# All Questions

695 views

### How would I value a perpetual bond with an embedded option?

I am trying to work out how to value the following transactions. It should be straight forward, since it breaks down into a series of well known instruments, yet I am not sure how to evaluate it: ...
969 views

### Which risk-free rate to use to price a bond issued in one currency but convertible into equity in another?

A convertible bond denominated in USD is issued by an Indian company (with equity traded in INR). The bond will be repaid in USD and if converted into equity in the company, the conversion price will ...
120 views

### How to handle coupon payments when pricing a bond with an embedded option?

I'm using a binomial tree to price a bond that has an embedded call or put option. On every node that has a coupon payment, do you include the coupon payment then max/min out the value, or do you ...
683 views

### How to properly evaluate backtest returns?

Do you evaluate a strategy in a backtest based on the cumulative returns generated by the strategy (i.e. looking at the cumulative returns of the trades that occur) or do you start with a certain ...
338 views

### How to apply quasi-Monte Carlo to path-dependent options?

Following up on my recent question on variance reduction in a Cox-Ingersoll-Ross Monte Carlo simulation, I would like to learn more about using a quasi-random sequence, such as Sobol or Niederreiter, ...
502 views

### What is the market standard for pricing VIX futures?

Pricing of VIX futures is complicated, because it is not possible to use a standard hedging argument to get a value similar to stock futures. What different approaches for pricing VIX futures exist? ...
799 views

### How to apply the Kelly criterion when expected return may be negative?

My concern is how to handle a negative value for the Kelly formula. Even when you have a system that has positive expectancy, you can (and usually will) sustain a number of losses, sometimes ...
241 views

### How to reduce variance in a Cox-Ingersoll-Ross Monte Carlo simulation?

I am working out a numerical integral for option pricing in which I'm simulating an interest rate process using a Cox-Ingersoll-Ross process. Each step in my Monte Carlo generated path is a ...
142 views

### Modeling interest rates with correlation

I'm trying to model interest rates, and will use the following equation: $dr = \mu r dt + \sigma r dW$ I'm also being told that interest rates are 40% correlated to S&P returns. How can I ...
174 views

### Are there “live” uses of the Generalized Method of Moments or are they all academic?

I see the Generalized Method of Moments suggested in numerous academic papers as a way to calibrate stochastic volatility models. However, any decent trading shop is going to calibrate to observable ...
534 views

### Diversification, Rebalancing and Different Means

I have found many financial authors making generalizations about GM and AM but they are wrong in certain circumstances. Could someone explain their reasoning? My fact why they are wrong is based ...
213 views

### How to define and measure liquidity or funding premium in credit markets?

Even companies with just a single non-callable corporate bond outstanding will often have CDS quote spreads that differ from the bond quote spread. During the 2008 crisis, there were dozens of cases ...
2k views

### Can the concept of entropy be applied to financial time series?

I am not familiar with the concept of entropy for time series. I am looking for good reference papers and examples of use.
220 views

### How to balance two Forex crosses correctly to do a linear regression?

I have two cross and an account in EUR: EUR/USD GBP/USD I would like to do a balanced linear regression using R. With "balanced" I mean that I would like to normalize it by calculating the ...
228 views

### When people say calculate moving average for 30 days include weekends or not? [closed]

This is blowing my mind a little bit, when someone wants to calculate a 30-day moving average of a commodity, do they mean 30 business days, or 30 calendar days? I'm looking for the general ...
81 views

### Analysis of Unbalanced Covered Calls

Hello I am doing an analysis on covered calls with and extra amount of naked calls. Ignore the symbol and current macroeconomic events. I couldn't find any reference to this strategy (unbalanced is ...
123 views

### Buying one company or index against another, is this readily possible with options, with an accurate return (also Alpha Indexes)

There's a relatively new product in the market / on the Nasdaq called Alpha Indexes. It lets one own a company -- e.g. Apple, GE, Google, etc -- as the difference between how that company does (the ...
329 views

### Quantlib in JavaScript? [closed]

Is there such a thing? Or is there a project around that aims to realize Quantlib in JS? I'm a JS coder and I'd like to get involved if so. Maybe it seems futile or insane today, but who can doubt ...
675 views

### What is the replicating portfolio of swaptions for a constant maturity swap (CMS)?

How do you replicate the payoff of a constant maturity swap rate? That is, if the payoff of a contract pays the 5-year swap rate every year for 10 years, how would you replicate this payoff using ...
901 views

### How to compute the alpha decay of a strategy?

How can one compute the alpha decay of a systematic trading strategy?
158 views

### How would I calculate a stop on a pair trade? [closed]

I have a trading strategy that I use on single tickers. I'd like to start using it with pairs as well. However, I'm somewhat math challenged and not sure how to best calculate the stops of the ...
118 views

