Retire with $1 million, based on the backtests

Selling options is one way to draw a monthly income from a portfolio — and a way to preserve it. The setup: hold SGOV, a T-bill ETF that pays interest on its own, and use it as collateral to sell puts.

In the backtests below, the better variants of that trade earned about 10% a year over the last decade. On a $1 million account, that was roughly $100,000 a year — depending on what your life costs, that can be retirement money.

Best risk-adjusted strategy

QQQ 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop

CAGR

11.2%

2016 → 2026, backtested

Max drawdown

−17.9%

vs −35.1% for QQQ buy & hold

Income on $1M

$112k

one year at the backtested rate

01 · Equity curves

The equity curve for each wheeling strategy

There are many ways to sell options, though — and each one produced a different return with a different risk profile.

S&P 500 underlying — SPY wheels

Strategy	Return / year	Worst drawdown	Sharpe	End value
SPY · 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop	9.0%	-24.1%	0.79	$2,498,310
SPY buy & hold	15.3%	-33.7%	0.78	$4,539,699
SPY · Monthly ATM Δ0.50 wheel	9.9%	-29.3%	0.71	$2,734,450
SPY · Monthly Δ0.30 wheel	7.6%	-29.6%	0.51	$2,187,313
SPY · Weekly 7 DTE Δ0.30 wheel	6.0%	-29.9%	0.35	$1,855,352

Nasdaq-100 underlying — QQQ wheels

Strategy	Return / year	Worst drawdown	Sharpe	End value
QQQ · 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop	11.2%	-17.9%	1.11	$3,085,830
QQQ buy & hold	20.1%	-35.1%	0.89	$7,051,088
QQQ · Monthly ATM Δ0.50 wheel	10.6%	-24.5%	0.69	$2,932,886
QQQ · Monthly Δ0.30 wheel	9.6%	-29.4%	0.62	$2,645,204
QQQ · Weekly 7 DTE Δ0.30 wheel	5.5%	-31.7%	0.28	$1,771,503

02 · High-IV single names

The TSLA / NVDA wheel

You can wheel other stocks, too — the same strategies, priced from each stock's own volatility. What you sell premium on turns out to matter more than how.

TSLA — growth of $1M (log scale)

NVDA — growth of $1M (log scale)

Strategy	Return / year	Worst drawdown	Sharpe	End value
NVDA buy & hold	69.5%	-66.3%	1.48	$275,868,628
TSLA · Weekly 7 DTE Δ0.30 wheel	32.8%	-51.3%	1.01	$20,487,177
NVDA · Monthly Δ0.30 wheel	23.9%	-46.5%	0.84	$9,829,898
NVDA · Monthly ATM Δ0.50 wheel	20.4%	-47.0%	0.73	$7,186,703
TSLA · 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop	14.7%	-43.7%	0.63	$4,284,286
NVDA · 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop	13.2%	-35.8%	0.62	$3,711,882
NVDA · Weekly 7 DTE Δ0.30 wheel	16.7%	-47.0%	0.57	$5,114,349
TSLA buy & hold	34.5%	-73.6%	0.55	$23,415,469
TSLA · Monthly Δ0.30 wheel	17.1%	-54.8%	0.51	$5,377,452
TSLA · Monthly ATM Δ0.50 wheel	10.2%	-52.4%	0.28	$2,817,949

03 · Key takeaways

Key takeaways

Selling puts is market exposure with the upside capped at the premium: Every variant rose and fell with its underlying. The index wheels earned 5.5–11.2% a year all-in — option P&L plus the collateral's T-bill interest — across a decade in which SPY buy-and-hold earned 15.3%. The premium is compensation for taking downside risk, not a way around it.
The underlying decides the outcome: Identical mechanics earned 23.9% a year on NVDA and 7.6% on SPY (the monthly Δ0.30 wheel) — but the single names carried drawdowns past −45%. Strike distance and exit rules only shape the risk — what you sell premium on dominates everything else, and that's a stock-picking bet wearing an options costume.
The best risk-adjusted strategy: QQQ 45→21 DTE Δ0.30 time-stop: Highest Sharpe of everything tested (1.11) — 11.2% a year at a −17.9% max drawdown, half of QQQ buy-and-hold's. The rule is the calendar, not the price: sell the ~45-day Δ0.30 put, buy it back when 21 days remain, repeat. It never holds to expiration, so it's never assigned.
What these numbers are — and aren't: Option prices are model-simulated. Past performance — simulated or real — does not predict future results. Nothing here is investment advice. Investing involves risk of loss.

04 · Replicate

Replicate a strategy

See every detail about each wheeling strategy — and how to replicate it yourself, month by month, on a $1 million account.

Underlying to wheel

Pick a strategy above to see its month-by-month playbook.