Concepts Flashcards
Define Hedging Strategies - Straddles, Collar,
Protective Put
Straddle: Buying a put and buying a call - the buyer does NOT own the stock
Collar: Selling a call (out-of-the-money) at one strike price and buying a put at a lower strike price; investor OWNS the stock
Protective Put: Buying a stock (or already owning it) and a put for the stock serving as insurance against the decline in the underlying stock. (Hint: A good answer for the exam.)
Duration
(Principles to Remember)
First thing to do is to think if there were two bonds with similar varibales and then the variable below is different. How would the duration react.
Years to Maturity (Remember duration and maturity are positively related)
Annual Coupon (Remember duration is inversely related to coupon rate)
YTM, the current yield on comparative bonds (duration is inversely related)
How to Remember: Coupon and yield are interest rates - inversely related.
Ex: A bond’s coupon rate is a key factor in calculation duration. If we have two bonds that are identical with the exception on their coupon rates, the bond with the higher coupon rate will pay back its original costs faster than the bond with a lower yield. The higher the coupon rate, the lower the duration, and the lower the interest rate risk so it has an inverse relationship.
Zero Coupon Bonds
- Duration equal to Maturity
- No coupon interest, yet produces “phantom” income
- No reinvestment rate risk
- Sold at deep discounts to par
- Fluctuate more than coupon bond with the same maturities
Rules for using Duration to Manage Bond Portfolios
- If interest rates are expected to rise, shorten duration. (interest rates up, shorten duration. Remember: UPS - UP for up, and S for shorten.)
- If interest rates are expected to fall, lengthen duration. Buy low coupon bonds with long maturities. Interest rates fall → lengthen duration. Remember: FALLEN - FAL for fall and LEN for Lengthen.
Conclusions to Fluctuations in Bond Prices
- The smaller the coupon, the greater the relative price fluctuation
- The longer the term to maturity, the greater the price fluctuation
- The lower the market interest rate, the greater the relative price fluctuation
Define Convexity
- The degree which duration changes as the yield-to-maturity (YTM) changes.
- Largest for low coupon bonds, long-maturity bonds and low-YTM bonds
- allows to improve the duration approximation for bond price changes.
What are the three Monetary Policy Tools by the Fed?
- Open Market Operations
- Discount Rate Changes
- Reserve Requirement Changes
What are Expansionary Monetary Policy Tools?
Open Market Operations - Purchase Government Securities
- Fed creates dollars to buy securities on the open market
- Dollares transferred from the Fed to the Public and Banks
Discount Rate - Lower Discount Rate
- Encourages banks to borrow from the Fed to lend to their customers
Reserve Requirements - Lower Reserve Requirements
- Allows banks to expand lending
What are Contractionary Monetary Policies?
Open Market Operations - Sell Government Securities
- Fed sells securities on the open market
- Dollars transferred from the Public and Banks to the Fed
Discount Rate - Raise Discount Rate
- Discourages banks to borrow from the Fed to lend to their customers
Reserve Requirements - Raise Reserve Requirements
- Discourages banks from expand lending
Covariance and Correlation Coefficient
They communicate the same informaiton. They both measure the strength of the relationship between the returns of two securities.
The only reason Covariance may be needed is as an input into the formula for Standard Deviation of a portfolio.
You may be given the correlation coefficient and the standard deviation of two assets and then be asked to compute the covariance using the following formula COVij = ρijσiσj and you would divide each side by σiσj to get COVij / σiσj = ρij or Rij
Similarities of Covariance and Correlation Coefficient?
Both measures only linear relationship between two variables, i.e. when the correlation coefficient is zero, covariance is also zero. Further, the two measures are unaffected by the change in location.
Differences of Covariance and Correlation Coefficient?
- A measure used to indicate the extent to which two random variables change in tandem is known as covariance. A measure used to represent how strongly two random variables are related known as correlation.
- Covariance is nothing but a measure of correlation. On the contrary, correlation refers to the scaled form of covariance.
