CION Cash-Secured Put Strategy
CION (CION Investment Corporation), in the Financial Services sector, (Asset Management industry), listed on NYSE.
CION Investment Corporation operates as a Business Development Company (BDC) with a core focus on providing capital to middle-market businesses. It specializes in various debt instruments, including senior secured loans (such as unitranche, First Lien, and second lien loans), long-term subordinated loans, mezzanine debt, corporate bonds, and other debt securities. Additionally, the firm acquires equity interests, like warrants or options, in these target companies. CION supports diverse corporate initiatives, ranging from funding for growth and acquisitions to leveraged buyouts, market and product expansion, refinancing existing debt, and recapitalization efforts. Up to 30% of its assets may also be allocated to opportunistic investments, which can include securities issued by larger public corporations and foreign holdings. The company actively participates in the secondary loan market but explicitly avoids investing in start-up ventures, companies undergoing turnaround situations, or those with speculative business models.
CION (CION Investment Corporation) trades in the Financial Services sector, specifically Asset Management, with a market capitalization of approximately $369.9M, a trailing P/E of 28.50, a beta of 1.08 versus the broader market, a 52-week range of 5.83-10.93, average daily share volume of 580K, a public-listing history dating back to 2021, approximately 500 full-time employees. These structural characteristics shape how CION stock options price implied volatility around earnings windows, capital events, and macro-driven sector rotations.
A beta of 1.08 places CION roughly in line with broader market moves, so the strategy payoff and realized volatility track the index-equivalent baseline. CION pays a dividend, which adjusts put-call parity and shifts the ex-dividend pricing across the listed chain.
What is a cash-secured put on CION?
A cash-secured put sells an out-of-the-money put while holding cash equal to the strike-times-100 obligation, keeping the premium when the underlying stays above the strike.
CION snapshot
As of August 14, 2026, spot at $7.46, ATM IV 14.20%, IV rank 4.96%, expected move 4.07%. The cash-secured put on CION below is built from the end-of-day chain, with strikes snapped to listed contracts and premiums pulled from the bid/ask midpoint at a 35-day expiry.
Why this cash-secured put structure on CION specifically: CION IV at 14.20% is on the cheap side of its 1-year range, which means a premium-selling CION cash-secured put collects less credit per unit of strike-width risk, with a market-implied 1-standard-deviation move of approximately 4.07% (roughly $0.30 on the underlying). The 35-day window matched to the front-month expiry keeps theta exposure bounded while still capturing the post-snapshot move; longer-dated CION expiries trade a higher absolute premium for lower per-day decay. Position sizing on CION should anchor to the underlying notional of $7.46 per share and to the trader's directional view on CION stock.
CION cash-secured put setup
The CION cash-secured put below is built from the end-of-day chain, with each option leg priced at the bid/ask midpoint of its listed strike. With CION at $7.46 on that close, the first option leg uses a $7.09 strike; additional legs (when the strategy has them) anchor to spot-relative offsets. Premiums come from the bid/ask midpoint on the listed CION chain at a 35-day expiry; the cross-strike IV skew is reflected directly in the per-leg values rather than approximated. Quantity sizing assumes one contract per option leg (or 100 CION shares for the stock leg in covered calls and collars).
| Action | Type | Strike / Basis | Premium (est) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sell 1 | Put | $7.09 | N/A |
CION cash-secured put risk and reward
- Net Premium / Debit
- N/A
- Max Profit (per contract)
- Unbounded
- Max Loss (per contract)
- Unbounded
- Breakeven(s)
- None on modeled curve
- Risk / Reward Ratio
- N/A
Max profit equals premium times 100; max loss equals strike minus premium times 100 (at zero, assuming assignment). Breakeven is strike minus premium.
CION cash-secured put payoff curve
Modeled P&L at expiration across a range of underlying prices for the cash-secured put on CION. Each row is one sampled price point from the computed payoff curve; the full curve uses 200 price points internally before being summarized into 10 rows here.
When traders use cash-secured put on CION
Cash-secured puts on CION earn premium while a trader waits to acquire CION stock at a target strike below the current quote; most attractive when IV is rich and the trader is comfortable owning CION.
CION thesis for this cash-secured put
The market-implied 1-standard-deviation range for CION extends from approximately $7.16 on the downside to $7.76 on the upside. A CION cash-secured put lets a trader earn premium while waiting to acquire CION at the strike price; the strategy is most attractive when the trader is comfortable holding the underlying at that level and IV is rich enough to compensate for the assignment risk. Current CION IV rank near 4.96% sits in the lower third of its 1-year distribution, where IV often re-expands toward the mean; this favors premium-buying structures and disadvantages premium-selling structures on CION at 14.20%. As a Financial Services name, CION options can move on sector-level news flow (peer earnings, regulatory updates, industry-specific macro data) in addition to CION-specific events.
CION cash-secured put positions are structurally neutral to slightly bullish; the modeled P&L assumes European-style exercise at expiration and ignores early assignment, transaction costs, dividends paid before expiry on the stock leg (when present), and the bid-ask spread on the listed chain. CION positions also carry Financial Services sector concentration risk; news flow inside the sector (peer earnings, regulatory shifts, supply-chain headlines) can move CION alongside the broader basket even when CION-specific fundamentals are unchanged. Short-premium structures like a cash-secured put on CION carry tail risk when realized volatility exceeds the implied move; review historical CION earnings reactions and macro stress periods before sizing. Always rebuild the position from current CION chain quotes before placing a trade.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a cash-secured put on CION?
- A cash-secured put on CION is the cash-secured put strategy applied to CION (stock). The strategy is structurally neutral to slightly bullish: A cash-secured put sells an out-of-the-money put while holding cash equal to the strike-times-100 obligation, keeping the premium when the underlying stays above the strike. With CION stock at $7.46 on the most recent close, the strikes shown on this page are snapped to the nearest listed CION chain strike and the premiums come straight from that session's bid/ask midpoint.
- How are CION cash-secured put max profit and max loss calculated?
- Max profit equals premium times 100; max loss equals strike minus premium times 100 (at zero, assuming assignment). Breakeven is strike minus premium. For the CION cash-secured put priced from the end-of-day chain at a 30-day expiry (ATM IV 14.20%), the computed maximum profit is unbounded per contract and the computed maximum loss is unbounded per contract. Live intraday quotes will differ as the chain moves through the trading session.
- What is the breakeven for a CION cash-secured put?
- The breakeven for the CION cash-secured put priced on this page is no defined breakeven on the modeled curve at expiration, derived from the end-of-day chain's premiums. Breakeven is the underlying price at which the strategy's P&L crosses zero ignoring transaction costs and assignment risk. The CION market-implied 1-standard-deviation expected move in the same options snapshot is approximately 4.07%; if the move sits well outside the breakeven distance, the structure's risk-reward becomes correspondingly tighter.
- When should you consider a cash-secured put on CION?
- Cash-secured puts on CION earn premium while a trader waits to acquire CION stock at a target strike below the current quote; most attractive when IV is rich and the trader is comfortable owning CION.
- How does current CION implied volatility affect this cash-secured put?
- CION ATM IV is at 14.20% with IV rank near 4.96%, which is on the low end of its 1-year range. Premium-buying structures (long call, long put, debit spreads) are relatively cheap in this regime; premium-selling structures collect less credit per unit risk.