HTGC Bear Put Spread Strategy
HTGC (Hercules Capital, Inc.), in the Financial Services sector, (Asset Management industry), listed on NYSE.
Hercules Capital, Inc. is a business development company. The firm specializing in providing venture debt, debt, senior secured loans, and growth capital to privately held venture capital-backed companies at all stages of development from startups, to expansion stage including select publicly listed companies and select special opportunity lower middle market companies that require additional capital to fund acquisitions, recapitalizations and refinancing and established-stage companies. The firm provides growth capital financing solutions for capital extension; management buy-out and corporate spin-out financing solutions; company, asset specific, or intellectual property acquisition financing; convertible, subordinated and/or mezzanine loans; domestic and international corporate expansion; vendor financing; revenue acceleration by sales and marketing development, and manufacturing expansion. It provides asset-based financing with a focus on cash flow; accounts receivable facilities; equipment loans or leases; equipment acquisition; facilities build-out and/or expansion; working capital revolving lines of credit; inventory. The firm also provides bridge financing to IPO or mergers and acquisitions or technology acquisition; dividend recapitalizations and other sources of investor liquidity; cash flow financing to protect against share price volatility; competitor acquisition; pre-IPO financing for extra cash on the balance sheet; public company financing to continue asset growth and production capacity; short-term bridge financing; and strategic and intellectual property acquisition financings. It also focuses on customized financing solutions, emerging growth, mid venture, and late venture financing.
HTGC (Hercules Capital, Inc.) trades in the Financial Services sector, specifically Asset Management, with a market capitalization of approximately $2.97B, a trailing P/E of 8.73, a beta of 0.77 versus the broader market, a 52-week range of 13.7-19.67, average daily share volume of 2.7M, a public-listing history dating back to 2005, approximately 100 full-time employees. These structural characteristics shape how HTGC stock options price implied volatility around earnings windows, capital events, and macro-driven sector rotations.
A beta of 0.77 places HTGC roughly in line with broader market moves, so the strategy payoff and realized volatility track the index-equivalent baseline. The trailing P/E of 8.73 is on the value side, where IV often compresses outside event windows because forward growth expectations are already discounted into the share price. HTGC pays a dividend, which adjusts put-call parity and shifts the ex-dividend pricing across the listed chain.
What is a bear put spread on HTGC?
A bear put spread buys an at-the-money put and sells an out-of-the-money put at a lower strike for defined risk and defined reward bounded by the strike width.
Current HTGC snapshot
As of May 15, 2026, spot at $15.51, ATM IV 23.10%, IV rank 5.03%, expected move 6.62%. The bear put spread on HTGC 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 154-day expiry.
Why this bear put spread structure on HTGC specifically: HTGC IV at 23.10% is on the cheap side of its 1-year range, which favors premium-buying structures like a HTGC bear put spread, with a market-implied 1-standard-deviation move of approximately 6.62% (roughly $1.03 on the underlying). The 154-day window matched to the front-month expiry keeps theta exposure bounded while still capturing the post-snapshot move; longer-dated HTGC expiries trade a higher absolute premium for lower per-day decay. Position sizing on HTGC should anchor to the underlying notional of $15.51 per share and to the trader's directional view on HTGC stock.
HTGC bear put spread setup
The HTGC bear put spread below is built from the end-of-day chain, with each option leg priced at the bid/ask midpoint of its listed strike. With HTGC near $15.51, the first option leg uses a $16.00 strike; additional legs (when the strategy has them) anchor to spot-relative offsets. Premiums come from the bid/ask midpoint on the listed HTGC chain at a 154-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 HTGC shares for the stock leg in covered calls and collars).
| Action | Type | Strike / Basis | Premium (est) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buy 1 | Put | $16.00 | $1.38 |
| Sell 1 | Put | $15.00 | $1.00 |
HTGC bear put spread risk and reward
- Net Premium / Debit
- -$37.50
- Max Profit (per contract)
- $62.50
- Max Loss (per contract)
- -$37.50
- Breakeven(s)
- $15.63
- Risk / Reward Ratio
- 1.667
Max profit equals strike width minus net debit times 100; max loss equals net debit times 100. Breakeven is long-put strike minus net debit.
