Finding optimal covered call and cash-secured put opportunities requires the ability to quickly analyze hundreds of option chains across multiple ticker symbols and expiration dates while filtering for specific criteria that match your income strategy parameters. The Option Search page in MyATMM provides comprehensive screening capabilities that transform option analysis from manually scanning dozens of strike prices across multiple stocks into targeted searches that surface exactly the opportunities you're seeking within seconds.
This advanced search interface goes beyond the general covered call analysis screen by breaking out calls and puts separately, displaying all strikes for upcoming expirations up to 14 days forward, and offering granular filtering controls for bid price, return on investment, stock price ranges, dividend status, and stock classification categories like S&P 500 membership or ETF designation.
What makes this tool particularly powerful for wheel strategy implementation is how it narrows thousands of potential option combinations down to focused lists matching your exact requirements. Instead of scrolling through complete option chains trying to identify which strikes offer sufficient premium and acceptable ROI, you define your minimum thresholds and let the system present only the opportunities that meet those standards. This systematic approach to option discovery saves hours of manual research while ensuring you never miss attractive positions simply because they weren't on your usual watchlist.
The Option Search page operates on the same symbol list you maintain in the covered call analysis screen, ensuring consistency across your watchlists while providing more targeted filtering capabilities specifically for option-focused research.
Before using Option Search, you need to populate your tracked ticker symbol list through the covered call screen. This centralized symbol management approach means adding or removing symbols in one location automatically updates both the covered call analysis and the option search data sets.
To manage your symbol list:
Once symbols are added to your list, they automatically appear in the Option Search results, pulling current option chain data for all strikes and expirations within the next two weeks. This integration ensures you're always analyzing the complete set of stocks you've identified as potential candidates for option income strategies.
When you first open the Option Search page, the system loads all option chains for your tracked symbols and displays them in a comprehensive table format showing:
This comprehensive data presentation provides all the key metrics needed to evaluate potential option trades without requiring you to switch between the application and your brokerage platform's option chains.
Due to the large volume of options data generated by querying dozens of symbols across multiple expirations and hundreds of strike prices, the Option Search page implements a 500-record display limit. When your query would return more than 500 results, the interface displays "500+" and shows only the first 500 records.
This performance optimization prevents the interface from becoming sluggish when rendering massive data sets. If you see the 500+ indicator, it signals that you should apply additional filters to narrow the results to a more manageable and targeted subset that focuses on your specific trading criteria.
The first level of filtering narrows the option universe by focusing on specific expiration dates and isolating either calls or puts based on your current strategy focus.
The Option Search pulls expiration dates extending 14 days forward from the current date, capturing the next two weeks of available option expirations. For most stocks trading only weekly options, this typically displays two Friday expirations. However, if your tracked symbol list includes highly liquid instruments like SPY that offer daily options, you'll see every single day represented in the expiration filter.
The demonstration shows multiple daily expirations appearing (April 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th) specifically because symbols with daily option availability were included in the tracked list. This abundance of expiration dates can make the results overwhelming unless you filter down to specific dates.
For traders focused exclusively on weekly option strategies, the expiration filter allows you to select just the Friday expiration you're targeting. In the demonstration, filtering to April 5th (the next weekly expiration) immediately reduces the data set from 500+ records down to a focused list containing only options expiring on that specific Friday.
This weekly focus serves multiple strategic purposes:
The option type filter allows you to isolate covered call opportunities from cash-secured put opportunities, or view both simultaneously depending on your current trading focus.
The three option type settings include:
When searching for covered call opportunities on existing stock positions, selecting "Calls" filters out all the put data and focuses exclusively on call strikes. Conversely, when looking for cash-secured put entry points to initiate new positions, selecting "Puts" narrows the view to only put options at various strikes below current market prices.
The demonstration specifically focuses on put option analysis by filtering to "Puts" only, which immediately changes the displayed data from showing both calls and puts to showing exclusively cash-secured put opportunities across all tracked symbols for the April 5th expiration.
