lose a fixed $1,866. Between short and long strike the P/L slides linearly — that is where most condors are actually managed, not at expiry.
The killer is a trend, not a spike. A slow grind through the short call over three weeks costs the same as a gap and gives you more chances to talk yourself out of closing.
The structural problem with short premium is not the loss rate, it is the loss SIZE. A long run of small wins funded by an occasional large loss looks like skill on a monthly statement and like variance on a five-year one.
What AMD's chain actually looks like
The correlation is the risk nobody prices. Short premium on AMD and short premium on NVDA is one position with two tickets, and it gets tested on the same afternoon — AMD moves on NVDA's guidance as reliably as on its own. If both are in the book, size them as a single semi-cycle exposure and halve each.
AMD's Aug 28 strikes are $10 apart near the money (2.10% of spot). On a ladder that wide, "pick the 0.30 delta strike" resolves to whichever rung happens to be closest — sometimes not close at all. 7.9k contracts of open interest on Aug 28 is thin, and a structure that needs four separate fills will pay for it. 41 strikes on that expiry — 48% of the board — carry prints that agree with their own implied volatility and hold up across the ladder, and those are the strikes priced here. Good depth around the money, thinner in the wings than NVDA's; keep condor widths inside where the open interest actually is.
Skew is inverted: the 25-delta CALL implies 8.5% more vol than the put. That is the market pricing upside risk above downside risk — a squeeze, a takeover rumour, or a crowded short. Selling calls into an inverted skew pays better than usual and is riskier than usual for exactly the same reason. The term structure is backwardated — Aug 28 implies 6.0% MORE vol than the following month. That is the signature of a dated event inside the front month, and it is the strongest argument for picking the expiry that sits behind it.
At 81% ATM implied vol, the Aug 28 options are pricing a one-standard-deviation move of $104.82 over 27 days — roughly −22.0% to +22.0%, or $371.33 to $580.97. A short-premium structure here is a bet that 22.0% over 27 days is more than AMD will actually use. That is the thesis, stated honestly.
The AMD-specific failure mode: Selling AMD premium as a diversifier from an NVDA position. It is the same trade at a higher beta.
Picking the strike on AMD
Condor strike selection is two decisions: how far out the short strikes sit (delta), and how wide the wings are (width). Deltas on AMD at $476.15:
| Band | What it means | When it fits |
|---|---|---|
| 0.10 Δ shorts | ~80% of the distribution inside the band | High win rate, small credit. One loss wipes out several wins — position sizing is everything.On AMD: the Aug 28 $365 put at $5.00, 14% annualized |
| 0.16 Δ shorts | Roughly the 1-standard-deviation band | The most common setup. Credit ≈ 1/3 of width is the usual quality check.On AMD: the Aug 28 $395 put at $9.43, 27% annualized |
| 0.25 – 0.30 Δ shorts | Tighter range, richer credit | Only when you actively expect mean reversion. Gets managed often.On AMD: the Aug 28 $425 put at $18.02, 51% annualized |
| Wing width | Wider wings = more credit, more risk | Width sets max loss. Pick the risk you can size, then find strikes — not the reverse. |
The Aug 28 put chain below gives you real deltas to place the short strikes against. A useful filter: if the credit is less than a quarter of the spread width, the condor is not paying you enough for the tail.
From the far strike to the near one, the premium below moves by a factor of 5.3. Where you sit on that curve is the trade. Open interest concentrates at $435 on this expiry, which is usually where the fills are cleanest.
