Make Your AMGN Shares Pay You 8.7% While You Hold Them

Get paid a guaranteed income now on your Amgen shares, which you keep no matter what, in exchange for agreeing to sell at a price that’s already a win.

Amgen (AMGN) has had a good run, climbing +29% in the past year to trade around $368 a share. Management calls this a “springboard year” as it pivots from aging blockbusters to a new slate of growth drugs. For shareholders, that pivot introduces a question: lock in some gains now, or hold on for the next leg up? Here is a way to get paid to make that choice.

8.7% annualized income on AMGN shares you already own, with 8.7% of upside room, by selling a covered call.

• You own (or buy) 100 shares of AMGN near today’s price of $368.
• Sell one call option on AMGN expiring 6/17/2027, with a strike price of $400, about 8.7% above today.
• Collect roughly $3,025 in premium up front per contract (each contract covers 100 shares), which you keep no matter what the stock does.
• That premium is about 8.7% annualized on the $36,799 of stock, income you earn just for holding.
• If AMGN finishes above $400, your shares are called away at $400. Counting the premium, your total return works out to about 18% annualized, but you give up any gains above the strike.

Two Ways This Plays Out, Both Pay You

If AMGN finishes below $400 on 6/17/2027, the call expires worthless, and you keep the full $3,025 premium and all your shares. That is about 8.2% over 344 days, income earned just for holding, and you are free to sell another call.

If AMGN finishes above $400, your 100 shares are called away at $400. You still keep the $3,025 premium, and counting it as your total gain works out to about 17%, a healthy exit. The cost of the trade is that any gain above $400 is no longer yours. And if the stock instead falls, you keep the premium but still ride the shares down, cushioned only slightly.

So the whole trade comes down to one thing: how much of that upside are you really likely to give up, and would you be content to sell at that higher price?

Would You Be Happy To Sell AMGN Higher?

The trade’s only real cost is the upside you cap. So, how much blue sky are you really giving up? The bull case for Amgen is potent and centers on its pipeline, especially the obesity drug MariTide. The company is betting it can change the game with a therapy injected as few as “4 or 6 times a year,” a massive convenience leap over the weekly competition. If that vision becomes reality, the stock could have significant room to run, and you would miss the gains above your exit price. This is the core risk of capping your upside, and we took a closer look at the competitive landscape in a separate piece on a key rival.

But the path isn’t clear. Amgen is also managing a serious headwind, with legacy drugs like Prolia and XGEVA seeing sales fall 32% year-over-year and facing what management calls “accelerated sales erosion.” That’s a big revenue hole to plug. The pipeline isn’t bulletproof either, with a proposed FDA withdrawal for TAVNEOS and a pause on some studies for its BiTE platform. For investors who see these execution risks and prefer a more diversified bet on the sector, a biotech ETF offers broader exposure. For an Amgen holder, these risks are the reason why accepting a guaranteed income now to sell at a higher price might feel like a smart trade.

Ultimately, the decision comes down to your conviction in the company’s transition. If you believe the new growth drivers will more than offset the legacy declines, you might hold out for more. If you see the hurdles and would be happy with a solid, capped return, getting paid to wait is an attractive proposition. The thing to watch is the clinical data for MariTide; specifically, any updates on its “3-step dose escalation” and whether it truly delivers better tolerability. That will be the clearest sign of whether the springboard is about to launch.

What Income Could Your Own Stocks Pay?

You may not own AMGN, but you almost certainly own something that could be paying you. Our Covered Call Finder lets you type in a stock, or a few, and instantly see the income a covered call could generate on each, then dial the strike up or down with a slider to balance more income against more upside. It is the quickest way to see what the names in your own portfolio could pay.

Income Is Nice. Concentration Is Not.

Selling calls can squeeze income from a holding – but it does nothing about the bigger risk, which is how much of your wealth sits in that one name. If a single stock dominates your portfolio, the income is a rounding error next to the drawdown risk, and selling to diversify means a tax bill. There is a way to protect the position and diversify out tax-efficiently.