While the Option Search displays data for all tracked symbols by default, you can narrow analysis to one or more specific tickers using the symbol search filter at the top of the interface.
The symbol filter operates like a search box where typing a ticker symbol filters the entire result set to show only options for that specific underlying security. The demonstration shows filtering specifically for SPY and QQQ options by typing "SPY QQQ" into the symbol filter field.
This direct symbol targeting proves useful when:
After entering the symbol and pressing Enter, the system filters the complete data set down to show only puts (since the type filter is set to "Puts") for the specified symbols across all expirations (or the filtered expiration if that filter is still applied).
The symbol filter accepts multiple ticker symbols separated by spaces, allowing side-by-side comparison of option opportunities across several related stocks or ETFs. This multi-symbol capability facilitates sector-based analysis where you might want to compare similar stocks within the same industry to identify which offers the most attractive premium for comparable risk.
To return to viewing all tracked symbols after applying a symbol-specific filter, simply clear the symbol search box and press Enter. This returns the display to showing all symbols from your tracked list that match the other active filters.
Beyond individual symbol selection, the Option Search provides high-level category filters that automatically narrow results to stocks and ETFs matching specific quality classifications relevant to conservative income-focused option strategies.
The "Active Positions" toggle filters the option list to show only symbols where you currently have ongoing positions tracked in the cost basis section. This filter proves especially valuable when you're looking for rolling opportunities on existing positions or want to add covered calls to stocks you've recently acquired through cash-secured put assignments.
In the demonstration using a demo account with no active positions, toggling this filter resulted in zero results because no cost basis positions existed. In accounts with multiple active positions, this filter quickly surfaces relevant option chains without requiring manual symbol entry for each ticker you're already trading.
The Aristocrat toggle filters the list to show only dividend kings (50+ years of consecutive dividend increases) and dividend aristocrats (S&P 500 stocks with 25+ years of consecutive increases). These represent the highest-quality dividend-paying stocks with proven track records of stable cash flows and consistent shareholder returns.
For option sellers focused on selling puts and calls on quality underlying securities, this filter immediately narrows the universe to blue-chip stocks that demonstrate financial stability and lower bankruptcy risk compared to growth stocks or speculative names. The demonstration shows filtering down to just 35 option results when the aristocrat filter is applied, representing the subset of tracked symbols that meet these stringent dividend increase requirements.
The dividend filter broadens the criteria beyond aristocrats to include all stocks and ETFs that pay any dividend, regardless of dividend growth history. This expands the opportunity set while still maintaining focus on income-generating securities that provide dual income through both dividends and option premium.
Applying the dividend filter in the demonstration reduced the result set from 500+ down to 335 options, indicating that roughly two-thirds of the tracked symbols in this particular account were dividend-paying instruments. This makes sense for accounts focused on income strategies where dividend collection complements option premium for total yield enhancement.
The ETF toggle isolates exchange-traded funds from individual stocks, focusing exclusively on diversified instruments that offer sector, market, or asset class exposure without single-company risk. ETFs like SPY, QQQ, IWM, and sector-specific funds provide option premium opportunities without earnings surprises or company-specific news events that can create unexpected volatility in individual stocks.
The S&P 500 filter shows only stocks that are current constituents of the S&P 500 index, representing large-cap American companies that meet specific liquidity, profitability, and market capitalization requirements. This filter ensures you're analyzing options on established, liquid securities rather than small-cap or speculative names.
These category filters can be combined to create highly specific screening criteria. However, as the demonstration notes, some combinations may eliminate all results due to mutually exclusive conditions. For example, combining the ETF filter with the S&P 500 filter initially showed no results because SPY (the S&P 500 ETF) may not have had options expiring on certain dates in the filtered view, or the combination logic excluded results that technically met both criteria.
When combining filters produces zero or unexpectedly low results, try removing one filter at a time to identify which combination is eliminating all candidates, then adjust your criteria to expand the search scope slightly.
Beyond categorical filters, the Option Search provides numeric threshold filters that define minimum and maximum values for bid price, return on investment percentage, and underlying stock price, allowing extremely targeted searches that surface only opportunities meeting your specific income and capital requirements.