HTGC bear put spread payoff curve
Modeled P&L at expiration across a range of underlying prices for the bear put spread on HTGC. 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 | -99.9% | +$62.50 |
| $3.44 | -77.8% | +$62.50 |
| $6.87 | -55.7% | +$62.50 |
| $10.29 | -33.6% | +$62.50 |
| $13.72 | -11.5% | +$62.50 |
| $17.15 | +10.6% | -$37.50 |
| $20.58 | +32.7% | -$37.50 |
| $24.01 | +54.8% | -$37.50 |
| $27.44 | +76.9% | -$37.50 |
| $30.86 | +99.0% | -$37.50 |
When traders use bear put spread on HTGC
Bear put spreads on HTGC reduce the cost of a bearish HTGC stock position by selling a lower-strike put; suited to moderate-decline theses where price reaches but does not vastly exceed the short strike.
HTGC thesis for this bear put spread
The market-implied 1-standard-deviation range for HTGC extends from approximately $14.48 on the downside to $16.54 on the upside. A HTGC bear put spread caps both the risk and the reward of a bearish position; relative to an outright long put on HTGC, the spread reduces the cost basis but limits the maximum profit to the strike width minus net debit. Current HTGC IV rank near 5.03% 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 HTGC at 23.10%. As a Financial Services name, HTGC options can move on sector-level news flow (peer earnings, regulatory updates, industry-specific macro data) in addition to HTGC-specific events.
HTGC bear put spread positions are structurally moderately bearish; 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. HTGC positions also carry Financial Services sector concentration risk; news flow inside the sector (peer earnings, regulatory shifts, supply-chain headlines) can move HTGC alongside the broader basket even when HTGC-specific fundamentals are unchanged. Long-premium structures like a bear put spread on HTGC are particularly exposed to IV-crush risk through scheduled events (earnings, FDA decisions, central-bank meetings) where IV typically contracts post-event regardless of the directional outcome. Always rebuild the position from current HTGC chain quotes before placing a trade.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a bear put spread on HTGC?
- A bear put spread on HTGC is the bear put spread strategy applied to HTGC (stock). The strategy is structurally moderately bearish: A bear put spread buys an at-the-money put and sells an out-of-the-money put at a lower strike for defined risk and defined reward bounded by the strike width. With HTGC stock trading near $15.51, the strikes shown on this page are snapped to the nearest listed HTGC chain strike and the premiums come straight from the end-of-day bid/ask midpoint.
- How are HTGC bear put spread max profit and max loss calculated?
- Max profit equals strike width minus net debit times 100; max loss equals net debit times 100. Breakeven is long-put strike minus net debit. For the HTGC bear put spread priced from the end-of-day chain at a 30-day expiry (ATM IV 23.10%), the computed maximum profit is $62.50 per contract and the computed maximum loss is -$37.50 per contract. Live intraday quotes will differ as the chain moves through the trading session.
- What is the breakeven for a HTGC bear put spread?
- The breakeven for the HTGC bear put spread priced on this page is roughly $15.63 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 HTGC market-implied 1-standard-deviation expected move is approximately 6.62%; if the move sits well outside the breakeven distance, the structure's risk-reward becomes correspondingly tighter.
- When should you consider a bear put spread on HTGC?
- Bear put spreads on HTGC reduce the cost of a bearish HTGC stock position by selling a lower-strike put; suited to moderate-decline theses where price reaches but does not vastly exceed the short strike.
- How does current HTGC implied volatility affect this bear put spread?
- HTGC ATM IV is at 23.10% with IV rank near 5.03%, 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.