# MEIC Roundtable 2026: Tammy Chambless, Dan Sheridan and Three MEIC Traders

> Dan Sheridan hosts Tammy Chambless and three MEIC traders on 0DTE iron condors in 2026, from Optimizer entry times to slippage, stops and automation.

- URL: https://optionomega.com/blog/meic-roundtable-tammy-chambless-dan-sheridan/
- Published: 2026-10-06
- Author: Dan Sheridan (Options mentor and former CBOE market maker)
- Featuring: Tammy Chambless (Full-time options trader)
- Topics: MEIC, 0DTE, SPX, Optimizer, Interview
- Video: [Option Omega MEIC Roundtable-- Tammy, Dan and Friends!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htwCH2v56f8)

## Key points

- Tammy Chambless used the Optimizer on six months of data to pick six MEIC entry times, then per-leg credit targets. On those same six months, the credit step took the backtest from a 16% CAGR (MAR 4) to a 67% CAGR (MAR about 15); she called her process "probably the ultimate in curve fitting."
- Christopher runs a fully automated system that re-picks spreads weekly from the last 12 weeks, averaging each entry minute with the 6 minutes either side.
- Sidd called slippage the single biggest threat to MEIC in 2026; the group discussed exit execution, spreading positions across strikes and using SPY for better fills.
- Tammy sizes so a day where every trade stops out stays within 2% of the account, and has found VIX changes her credit targets more than her results.

Multiple entry iron condors (MEIC) spread several 0DTE SPX iron condors across the trading day. In this roundtable, Dan Sheridan brought together four traders who run it: Tammy Chambless, plus Christopher, Joel and Sidd. Each trades MEIC differently. The topic that kept coming back was execution and slippage in 2026.

Dan said up front that he isn't an MEIC expert and wanted to hear how people who trade it every day go about it. The Optimizer walkthrough, the four setups and the disagreements below are as they described them in October 2026.

## What MEIC is

Tammy's short version: MEIC sells 0DTE iron condors several times a day, hoping each expires worthless. She compares it to flipping a weighted coin: the more flips, the more the edge shows up.

Her base setup in the demo:

- She aims for about $1.50 of credit per side and manages each side separately.
- She allocates about 2% of her capital per day and risks no more than 50% of her buying power per day.
- She plans six entries.
- She uses a 0.9x stop multiple, a stop at slightly less than two times the initial premium.

## Tammy's Optimizer workflow

Tammy re-tests at the end of every month to choose the next month's entry times. In the session she showed how she does it with the [Optimizer](https://optionomega.com/features/backtesting/), over the last six months, one parameter at a time.

### Step 1: Entry times

She swept entry times from shortly after the open to the last half hour of the day in 10-minute steps, 36 backtests in all. She ranks results by MAR, P&L or CAGR, and avoids the Sharpe ratio for options because it penalizes upside too.

With her settings over those six months, entries in about the first 90 minutes lost money, a late-morning entry was just slightly profitable, and several afternoon times did better. She picked six times spread across the late morning and afternoon instead of clustering the six best, because the best times move around.

Christopher pushed back on one pick that was surrounded by red. He judges an entry time by the average of the times around it.

### Step 2: Credit targets per leg

The Optimizer can now vary DTE, price and offset for each leg independently. Tammy saved the test, then swept the put and call credit targets from $1 to $3 in 25-cent steps. Sorted by Sortino and then by P&L, $1.75 on the puts and $2.75 on the calls came out best in this window, and that's the pair she used.

### Step 3: Spread width

She then tested widths from 10 to 100 in steps of 10 (put widths are entered as negative numbers). Narrower widths looked better in the sweep, but after re-running the full backtest the CAGR rose only a little and the MAR came in at 7.4, lower than the previous run. She normally trades 50 wide. In her experience, narrower spreads have tended to do a bit better because they let her trade more contracts with the same buying power.

| Backtest step (last 6 months) | CAGR | Max drawdown | MAR |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Single entry time | Not stated | About 1.3–1.4% | Not stated |
| Six entry times | 16% | 3.9% | 4 |
| Six entry times + per-leg credit targets | 67% | About 4% | About 15 |
| + narrower widths | Slightly higher | Not stated | 7.4 |

Every row was chosen and measured on the same six months, and the CAGR figures are annualized from that short window. As Tammy put it, "hindsight is so good."

Two cautions from Tammy. First, every change means re-testing the others, since the entry times were chosen with the old premium. Second, she calls her monthly process "probably the ultimate in curve fitting." She does it anyway because, in her view, no parameter stays best forever and she would rather stay close to the current market.

## Sidd: volume profile for when not to trade

Sidd uses the backtest to find statistically good entry times, then market profile and volume profile on ES futures to decide whether to take them that day.

- **Thin volume on a big move** means the market has not agreed on fair value. He does not enter into a trend.
- **A double distribution** (a big drop, a base, then a V-shaped recovery into a second base) is, in his view, a poor day for MEIC. Puts can get stopped on the way down and calls on the way back up.
- **A consolidating distribution,** often after the first hour and a half to two hours, is when he starts entering.

His view: the backtest tells you what to do; volume profile tells you what not to do. He also uses average true range. He keeps credits steady at about $1.50 to $1.75 per leg, but may size up after volatility has expanded, expecting it to contract.