The minimum bid price filter eliminates options with bid prices below your specified threshold. This proves critical for option sellers who need to collect sufficient premium to justify the commissions and fees associated with small-dollar trades, or who simply want to focus on higher-premium opportunities that generate meaningful income per contract.
The demonstration shows setting a minimum bid price of $0.50, which filters out all options with bids below 50 cents. This threshold makes sense for most option sellers because sub-50-cent options typically generate net credits of only $30-$40 after commissions, which may not justify the capital commitment and management attention required.
After applying the 50-cent minimum bid filter in the demonstration, the result set dropped from 500+ options down to 308, eliminating nearly 40% of the low-premium options that likely wouldn't have been tradeable candidates anyway.
The minimum ROI (return on investment) filter allows you to specify a percentage threshold that eliminates options failing to generate your target weekly or monthly return relative to capital deployed. This filter helps maintain discipline around your income targets by preventing you from considering trades that don't meet your minimum profitability requirements.
In the demonstration, a 65% ROI minimum is applied to further reduce the list from 308 options down to a smaller subset. This 65% threshold represents an annualized return target converted to a weekly percentage, though the specific calculation methodology (weekly return vs annualized return) would depend on how MyATMM calculates the ROI metric in this context.
It's worth noting that extremely high ROI percentages typically indicate either very low-priced underlying stocks where absolute dollar premiums are small, or out-of-the-money options on volatile stocks where assignment probability is elevated. The demonstration acknowledges this by showing results with 82%, 86%, and 100% ROI figures on stocks priced in the $10-15 range, cautioning that these high percentages may not represent the same quality opportunities as lower-ROI options on established blue-chip names.
The minimum and maximum stock price filters define a price range for the underlying security, allowing you to focus on stocks within your capital availability and risk tolerance preferences.
The demonstration shows multiple filtering iterations:
These price range filters serve several strategic purposes:
An important pattern emerges when analyzing the filtered results: lower-priced stocks consistently show higher ROI percentages even though their absolute dollar premium may be comparable to higher-priced stocks with lower ROI figures. This occurs because ROI is calculated as premium divided by capital required (strike price for cash-secured puts), so a $1.00 premium on a $10 stock shows 10% ROI while the same $1.00 premium on a $100 stock shows only 1% ROI.
The demonstration highlights this by showing stocks in the $10-15 range displaying ROIs of 82%, 86%, and 100%, which seem extraordinarily high but reflect the mathematical reality of small denominators in the ROI calculation. Don't chase high ROI percentages on low-quality stocks simply because the math looks attractive. Focus instead on quality underlying securities with sustainable dividends and stable business models, even if ROI percentages appear more modest.
Earnings announcements create volatility spikes that can dramatically impact option values and assignment probabilities. The earnings filter in Option Search allows you to include or exclude stocks based on recent earnings performance trends.
The earnings filter displays positive or negative trend indicators next to stocks (but not ETFs, since ETFs don't report earnings). These indicators reflect recent earnings patterns, though the specific methodology (recent surprise, trend over multiple quarters, or analyst expectation comparisons) would depend on the data source and calculation logic MyATMM uses.
The demonstration shows applying the "positive earnings" filter, which narrows the result set to show only stocks with positive earnings trends. This filtering approach helps you avoid stocks experiencing earnings deterioration that might signal fundamental problems with the business, while focusing on companies with stable or improving financial performance.
How you apply earnings filters depends on your specific option strategy and risk tolerance:
The demonstration notes that earnings filters don't apply to ETFs because diversified funds don't have single earnings events that create concentrated volatility. This makes ETFs attractive for option sellers who want to avoid earnings risk entirely, since you can sell options on instruments like SPY, QQQ, IWM, and sector ETFs without worrying about quarterly announcement dates.
The true power of the Option Search tool emerges when you develop systematic workflows that apply filters in logical sequences to progressively narrow result sets from thousands of options down to focused opportunity lists matching your exact trading criteria.
