Options Trading Simulator
We're going to buy 100 shares of ABC Corp at $200.00 a share, then sell someone the right to buy those shares from us at a higher price, collecting cash for it today. That's a covered call. We'll build one, watch it move, then close it, no real money involved.
Every option has a deadline, called the expiration. After that date it's over: either it paid off, or it's worth nothing. Click a date row to open its prices. More days left means a richer premium, because more can still happen.
Every option has a target price too, called the strike. It's the price you're locking in: a call locks in a price to buy, a put locks in a price to sell. This time you're the one selling a call, so you're picking a strike above where ABC sits, the price you're agreeing to hand over your shares at if the buyer exercises.
Later in this walkthrough we'll use the $210 strike, $10 above ABC's $200 price. That gap isn't value, the call would be worth nothing if it expired today, it's just room: space for the stock to climb a little before you'd have to hand over your shares. Every dollar you collect for selling it is pure hope value, nothing real behind it yet, which is exactly why sellers get paid: for possibility, not substance.
These colors are about the call you'd be selling. Green strikes are already in the money, below ABC's price, so writing a call there caps your stock almost immediately, barely any room left to run. Plain strikes are out of the money, above ABC's price, room for the stock to climb first, which is why the $210 strike we're using here is plain, not green.
Every option has two prices, and once you fold in your 100 shares, so does the whole covered call. Ask is what it costs to open, Bid is what you'd get back closing it. The gap between them is the spread, a real cost.
IV (implied volatility) is how much movement the market is pricing in. High IV means a fatter premium for you as the seller, because a wild stock is more likely to pay off for the buyer. Vol is how many contracts changed hands today, a rough gauge of how easy it'll be to trade yours later.
These are the two columns beginners ignore and later regret. You don't need to master them today, just know that a high-IV option pays you more premium for the exact same target price.
Let's say you buy 100 shares of ABC at $200 and immediately sell the $210 call against them, expiring Feb 14, 30 days out. You're paying $200 a share for the stock and collecting a premium for the call, so your real cost is the stock price minus what you collect. Follow the red numbers in the chain above: 1 is the Feb 14 row, 2 is the $210 strike, 3 is the Ask column, that net cost per share. Where that row meets that column is the price that's pulsing green. Click it to open your order ticket.
Grab either slider below and drag it. Everything above reprices instantly: the chain, your position, your profit. This is the part beginners never get to see before real money is on the line.
Try the friendly one: leave the price at $200 and drag time forward 15 days. Nothing happened to the stock and you're still making money. That's time decay, and this time it's working for you, not against you, the exact opposite of what happens when you buy options instead of sell them.
Sell Option
One contract covers 100 shares.