Bull call debit spreads vs put credit spreads
Both are bullish, defined-risk trades. One pays you up front and one costs you up front, and on years of index data they turned out to be very different bets.
Two ways to be bullish with defined risk
A bull call debit spread buys a call near the money and sells a further call above it. You pay a debit and profit if the underlying rises past your long strike plus the debit. A put credit spread sells a put below the market and buys a further put below it. You collect a credit and profit as long as the underlying does not fall through your short strike.
Both have capped gains and capped losses. Both lose if the market falls hard. The difference is what each one needs: the debit spread needs the market to go up, while the credit spread only needs it to not go down very far.
What the history says about the debit spread
On a decade of QQQ and SPY entries, the bull call debit spread looked excellent on average: around +18% on the dollars at risk per trade. But it was positive in rising years and negative in 2018, 2022 and 2026 on every index name tested, which are exactly the years the underlying fell. Its win rate was close to a coin flip.
That pattern is what beta looks like. The debit spread is a leveraged long position in the index with a cap. A decade that was mostly one long bull market flatters it, and it gives nothing back in a bad year.
What the history says about the credit spread
The 25-delta put credit spread with a 5% wing earned about +6% on the dollars at risk per trade on QQQ over 129 months, with an interval that excluded zero and a win rate near 80%. It was positive in nine of eleven years; the losing years were 2018 and 2022. Holding it always beat every regime timing rule we tried out of sample.
The credit spread wins more often because it profits from time passing and from the gap between implied and realized volatility, not from the market rising. It can earn in a flat market, where the debit spread loses its debit.
Which is which
If you want exposure to the market rising, the debit spread is an honest way to get it with a known maximum loss, and the guide on position sizing applies to it like any other levered position. Just do not read its long-run average as skill: compare it against holding the same delta in shares.
If you want to earn the premium that option sellers are paid, the credit spread is the one that measured as a structure with its own edge. Its risk is a gap through the short strike, which the guide on put credit spreads covers in detail.
Historical replays are not a forecast. Options can lose more than the premium collected. This is education, not a recommendation to trade anything.