Based on the demonstration and optimal search efficiency, this filtering sequence produces the best results:
This sequence works from broad categorical filters that eliminate large swaths of inappropriate options early, then progressively applies numeric thresholds that fine-tune the remaining candidates, and finally applies symbol-specific filters only if you're looking for particular underlying securities.
Here are practical examples of complete filter combinations for typical option seller objectives:
After applying all relevant filters, the demonstration shows using the column sort functionality to organize the remaining options by specific metrics. Clicking column headers sorts the data by that field, allowing you to:
This final sorting step transforms the filtered list from an unordered collection into a prioritized queue where the most attractive opportunities (by your chosen metric) appear at the top for immediate analysis and potential order placement.
While the Option Search provides comprehensive screening and filtering capabilities, it's important to understand the data currency limitations and how this tool integrates into your complete trading workflow.
The demonstration explicitly states that the option data displayed in MyATMM is not real-time information. This delay (typically 15-20 minutes depending on data provider agreements) means the bid prices, stock prices, and calculated ROI figures you see represent recent but not current market conditions.
This data delay impacts your workflow in specific ways:
The optimal workflow treating Option Search as the research and filtering stage, with your brokerage platform serving as the execution stage:
This two-stage approach leverages MyATMM's superior filtering capabilities to handle the time-consuming screening work, while relying on your broker's real-time data for execution decisions. The result is dramatically reduced research time without compromising order execution quality.
Despite the 15-20 minute delay, the Option Search delivers substantial value for these reasons:
The Option Search page represents just one component of MyATMM's comprehensive option tracking and analysis platform. Understanding how this tool integrates with other MyATMM features maximizes its value for systematic income trading.
The fact that Option Search draws from the same symbol list maintained in the covered call screen means you build one watchlist that serves multiple purposes:
This unified approach eliminates duplicate data entry and ensures consistency across all platform features.
The natural workflow progression flows from Option Search to cost basis tracking:
This continuous workflow loop ensures every trade flows from systematic screening through accurate position tracking to informed rolling and closing decisions.
The "Active Positions" filter directly connects Option Search results to your cost basis tracking, showing option opportunities only on symbols where you currently hold positions. This integration proves especially valuable when:
The dividend aristocrat, dividend payer, and S&P 500 filters connect directly to MyATMM's dividend stock research library, which maintains comprehensive lists of dividend kings, aristocrats, champions, and contenders. When you filter for aristocrats in Option Search, you're analyzing options specifically on stocks appearing in those curated quality lists.
This integration ensures your option selling strategies focus on high-quality underlying securities with proven dividend track records, aligning option premium income with dividend income for comprehensive yield generation.
Effective use of the Option Search tool transforms option opportunity identification from time-consuming manual chain review into systematic filtered searches that surface only trades matching your specific criteria within seconds.
Develop repeatable search workflows tailored to your common trading scenarios:
Recognize what Option Search provides versus what requires real-time brokerage data:
Interpret ROI percentages and bid prices with contextual awareness:
Option Search functions as the discovery engine within MyATMM's comprehensive tracking platform:
Options trading involves significant risk and is not suitable for all investors. Cash-secured puts obligate you to purchase shares at the strike price if assigned, potentially requiring substantial capital deployment. Covered calls cap upside potential and provide only limited downside protection equal to premium received.
Option data displayed in MyATMM is delayed and should be used for screening and research purposes only. Always verify current bid/ask prices and market conditions in your real-time brokerage platform before placing orders. Market prices can change significantly during data delays.
High ROI percentages do not necessarily indicate superior investment opportunities and may reflect elevated assignment risk, low liquidity, or volatile underlying securities. Past performance and historical premium levels do not guarantee future results.
This content is for educational purposes only and should not be considered financial advice. Always consult with a qualified financial advisor before implementing any options trading strategy.
MyATMM's Option Search tool filters options by expiration, type, bid price, ROI, stock characteristics, and dividend status, transforming hours of manual option chain review into targeted opportunity lists matching your exact criteria.
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