| Strike | vs spot | Mid | Δ | IV | % of spot | Ann. | OI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $355 | −25.4% | $3.90 | -0.08 | 83% | 0.8% | 11% | 340 |
| $365 | −23.3% | $5.00 | -0.10 | 81% | 1.1% | 14% | 118 |
| $375 | −21.2% | $5.95 | -0.12 | 80% | 1.2% | 17% | 208 |
| $385 | −19.1% | $7.15 | -0.14 | 79% | 1.5% | 20% | 58 |
| $395used | −17.0% | $9.43 | -0.17 | 78% | 2.0% | 27% | 269 |
| $405 | −14.9% | $11.45 | -0.20 | 79% | 2.4% | 33% | 115 |
| $415 | −12.8% | $15.13 | -0.23 | 77% | 3.2% | 43% | 398 |
| $425 | −10.7% | $18.02 | -0.27 | 77% | 3.8% | 51% | 194 |
| $435 | −8.6% | $20.70 | -0.31 | 77% | 4.3% | 59% | 439 |
AMD puts expiring August 28, 2026· 15-min delayed capture · “Ann.” annualizes the mid as a percentage of spot over 27 days.
Managing the position
- Have an exit at 2× the credit received in losses. Condors do not recover often enough to justify hoping.
- Manage at 21 days to expiry regardless of P/L. Gamma past that point makes the position behave very differently from the one you opened.
- Roll for a credit or do not roll. A roll that costs money is a new trade financed by refusing to book a loss on the old one, and the accounting hides that from you.
- Keep a ledger of realized credit per underlying, not per trade. The wheel and the covered call are multi-quarter programs and the per-trade view flatters them.
Common mistakes
Judging the trade by win rate
69% sounds excellent until you notice the payoff: $634 won versus $1,866 lost. Expectancy, not hit rate, is the number that matters.
Legging in on four legs
Enter as a single order at a net credit. Chasing individual legs on AMD costs more in slippage than the improved fill you were hoping for.
Selling premium because the credit is large
Credits are large when the market thinks the move might be. Rich premium is a forecast, not a discount, and the two are only distinguishable after the fact.
AMD iron condor FAQ
What is the max loss on this AMD iron condor?
$1,866 per condor — the width of one vertical minus the $634 credit. It is reached anywhere beyond $375 on the downside or $640 on the upside at August 28, 2026.
Where are the breakevens?
$388.66 and $621.34. AMD finishing anywhere inside that band at expiry is a profit; the maximum $634 requires a close between the short strikes.
Is AMD option skew favouring puts or calls?
Calls. The 25-delta call implies 8.5% more volatility than the 25-delta put on the Aug 28 chain — an inverted skew, usually a sign of squeeze or event risk to the upside.
How wide are AMD option strikes?
About $10 apart near the money on the Aug 28 expiry — 2.10% of the share price per rung. That sets how precisely you can place a short strike, and how granular a spread's width can be.
Build it yourself
Everything above is one construction at one moment. Open it in the builder to drag strikes along the ladder, scrub the expiry, and watch max profit, breakevens and probability of profit recompute live against the real AMD chain — free, no account.
Related reading
- Strike selection with delta and IV"Sell the 30 delta" is the most repeated rule in retail options and nobody can tell you what it means. Here is what delta actually measures, where it stops matching probability, and how far off it gets on a high-IV name.
- What a cash-secured put actually paysThe annualized-return column is the one everybody screenshots. It is also the one that tells you least. Here is the whole ladder — return, probability, breakeven, and the loss that takes six winners to repair.
- The wheel strategy, with real numbersEveryone can recite the four steps. Almost nobody can tell you what a completed cycle returned on the capital it tied up. Here is one, priced off a real chain and folded by the same engine that runs our tracker.
Other AMD strategies
- AMD covered callSell upside on shares you already own and get paid for the cap.
- AMD cash-secured putGet paid to place a limit order below the market.
- AMD bull call spreadBuy a call, sell a higher one — cheaper upside with a ceiling.
- AMD bull put spreadSell a put spread below the market: credit now, defined risk.
- AMD long straddleBuy the call and the put — pay for a move in either direction.
- AMD long strangleOTM call plus OTM put — cheaper than a straddle, needs more move.
- AMD long callDefined-risk upside with a deadline attached.
- AMD long putDefined-risk downside, or insurance with an expiry date.
- AMD calendar call spreadSell the near-dated call, buy the far one — rent time twice.