Remote Funded Covered Call Strategist — Chicago, IL
Chicago, IL
Maverick Trading
Generate income against equity holdings. Covered calls, wheel strategies, and laddered overwrites.
Trade from the world's derivatives capital — same time zone as the CME, deepest trader community in the country outside NYC.
A covered call strategist at Maverick runs an income overlay on firm equity holdings. The role isn't about picking the next moonshot stock — it's about managing a portfolio of quality names and systematically generating premium against them. Done well, the strategy compounds an equity portfolio's return without taking on the open-ended risk of naked short calls.
Trading from Chicago, IL
Chicago is the global capital of derivatives trading. The CME, CBOE, and the cluster of prop firms in the West Loop — Citadel, DRW, Optiver, Jump, IMC, Belvedere — make this the city with the highest density of professional traders per capita anywhere outside Manhattan. The Central Time zone is a natural fit for trading US equities: an 8:30am open with a 3pm close gives a long afternoon and a manageable schedule.
Local ecosystem: CME, CBOE, and a major cluster of prop trading firms in the West Loop and Loop districts.
Time zone: CT — the NYSE opens at 8:30am local for traders based in Chicago.
What You'll Trade
Covered calls on firm-held equity positions, predominantly large-cap dividend-paying names and quality growth stocks. Some traders also run cash-secured puts on names they would be willing to own — the 'wheel' approach — to enter equity positions at a discount.
Day-to-Day
- Review the equity book: which positions are held, current cost basis, any positions approaching ex-dividend dates
- Identify covered-call candidates based on IV rank, delta, and days-to-expiration framework
- Execute call overwrites at the planned strikes — typically 20–35 delta, 30–45 days out
- Manage assigned positions: take assignment when the strike is right, roll when the underlying has moved too far
- Monitor portfolio-level call coverage; not every share needs to be covered every week
Risk Profile
Covered calls cap upside on the underlying — that's the trade. The risk is leaving large gains on the table when overwritten strikes are blown through. Maverick traders manage this by tiered coverage (only writing against a portion of a position) and by sizing call strikes based on the underlying's expected move and the trader's directional view.
Who Succeeds in This Role
- Traders who already think in portfolio terms — not single-position P&L
- People comfortable with a strategy whose returns are bounded but steady
- Candidates with a value-investing or income-investing background
- Traders who can resist the urge to chase higher premium by selling deep-ITM or far-OTM calls
Why This Role Exists at Maverick
Covered call programs are a legitimate institutional strategy run by major asset managers. The retail version is often poorly executed — wrong strikes, wrong sizing, wrong expirations. Maverick funds traders who run the strategy with institutional discipline against firm capital.
What Maverick Offers
- Trade firm capital — no personal capital at risk
- 65%–90% profit split based on performance tier
- Performance-based capital scaling, no upper cap
- Professional training and mentorship from active traders
- Fully remote — trade from anywhere with reliable internet (US applicants)
- Monthly ACH payouts
- No challenge accounts, no evaluations, no monthly fees
About Maverick Trading
Maverick Trading is a proprietary trading firm founded in 1997. We allocate firm capital to disciplined traders and scale buying power based on performance. We are not a brokerage, we do not run challenge accounts, and we do not sell evaluations. We profit only when our traders profit.