HIG Cash-Secured Put Strategy
HIG (The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc.), in the Financial Services sector, (Insurance - Diversified industry), listed on NYSE.
The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. provides insurance and financial services to individual and business customers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and internationally. Its Commercial Lines segment offers workers' compensation, property, automobile, liability, umbrella, bond, marine, livestock, and reinsurance; and customized insurance products and risk management services, including professional liability, bond, surety, and specialty casualty coverages through regional offices, branches, sales and policyholder service centers, independent retail agents and brokers, wholesale agents, and reinsurance brokers. The company's Personal Lines segment provides automobile, homeowners, and personal umbrella coverages through direct-to-consumer channel and independent agents. Its Property & Casualty Other Operations segment offers coverage for asbestos and environmental exposures. The company's Group Benefits segment provides group life, disability, and other group coverages to members of employer groups, associations, and affinity groups through direct insurance policies; reinsurance to other insurance companies; employer paid and voluntary product coverages; disability underwriting, administration, and claims processing to self-funded employer plans; and a single-company leave management solution. This segment distributes its group insurance products and services through brokers, consultants, third-party administrators, trade associations, and private exchanges.
HIG (The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc.) trades in the Financial Services sector, specifically Insurance - Diversified, with a market capitalization of approximately $36.36B, a trailing P/E of 9.09, a beta of 0.50 versus the broader market, a 52-week range of 119.61-144.5, average daily share volume of 1.5M, a public-listing history dating back to 1995, approximately 19K full-time employees. These structural characteristics shape how HIG stock options price implied volatility around earnings windows, capital events, and macro-driven sector rotations.
A beta of 0.50 indicates HIG has historically moved less than the broader market, dampening realized volatility and producing tighter expected-move bands per unit of dollar exposure. The trailing P/E of 9.09 is on the value side, where IV often compresses outside event windows because forward growth expectations are already discounted into the share price. HIG 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 HIG?
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.
Current HIG snapshot
As of May 15, 2026, spot at $134.25, ATM IV 18.70%, IV rank 28.17%, expected move 5.36%. The cash-secured put on HIG below is built from the same end-of-day chain, with strikes snapped to listed contracts and premiums pulled from the bid/ask midpoint at a 34-day expiry.
Why this cash-secured put structure on HIG specifically: HIG IV at 18.70% is on the cheap side of its 1-year range, which means a premium-selling HIG cash-secured put collects less credit per unit of strike-width risk, with a market-implied 1-standard-deviation move of approximately 5.36% (roughly $7.20 on the underlying). The 34-day window matched to the front-month expiry keeps theta exposure bounded while still capturing the post-snapshot move; longer-dated HIG expiries trade a higher absolute premium for lower per-day decay. Position sizing on HIG should anchor to the underlying notional of $134.25 per share and to the trader's directional view on HIG stock.
HIG cash-secured put setup
The HIG 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 HIG near $134.25, the first option leg uses a $130.00 strike; additional legs (when the strategy has them) anchor to spot-relative offsets. Premiums come from the bid/ask midpoint on the listed HIG chain at a 34-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 HIG shares for the stock leg in covered calls and collars).
| Action | Type | Strike / Basis | Premium (est) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sell 1 | Put | $130.00 | $1.70 |
HIG cash-secured put risk and reward
- Net Premium / Debit
- +$170.00
- Max Profit (per contract)
- $170.00
- Max Loss (per contract)
- -$12,829.00
- Breakeven(s)
- $128.30
- Risk / Reward Ratio
- 0.013
Max profit equals premium times 100; max loss equals strike minus premium times 100 (at zero, assuming assignment). Breakeven is strike minus premium.
HIG cash-secured put payoff curve
Modeled P&L at expiration across a range of underlying prices for the cash-secured put on HIG. 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.
| Underlying Price | % From Spot | P&L at Expiration |
|---|---|---|
| $0.01 | -100.0% | -$12,829.00 |
| $29.69 | -77.9% | -$9,860.77 |
| $59.37 | -55.8% | -$6,892.54 |
| $89.06 | -33.7% | -$3,924.31 |
| $118.74 | -11.6% | -$956.08 |
| $148.42 | +10.6% | +$170.00 |
| $178.10 | +32.7% | +$170.00 |
| $207.79 | +54.8% | +$170.00 |
| $237.47 | +76.9% | +$170.00 |
| $267.15 | +99.0% | +$170.00 |
When traders use cash-secured put on HIG
Cash-secured puts on HIG earn premium while a trader waits to acquire HIG stock at a target strike below the current quote; most attractive when IV is rich and the trader is comfortable owning HIG.
HIG thesis for this cash-secured put
The market-implied 1-standard-deviation range for HIG extends from approximately $127.05 on the downside to $141.45 on the upside. A HIG cash-secured put lets a trader earn premium while waiting to acquire HIG 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 HIG IV rank near 28.17% 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 HIG at 18.70%. As a Financial Services name, HIG options can move on sector-level news flow (peer earnings, regulatory updates, industry-specific macro data) in addition to HIG-specific events.
HIG 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. HIG positions also carry Financial Services sector concentration risk; news flow inside the sector (peer earnings, regulatory shifts, supply-chain headlines) can move HIG alongside the broader basket even when HIG-specific fundamentals are unchanged. Short-premium structures like a cash-secured put on HIG carry tail risk when realized volatility exceeds the implied move; review historical HIG earnings reactions and macro stress periods before sizing. Always rebuild the position from current HIG chain quotes before placing a trade.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a cash-secured put on HIG?
- A cash-secured put on HIG is the cash-secured put strategy applied to HIG (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 HIG stock trading near $134.25, the strikes shown on this page are snapped to the nearest listed HIG chain strike and the premiums come straight from the end-of-day bid/ask midpoint.
- How are HIG 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 HIG cash-secured put priced from the end-of-day chain at a 30-day expiry (ATM IV 18.70%), the computed maximum profit is $170.00 per contract and the computed maximum loss is -$12,829.00 per contract. Live intraday quotes will differ as the chain moves through the trading session.
- What is the breakeven for a HIG cash-secured put?
- The breakeven for the HIG cash-secured put priced on this page is roughly $128.30 at expiration, derived from end-of-day chain premiums. Breakeven is the underlying price at which the strategy's P&L crosses zero ignoring transaction costs and assignment risk. The current HIG market-implied 1-standard-deviation expected move is approximately 5.36%; 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 HIG?
- Cash-secured puts on HIG earn premium while a trader waits to acquire HIG stock at a target strike below the current quote; most attractive when IV is rich and the trader is comfortable owning HIG.
- How does current HIG implied volatility affect this cash-secured put?
- HIG ATM IV is at 18.70% with IV rank near 28.17%, 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.