Binance Covered Call and Cash-Secured Put: How to Sell U.S. Stock Options for Premium, What Gets Locked and When You Get Assigned

What changed on 15 October

When Binance launched Stock Options on 1 September 2026, it was buy-only: users could buy calls and puts on 1,000-plus selected U.S. stocks and ETFs, with maximum loss limited to the premium paid, and the launch announcement said plainly "No writing or short exposure". The 15 October update adds the first two ways to sell. Binance describes them as "short-side strategies" that let users earn premiums as income on shares they already hold or to target an entry price on shares they want to own.

The structure behind it is unchanged. Binance Stock Options are offered through Nest Trading Limited, a broker-dealer regulated in Abu Dhabi Global Market, which acts as introducing broker and routes orders to Alpaca Securities LLC in the United States for execution, clearing, settlement and custody. Binance itself does not hold the securities. Settlement is physical: if you are assigned, real shares move at the strike price through Alpaca. Binance states it does not offer these products to U.S. users, and every announcement carries the line that products may not be available in your region.

How each strategy works

Binance's FAQ gives the arithmetic for the put: one contract at a $45 strike with a multiplier of 100 freezes 4,500 USDC, and the premium you receive does not reduce the cash locked.

A worked example (illustrative numbers, not a live quote)

Suppose a stock trades at $47 and you sell one Cash-Secured Put at a $45 strike for a premium of $1.50 a share. You receive $150 and 4,500 USDC is locked until the position closes, expires or is assigned. That $150 is a 3.3% return on the locked cash if the option expires worthless. If you are assigned, you buy 100 shares at $45, so your effective cost is $43.50 a share after the premium. If the stock then falls to zero, the loss is $4,350 per contract; the premium reduces the worst case by 3.3%, no more.

For a Covered Call, suppose you own 100 shares bought at $50, now at $52, and you sell one call at a $55 strike for $1.20 a share. You receive $120. If the stock stays below $55 at expiry you keep the shares and the $120. If it is assigned, you sell at $55, which is $500 of gain on the shares plus the $120 premium, or $620. If the stock runs to $62 you still sell at $55 and forgo the extra $7 a share, $700. If it falls to $44 you hold shares that lost $600 against your cost, cushioned by $120.

The premium is the only fixed number in either trade. What you give up is open-ended: the upside above the strike on a call, the fall below the strike on a put. That is the whole trade.

What it costs

Binance's fee promotion for Stock Options, which started on 1 September 2026 and runs until further notice, sets a commission of $0.60 per contract, a platform fee of zero and an exercise fee of zero. On top come pass-through regulatory fees: an Options Regulatory Fee of $0.015 per contract, an Options Clearing Corporation fee of $0.025 per contract, a consolidated audit trail fee of $0.000003 per executed equivalent share, and on sells an SEC fee of $0.0000206 times trade value. Binance rounds these up to the nearest cent per order, so a one-contract sale costs roughly $0.65 to $0.70, and closing it later costs about the same again. On a $150 premium that is under half a percent each way. USDC to USD conversion carries zero fee during the promotion.

The limits per order are 1,000 contracts and $500,000 of premium. Trading follows U.S. options hours of 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Eastern for most stock options (some ETF and ETN options run to 4:15 p.m.), which is 21:30 to 04:00 SGT in October; there is no pre-market or post-market session. New orders are not accepted outside those hours.

Steps to place one

1. Enable options. Your account needs Stock Options enabled: complete the Options Suitability Quiz and sign the disclaimer. If you have not opened Stocks before, Binance opens Stocks and Options together.
2. Prepare the collateral. For a Covered Call, hold at least 100 free shares per contract in the stock account. For a Cash-Secured Put, hold the full strike amount (strike × 100 per contract) in USDC in your Funding Account.
3. Open the chain. Go to the stock's candlestick page and tap the Options tab. If the tab is missing, options are not available for that stock.
4. Pick expiry and strike, choose Sell, and enter the number of contracts. The form shows Max Sell, calculated from your free shares or USDC; premium you will receive is not counted toward it.
5. Check the Collateral field, then tap Preview. The first time you will see a Covered Call or Cash-Secured Put risk notice; confirm to continue.
6. Place a limit order. The collateral is reserved at once. If the order fills, the collateral stays frozen and the premium arrives T+1; if it is cancelled or expires unfilled, the collateral is released.
7. Close it yourself if you want out. Use Positions > Close, which sends a Buy to Close order. In the final stretch before expiry the contract becomes close-only: from 3:15 p.m. Eastern on expiration day (3:30 p.m. for contracts that trade until 4:15 p.m.).

The risks Binance spells out

• Early assignment. The options are American-style, so assignment can happen overnight before expiry; Binance notifies you by push and email, and uses your collateral to settle.
• No auto-close at expiry. Long options may be auto-liquidated on a best-efforts basis near expiry, but short positions are not. If you hold a short option that is in the money at the cut-off, you may be assigned.
• Collateral calls. If required collateral is not maintained or topped up, the position may be closed out without further consent.
• Corporate actions. A split, merger or special dividend adjusts the contract. Adjusted contracts are close-only, and shares and cash are rechecked separately, so a surplus of one cannot cover a shortfall in the other.
• Locked assets. Frozen shares and USDC cannot be used for other orders or withdrawals, and the same shares cannot cover two calls.

Stock options, bStocks and perpetuals are different things

Binance now offers four ways to get U.S.-equity exposure from one account, and they carry different rights. Stock Options are contracts on real shares held by Alpaca; bStocks are tokenized shares that trade around the clock; equity-linked perpetuals track a price without delivery. Our comparison of what you own, trading hours and dividends across bStocks and TradFi perpetuals explains the other two, and the tokenized stocks hub lists the on-chain versions. If you want options on chain rather than on Binance's broker route, we covered Hypercall's S&P 500 options on Hyperliquid. Because Covered Calls and Cash-Secured Puts are physically settled, they behave like a brokerage product, not like a crypto derivative.

How to act on this

The practical test is simple. A Covered Call fits someone who already holds 100 shares of a stock they would be content to sell at a higher price; a Cash-Secured Put fits someone who has the full strike amount in USDC and would be content to own the shares at a lower price. If you are neither, these are not for you. If you are opening a Binance account for this, registering with referral code 11350287 returns 25% of your spot trading fees, which helps on the USDC and stablecoin trades around it; the sign-up route is on the Binance profile, and live promotions are on the activities page. Start with one contract on a stock you already follow, and read the Collateral field before you press confirm.

What we could not verify

Binance's pages do not show which stocks have options on a given day (that is visible only inside the app) or the current premiums, so the examples above use round numbers. Binance's announcement says regulatory pass-through fees can change without notice. We also could not confirm whether stock-options commissions count toward any referral rebate.

Quick answers

What is the difference between a Covered Call and a Cash-Secured Put on Binance? A Covered Call freezes your shares and obliges you to sell them at the strike if assigned; a Cash-Secured Put freezes the full strike amount in USDC and obliges you to buy the shares at the strike if assigned.

What collateral does Binance require? 100 free shares per contract for a Covered Call, and USDC equal to contracts × multiplier × strike in your Funding Account for a Cash-Secured Put.

Can I be assigned before expiry? Yes. Early assignment can happen overnight, and short positions are not closed automatically at expiry.

What does it cost? $0.60 commission per contract in the current promotion, no platform or exercise fee, plus a few cents a contract in regulatory fees.

Is it available to U.S. residents? No; Americans are excluded, and elsewhere availability depends on your region.