### How do you handle short-term asset allocation with Hedge-Funds?

Assuming I want to run an optimization over a short period, say 2 years, I would decide to take daily values in order to compute the efficient frontier of a portfolio. That works fine as long as I ...
268 views

### Given markets usually fall fast and rise slowly, are there trading mechanisms to take advantage of this?

Per a previous question on this topic -- markets generally fall fast and rise slowly: what options strategies or other strategies can one use to take advantage of this common occurrence?
237 views

### Links to the risk model methodologies of the major providers?

There is quite a bit of art in constructing an equity risk model. This paper summarizes some of the key decisions: choice of factors, horizon matching, cross-sectional vs. time-series method, and ...
208 views

### zero-sum active management riddle

Bill Sharpe proves that the average alpha from active management is zero (and after transaction costs the average active manager returns less than passive funds). One active manager's gain is offset ...
154 views

684 views

### time series management system

I'm happy how we store a single time series but we somehow lack a system that glues them all together. I'm talking about a few million time series coming from ~50 data vendors and representing maybe ...
139 views

### What's the difference between SA and SAAR?

I've only recently begun working in the quantitative finance field, and I've noticed that some time series I'm given are labeled "seasonally adjusted", and some labeled with "seasonally adjusted ...
133 views

### Taking into account the correlation in Barrier options on a Basket

In a Barrier option (where the contract cancels when the underlying hits the barrier) I succesfully found the way to compute the probability of a single underlying touching the barrier (with constant ...
359 views

### How are prices calculated for commercial/residential mortgage-backed securities?

What is the theoretical/mathematical basis for the valuation of [C]MBS and other structured finance products? Is the methodology mostly consistent across different products?
218 views

### Why is there a price difference between 30 year principal and interest STRIPS?

Sorry if this is obvious, I am not a professional. I like to trade 30 year treasury zero's. I have noticed that the price for a 30 year principal payment is never the same as a 30 year interest ...
403 views

### Algorithms for predicting a couple points in the future

I'm familiar with supervised learning algorithms like regression and neural networks which look at a bunch of input points and learn a function which outputs a value (the value varying depending on ...
454 views

### optimal re-balancing strategy with asynchronous alpha signal

You want to construct an optimal portfolio. Let's say you have an alpha signal that arrives with some period (say quarterly). The alpha signal predicts arithmetic returns one-year ahead. You have ...
253 views

### What close price to assume for thinly traded stocks?

If a thinly traded stock has not traded for the last few days (volume=0), is it better to use the last known trade price (i.e. roll over last non-missing trade price) or use last known ...
242 views

### What changes to put-call parity are necessary when evaluating american options on non-dividend paying assets?

If an underlying doesn't pay dividends (for our purpose defined as any distribution to the underlying's holder) directly or indirectly (e.g. options on futures) how does put-call parity change from ...
228 views

### When is it rational to exercise a bond option early?

Consider american options on interest rate futures such as the 10-year treasury note. When is early exercise optimal?
785 views

### What books should any quantitative portfolio manager or risk manager have as reference? [closed]

I'm interested to know what are the critical reference texts you rely on for portfolio or risk management? I mean those texts that you come back to because they are chock full of insight and know-how. ...
6k views

### How to check if a timeseries is stationary?

I'm using KPSS Method to check if the series is stationary, but I would also like to use another test to confirm if the series is stationary or not, what method coudl I use?
1k views

### Which algorithm should I look into to kick off my research in algorithmic trading? [closed]

I have recently undertaken a research into automated algorithmic trading algorithms. The aim of the research is to focus on studying algorithmic trading and trying to improve a basic implementation ...
1k views

### What papers have progressed the field of quantitative finance in recent years (post 2000)?

My question is pretty simple: what papers do you feel are foundational to quantitative finance? I'm compiling a personal reading list already, drawn from Wilmott forums, papers referenced in ...
524 views

### What is the difference between STOXX and STOXXE?

Could anyone explain the difference between STOXX and STOXXE? Which is the right index for benchmarking European stocks? Thanks.
400 views

### Monte carlo portfolio risk simulation

My objective is to show the distribution of a portfolio's expected utilities via random sampling. The utility function has two random components. The first component is an expected return vector ...
98 views

### single channel for multiple feeds of news? [closed]

I subscribe to various blogs and twitter feeds which I use to parse for keywords. Many times these subscriptions do not include topics which are of the primary concern. Are there multiplex channels ...
398 views

### Any recommendations for textbooks for an undergraduate course in mathematical finance? [closed]

I'll teach an introductory course on mathematical finance in the near future. The course is intended to entertain and broaden some well-prepared advanced undergrad mathematics majors, some physics ...