- The value of correlation takes place between -1 and +1. Conversely, the value of covariance lies between -∞ and +∞.
- Covariance is affected by the change in scale, i.e. if all the value of one variable is multiplied by a constant and all the value of another variable are multiplied, by a similar or different constant, then the covariance is changed. As against this, correlation is not influenced by the change in scale.
- Correlation is dimensionless, i.e. it is a unit-free measure of the relationship between variables. Unlike covariance, where the value is obtained by the product of the units of the two variables.
Shortcut to calculate Mean of portfolio?
First Enter Standard Deviation (SD or σ) asset and hit “INPUT”
Then enter Weighting of SD and hit “Σ+”
Then enter SD of next asset and hit “INPUT”
Then enter Weighting of SD and hit “Σ+”
Then keep going until all securities are entered
Then hit “shift” “6” key for answer
Testing Hierarchy of BATS
- Beta - Make sure Beta is reliability (if R-squared is given, need 0.70 or higher)
- Alpha - If Beta is reliable, then use alpha as first choice (since it is an absolute value)
- Treynor - If Alpha is not available, then use Treynor
- Sharpe - If these are not available or if beta is not reliable (R2 below 70) use Sharpe.
What are the 5 categories of Fundamental Analsyis Ratio Analysis?
- liquidity (current ratio which is current assets/current liabilities)
- quick ratio is current assets minus inventory/current liabilities
- activity (inventory turnover)
- profitability (EBITDA, ROE, return on capital)
- focus on these
- leverage (debt to equity)
- financial statement
Interest rates and duration are related?
Invesely related
Bond Yield See-Saw and YMCA
Think of the Y M C A and drop the A.
C Y = Current Yield
YTM = Yield to Maturity
YTC = Yield to Call
Next - Think of a see-saw. Put Y M C on right side of Fulcrum
If we have a bond selling at a discount then we pull the see-saw down and the it goes Y< M
If we have a bond selling at a premium, then we push the see-saw up and the goes Y > M > C, but each one is lower than the next
Duration and Interest Rates & Coupons are ……… related?
Inversely related like with price.
Why?
Think of starting duration at it’s fulcrum and then raising and lowering interst rates. What does that do to duration?
What happens to the fulcrum point with higher coupons? The fulcrum point will then shift to the left (meaning lower duration).
What happens to the fulcrum point with lower coupons? The fulcrum point will then shift to the right (meaning higher duration).
What is Convexity and how does it work with Bonds?
- For expected changes in rates of less than 1%, duration alone does a good job of explaining the expected change in bond price.
- For changes in rates exceeding 1%, convexity must be considered.
- The following graphic shows how convexity affects bond prices.
- When rates fall, convexity causes the price increase to be greater than duration alone would indicate.
Duration and Maturity are ……… related?
Directly related.
Why?
Think of starting duration at it’s fulcrum and then shortening maturities and lengthening maturities. What does that do to duration?
The shorter the maturity, the lower the duration.
The longer the maturity, the higher the duration.
Bond Questions: Read this and be aware of question nuances.
Be prepared for bond questions to be presented in different ways. For example, the question may say that an investor purchased a 20-year bond five years ago. In this case, the number of years until maturity would be 15 (30 compounding periods with semi-annual compounding). Or a bond may be presented as having a call premium of 5%. So, you would take the $1,000 face amount; increase it by 5% to arrive at a call price of $1,050. Don’t let these nuances throw you.
What do we want our currency to do against other currencies to make money?
With currencies in order to make money you want your currency to weaken (devaluation) and the other currency to strengthen (revaluation).
When is a Put In The Money?
An investor who purchases a put option makes a profit only if the market price of the stock is lower than the exercise (strike) price of the option.
Until the market price drops below the strike price, the option is said to be out-of-the-money.
It is in-the-money when the market price drops below the strike price.
Boot / Gain Recognized / Basis
- No boot received - recognized gain is zero
- When boot is received, just answer the recognized gain is the boot received
- Boot paid is added to the adjusted basis
- Basis carries over from the prior property


