iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) Expected Move
Expected move estimates the probable price range for a given period based on at-the-money options pricing. It reflects the market consensus for volatility over the selected timeframe.
iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) operates in the Financial Services sector, specifically the Asset Management - Bonds industry, with a market capitalization near $39.07B, listed on NASDAQ, carrying a beta of 2.40 to the broader market. Providing exposure to long-term government debt, the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF aims to replicate the performance of an index. public since 2002-07-30.
Snapshot as of Oct 6, 2026.
- Spot Price
- $77.28
- Expected Move
- 4.3%
- Implied High
- $80.59
- Implied Low
- $73.97
- Front DTE
- 31 days
As of Oct 6, 2026, iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) has an expected move of 4.28%, a one-standard-deviation implied price range of roughly $73.97 to $80.59 from the current $77.28. Expected move is derived from at-the-money straddle pricing and represents the market's pricing of a ±1σ move. Roughly 68% of outcomes should fall within this range under lognormal assumptions, though empirical markets have fatter tails.
TLT Strategy Sizing to the Expected Move
With iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF pricing an expected move of 4.28% from $77.28, risk-defined strategies sized to the implied range structurally target the modal outcome distribution. Iron condors with wings at the ±1σ expected move boundaries collect premium against the ~68% probability that spot stays inside the range under lognormal assumptions; strangles set wider at ±1.5σ or ±2σ target the tails but pay smaller per-trade premium. Long-vol structures (long straddles, ratio backspreads) profit when realized move exceeds the implied move, the inverse trade: they bet against the lognormal assumption itself, capitalizing on the empirically fatter equity-return tails.
How to read the TLT implied-range chart
The shaded range above shows the one-standard-deviation implied price band at each listed expiration, derived from ATM implied volatility scaled to days-to-expiration. The front-tenor expected move is 4.28%, anchoring an implied range of approximately $73.97 to $80.59. Under lognormal assumptions, roughly 68% of outcomes fall inside that band; 95% fall inside ±2σ; 99.7% inside ±3σ. The empirical equity-return distribution has fatter tails than lognormal, so true tail-outcome frequency is moderately higher than these closed-form numbers suggest.
TLT expected move and event pricing
Expected move widens with √time: a 5% 30-day move corresponds to roughly a 2.5% 7.5-day move and a 10% 120-day move. TLT term-structure is in backwardation (slope -0.001), so near-dated tenors price in disproportionate vol - usually because of a known event in the front-month window. Combined with the 78.9% IV rank, the implied move is meaningfully wider than the typical TLT trailing range, so even premium-selling structures need wide wings to absorb the elevated regime.
Sizing TLT structures to the expected move
Iron condors with wings at ±1σ collect the modal-outcome premium; ±1.5σ widens probability of inside-range to ~87% but cuts collected premium roughly in half. Strangles do the inverse trade - they pay against the same lognormal distribution, profiting when realized exceeds implied. Calendar spreads bet on the slope of the term structure rather than the level. TLT put/call volume ratio currently at 0.72 indicates balanced flow without strong directional skew. The expected move is the inputs the chain is pricing, not a forecast - realized moves above or below are normal under any distribution.
Learn how expected move is reported and how to read the data →
Per-expiration expected move for TLT derived from ATM implied volatility at each listed expiration. Implied high/low bounds are computed as $77.28 × (1 ± expected move %). One standard-deviation range under lognormal assumptions, roughly 68% of outcomes fall inside.
