Calendar spread
Selling a near-dated option and buying a longer-dated option at the same strike. The position profits from the faster decay of the front option and from rising implied volatility in the back month.
A calendar separates the two clocks inside every option: the front leg decays quickly, the back leg slowly, and the spread collects the difference while the underlying sits near the strike.
Its second engine is the term structure — a long calendar is long back-month vega, so it gains when longer-dated IV rises. That also defines its risks: a large immediate move away from the strike, or a collapse in back-month volatility, hurts.
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