📊 Year-End Options Recap 2025 — A Portfolio-Driven Analysis
Theme: Concentrated AI Beta, Managed with Options Structure
Looking at my current portfolio, 2025 was not about diversification — it was about owning the right volatility.
Over 60% of my P&L came from NVDA, PLTR, TSLA, and AMD, all names with:
• High gamma sensitivity
• Event-driven volatility
• Strong upside skew
That made options a necessity, not a choice.
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🔹 1. NVDA — Monetising IV Compression After Panic 📉➡️📈
April 2025: Tariff Shock
• NVDA sold off aggressively despite no change to AI capex demand
• IV jumped into the 80–90th percentile
• Downside skew widened irrationally
Options Decision
Instead of adding shares:
• Bought ITM call spreads (Δ ≈ 0.60)
• Sold upside calls where market priced in limited recovery
• 90–120 DTE to avoid near-term headline risk
Why This Was Precise
• Long calls captured delta recovery
• Short calls monetised excess IV
• Net vega exposure close to neutral → protected against post-panic IV crush
Result
As tariffs faded from headlines and earnings validated demand:
• IV compressed
• NVDA resumed trend
• Spread reached ~80% max value early → exited
📌 Key takeaway:
When fundamentals are intact, volatility mispricing is the trade, not direction.
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🔹 2. PLTR — Trading Earnings Volatility, Not Valuation 🧠
PLTR in 2025 was pure narrative volatility:
• Retail momentum
• AI contracts headlines
• Extreme post-earnings moves in both directions
Pre-Earnings Setup
IV consistently priced >12% move, while realised moves averaged ~7–9%.
Options Strategy
• Call diagonal spreads
• Long further-dated call (cheap vega)
• Short near-term call (rich IV)
This created:
• Positive theta
• Long-term upside exposure
• Defined downside
Outcome
• Short leg decayed rapidly post-earnings
• Core long call retained value as PLTR grinded higher
📌 Lesson:
In hype stocks, selling time is often more profitable than buying direction.
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🔹 3. TSLA — Avoiding Directional Bias in a Binary Name ⚡
TSLA in 2025 was not a trend — it was a volatility regime:
• Rate cuts helped
• Margins disappointed
• Autonomy headlines whipsawed price
What I Avoided
• No naked calls
• No long straddles (IV too expensive)
What Worked
• Put credit spreads during macro panic
• Entered when RSI oversold + IV spike
• Strikes placed below major gamma zones
This allowed:
• Income generation
• Probability-based trading
• No need to predict upside narratives
📌 Key insight:
In TSLA, probability beats conviction.
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🔹 4. AMD vs NVDA — Relative Volatility Trade 🧮
AMD lagged NVDA despite similar AI exposure:
• Lower IV
• Lower momentum
• Better risk-reward for catch-up trades
Trade Expression
• Long AMD calls
• Short NVDA calls (same expiry, similar delta)
This volatility-adjusted pair trade:
• Neutralised market beta
• Focused purely on relative re-rating
📌 Options edge:
Stocks express stories. Options express mispricing.
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🔻 5. NIO & SE — Why Equity Hurt, Options Wouldn’t 🚨
These were my biggest process lessons of 2025.
• Long equity required patience + capital lock-up
• Narrative didn’t fail — timing did
If expressed via options:
• Defined loss
• Clear thesis expiry
• Capital efficiency
📌 Hard truth:
Being early in equities feels the same as being wrong.
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🧠 Final 2025 Lessons
✔ Direction is secondary
✔ Volatility regime matters more than news
✔ Options are risk-shaping tools, not leverage
✔ The best trades are the ones where you don’t need to be right fast
2025 rewarded traders who understood structure over sentiment — and punished those who confused conviction with certainty.
🐯 Looking forward to how other Tigers used options this year — especially in AI and rate-sensitive names.
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