| Expiration | DTE | ATM IV | Expected Move | Implied High | Implied Low |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 7, 2026 | 1 | 13.3% | 0.7% | $77.82 | $76.74 |
| Oct 9, 2026 | 3 | 13.5% | 1.2% | $78.23 | $76.33 |
| Oct 12, 2026 | 6 | 11.4% | 1.5% | $78.41 | $76.15 |
| Oct 14, 2026 | 8 | 12.5% | 1.9% | $78.71 | $75.85 |
| Oct 16, 2026 | 10 | 13.3% | 2.2% | $78.98 | $75.58 |
| Oct 19, 2026 | 13 | 12.5% | 2.4% | $79.10 | $75.46 |
| Oct 21, 2026 | 15 | 13.2% | 2.7% | $79.35 | $75.21 |
| Oct 23, 2026 | 17 | 13.4% | 2.9% | $79.51 | $75.05 |
| Oct 30, 2026 | 24 | 14.3% | 3.7% | $80.11 | $74.45 |
| Nov 6, 2026 | 31 | 15.0% | 4.4% | $80.66 | $73.90 |
| Nov 13, 2026 | 38 | 14.9% | 4.8% | $81.00 | $73.56 |
| Nov 20, 2026 | 45 | 15.1% | 5.3% | $81.38 | $73.18 |
| Nov 30, 2026 | 55 | 14.7% | 5.7% | $81.69 | $72.87 |
| Dec 18, 2026 | 73 | 15.5% | 6.9% | $82.64 | $71.92 |
| Dec 31, 2026 | 86 | 15.0% | 7.3% | $82.91 | $71.65 |
| Jan 15, 2027 | 101 | 15.0% | 7.9% | $83.38 | $71.18 |
| Feb 19, 2027 | 136 | 14.9% | 9.1% | $84.31 | $70.25 |
| Mar 19, 2027 | 164 | 14.9% | 10.0% | $85.00 | $69.56 |
| Mar 31, 2027 | 176 | 14.9% | 10.3% | $85.28 | $69.28 |
| Apr 16, 2027 | 192 | 14.9% | 10.8% | $85.63 | $68.93 |
| May 21, 2027 | 227 | 14.9% | 11.8% | $86.36 | $68.20 |
| Jun 17, 2027 | 254 | 15.3% | 12.8% | $87.14 | $67.42 |
| Jun 30, 2027 | 267 | 14.9% | 12.7% | $87.13 | $67.43 |
| Jul 16, 2027 | 283 | 14.9% | 13.1% | $87.42 | $67.14 |
| Aug 20, 2027 | 318 | 14.8% | 13.8% | $87.96 | $66.60 |
| Sep 17, 2027 | 346 | 14.8% | 14.4% | $88.42 | $66.14 |
| Sep 30, 2027 | 359 | 14.9% | 14.8% | $88.70 | $65.86 |
| Jan 21, 2028 | 472 | 14.9% | 16.9% | $90.37 | $64.19 |
| Jun 16, 2028 | 619 | 14.8% | 19.3% | $92.17 | $62.39 |
| Dec 15, 2028 | 801 | 15.4% | 22.8% | $94.91 | $59.65 |
| Jan 19, 2029 | 836 | 15.3% | 23.2% | $95.17 | $59.39 |
TLT highest implied-volatility contracts
| Type | Strike | Expiration | Volume | OI | IV | Bid | Ask |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CALL | $120.00 | Jan 21, 2028 | 701 | 440.7K | 20.6% | $0.24 | $0.27 |
| CALL | $100.00 | Jan 21, 2028 | 1.6K | 403.8K | 16.4% | $0.60 | $0.64 |
| CALL | $90.00 | Dec 18, 2026 | 3.3K | 336.7K | 17.8% | $0.06 | $0.07 |
| CALL | $105.00 | Jan 21, 2028 | 166 | 201.8K | 17.7% | $0.47 | $0.50 |
| CALL | $83.00 | Oct 16, 2026 | 838 | 183.9K | 18.1% | $0.01 | $0.02 |
| PUT | $73.00 | Dec 18, 2026 | 1.0K | 161.8K | 17.0% | $0.70 | $0.72 |
| PUT | $84.00 | Oct 16, 2026 | 26.6K | 11.5K | 19.2% | $6.60 | $6.80 |
| CALL | $90.00 | Jan 21, 2028 | 532 | 159.2K | 14.8% | $1.34 | $1.37 |
| CALL | $90.00 | Jan 15, 2027 | 747 | 145.8K | 16.8% | $0.11 | $0.12 |
| CALL | $110.00 | Jan 15, 2027 | 26 | 137.3K | 24.4% | $0.02 | $0.03 |
Top 10 contracts from the institutional-grade nightly options scan; ranked by iv within the broader S&P 500/400/600 + ETF universe.
Frequently asked TLT expected move questions
- What is the current TLT expected move?
- As of Oct 6, 2026, iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) has an expected move of 4.28% over the next 31 days, implying a one-standard-deviation price range of $73.97 to $80.59 from the current $77.28. The expected move is derived from at-the-money straddle pricing and represents the market consensus for a ±1σ price move.
- What does the TLT expected move mean for traders?
- Roughly 68% of outcomes should fall within ±1 expected move and 95% within ±2 under lognormal assumptions, though equity returns have empirically fatter tails than log-normal predicts. Strategies sized to the expected move (iron condors at ±1σ, strangles at ±1.5σ) target the typical outcome distribution; strategies that profit from tail moves (long-vol structures, ratio backspreads) target the tails the lognormal model under-prices.
- How is TLT expected move calculated?
- The expected move displayed here is derived from at-the-money implied volatility scaled to the chosen tenor: expected move % is approximately ATM IV times sqrt(T / 365), where T is days to expiration. An equivalent straddle-based form: the ATM straddle (call + put at the same strike) is roughly sqrt(2/pi) times spot times IV times sqrt(T/365), so the implied one-standard-deviation move is approximately 1.25 times ATM straddle divided by spot. The two formulations agree once the sqrt(2/pi) constant is reconciled.