## Christopher: a fully automated system

Christopher makes no discretionary entries. His system:

- Treats every put spread and call spread separately, then combines them into iron condors and EMA-based trades.
- Trades 200-wide spreads. The longs are there mainly to limit margin.
- Skips the first two minutes and the last 10 minutes of the day.
- Tests premium targets from $1.50 up to about $6 and stop multiples from about 1x to 4x, per side. That is roughly 75,000 spreads per day.
- Looks back 12 weeks (recently better than longer windows in his tests), re-picks weekly, and was walk-forward tested back to SPX daily expirations, about four years.
- Never trusts a single minute. Each result is averaged with the 6 minutes either side.
- Forces even spacing: an iron condor every 20 minutes and an EMA trade every 30, with the same number of lots on every entry.

The result can pair very different sides, for example a $1.50 put spread with a 2x stop and a $5 call spread with a 4x stop. His only manual step: late in the day on larger accounts, he may take lots off a strike that has become too concentrated.

## Joel: mixing 1x and 2x stops

Joel has traded 0DTE since about 2020, moving from front-loaded morning entries with a 2x stop to Tammy's style of 1x stops and equal premium in 2022 and 2023. This year, he said, the 1x stop has done poorly.

His changes:

- Sized down.
- Cut his wings from 100 wide to 50.
- Leaves orphaned longs on after a short stops out, with a 20–30% trailing stop. On big headline moves, those longs have sometimes gone up 10, 20 or 50 times.
- Runs six iron condors with a 1x stop and six with a 2x stop. His reasoning: a trending day tends to favor the 1x, while a choppy day that hits the 1x stops on both sides may let the 2x survive.

## Slippage is the 2026 problem

Sidd called slippage the single biggest threat to the strategy, and much of the discussion focused on execution.

- **Christopher** emphasized exit execution and spreading positions across strikes to reduce concentration.
- **Sidd** discussed reducing size and using SPY for better fills, accepting that SPY does not get the Section 1256 tax treatment SPX does.
- **Tammy** said her slippage has been nowhere near the worst she heard of on the August 5 spike, when options 20 points out of the money spiked by about $17 with half a second left.

### Wide market protection: two views

Tammy has talked with people at Cboe since around 2022 and credits feedback from her and others with drill-through protection and wide market protection. After the August 5 spike, she emailed Cboe because the protection had been lifted in the final seconds of the day. By her account, about 10 days later it was extended through the close. Her advice was to report problems through your broker, since most retail clients can't contact Cboe directly.

Christopher sees it differently. Market makers take the risk, so they set the price. He does not like that wide market protection can delay even a market order while the market keeps running. He would rather get out.

Dan, who left the pits in 2004, suggested the group bring their data to people at Cboe, including JJ Kinahan. Someone in the group added that more competition, like the SPY alternative Sidd described, could tighten these markets over time.

## Closing round: VIX, automation and risk

- **Joel:** Higher VIX is slightly better in his backtests, but he trades every day except FOMC and end-of-month days. His SPX trades are fully automated.
- **Christopher:** Fully automated, including schedule generation. He said 95% of Option Omega's value for him is the Discord, where he shares his system and studies.
- **Tammy:** She has noticed VIX doesn't make much difference to her results, only to her credit targets (lower in low VIX, higher in high VIX). She is almost fully automated, keeps one small manual account, and skips FOMC days. After backtesting the days she skipped last year, she found she would have done better trading them. Her hard rule: if every trade that day lost, the total should not exceed 2% of the account.

Christopher gave the final caution. Tammy had described MEIC, traded the way she recommends, as low risk apart from slippage. Christopher said he does not consider it low risk. "One half is the trade, the other half is the execution." A stop can fail to fill at the price you expect, so your real risk can exceed your margin. Tammy agreed that her buying power is her risk, and possibly more.

## Key takeaways

1. **Tammy re-tests monthly with the Optimizer.** She picks entry times, then per-leg credits, then widths, re-testing after each change, and calls it "probably the ultimate in curve fitting."
2. **Christopher doesn't trust a single best minute.** He averages each minute with its neighbors.
3. **Four traders, four versions of MEIC.** Volume profile, full automation and mixed 1x/2x stops are each part of someone's process at this table.
4. **Execution was the group's main 2026 concern.** Christopher spreads lots across many strikes, Sidd moved some trading to SPY, and Christopher stresses knowing how stops can fail.
5. **Tammy sizes so a full stop-out day stays within 2% of the account.** Christopher's caution is that slippage and failed stops can push real losses past planned limits.

## Test your own MEIC

In Option Omega you can [build a multiple-entry iron condor](https://optionomega.com/blog/how-to-backtest-a-0dte-iron-condor-on-spx/), sweep entry times, credits and widths with the [Optimizer](https://optionomega.com/features/backtesting/), and [automate](https://optionomega.com/features/trading/) the result. For more of Tammy's approach, read our [earlier interview with Tammy Chambless](https://optionomega.com/blog/tammy-chambless-meic-0dte-iron-condors-2026/). To compare notes with these traders, [join the Discord](https://discord.gg/s5HG3ECUE4).

**[Start a free trial](https://optionomega.com/pricing/)**

*Watch the full conversation: [Option Omega MEIC Roundtable-- Tammy, Dan and Friends!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htwCH2v56f8).*

*This post summarizes a conversation published in October 2026 and is educational only. Options trading involves substantial risk.*