# All Questions

186 views

### RQuantLib: any difference between FixedRateBond() and FixedRateBondPriceByYield() with flat term structure?

Please, consider the following functions from RQuantLib package: FixedRateBond() ...
974 views

### Bond curve extrapolation

What are the best methods to extrapolate bond yields from an existing curve that doesn't extend quite this far? For example, how would one come about finding a theoretical bond yield for a 40 or 50 ...
4k views

### Call vs. Put Option

I have two interrelated questions that have been bothering me for some time. I have read all the stuff online and it still doesn't make sense to me: Let us assume: 0% interest rate (both hedge ...
28k views

### How to calculate unlevered beta

I have derived a firm's cost of equity using the WACC formula (see here), which means that the cost of equity has factored in the firms' debt (i.e. levered beta) and now I need to calculate the firm's ...
6k views

### How to use PCA for trading

Can anyone give me a few pointers of how to approach using PCA for trading? In particular, it seems to me, PCA is useful for selecting a subset of a portfolio of stocks(or other) rather than trading ...
1k views

### Black Scholes Formula for Collar Option

I am wondering if there exists a Black Scholes pricing formula for a collar option?
744 views

### Philips-Ouliaris test for cointegration

I'm trying to implement cointegration tests using the R urca package. I've figured out the Johansen test (ca.jo), but I'm having trouble with the Philips-Ouliaris test (ca.po). I have two questions: ...
425 views

### analyze strategy performance with given matrix of weights/time and weekly returns in R

I have a matrix of 259 weekly returns, 50 assets and a portfolio composition for each of the 259 weeks. I would like to test the performance of the portfolio during 52 weeks, rebalancing every 12 ...
758 views

### Volatility of a rolling window strategy

What methods can be applied to determine the volatility of strategy using a rolling window? Using normal standard deviation would bias the results as the returns will be highly correlated. Although, ...
90 views

### How to measure if variance is greater at a certain time of day?

I'm not very fluent in the quant vernacular, so perhaps the nature of my question will be better illustrated as a hypothesis. One market has closed and another market elsewhere on Spaceship Earth is ...
438 views

### How to measure contango?

Is there any unit of measure for the magnitude of the contango (or backwardation) for futures, so you can compare the contango of many symbols.
311 views

### Error term/Innovation process in ARCH/GARCH processes?

I am wondering about the distribution of the error term/innovation process in a ARCH/GARCH process and its implementation, I am not sure about some points. The basic assumption is ...
247 views

### Time Varying Volatility

If stock returns ($r_t$) are not auto correlated why is that the squared term of the returns (volatility) exhibit serial correlation? Does heteroskedacity, by its nature, imply that time varying ...
133 views

### How does one use the Johansen cointegration test in a linear time series model?

How does one use the Johansen cointegration test in a linear time series model? Should I only use normalized coeffients for interpretation? Or, once I know that the variables are cointegrated, do I ...
70 views

### Is there an appropriate sequence to tests during model diagnosis?

How should one order (sequence) the following tests? Stationarity test Johansen cointegration test Normality/Histogram test Autocorrelation test Heteroskedasticity test Multicollinearity test ...
3k views

### Implied dividend estimation

I am looking at two different ways of estimating the expected / implied dividends from market data. 1. Dividend futures I know that this asset class is not very liquid and might not be ...
1k views

### What exactly is an ISO order?

I have been looking this up and I feel like I keep running into different definitions. My understanding is that an ISO order is one which will get filled with the displayed quantity in a particular ...
266 views

### How replicate data using PCA

I have a set of date covering petrol prices. My example has two columns where each row represents a sequential date. ...
150 views

### Hedging differences between equity and index options?

Suppose we hedge an index option using futures on that index. How would the hedging strategy be different if the underlying could be traded directly (from a risk point of view)?
914 views

539 views

### portfolio optimization with a loop

I am attempting to minimize the variance of a 3 stock portfolio using optimization within a loop. What I have done is calculated the stock returns and cov matrix from dates 1980-01-01 to 1989-12-31 ...
686 views

### How is the MESA sine wave calculated?

I've found many, many sites which describe what the MESA sine wave looks like and how to interpret it. But I have yet to find any site that describes the actual formula used to calculate the sine ...
3k views

### Cointegration tests

I'm trying to figure out how to perform cointegration tests in R between 2 time series. I'm using po.test from the package ...
234 views

### How to synchronize put and call option-data?

I recently retrieved a large amount of European option data, for call and put prices, from OptionMetrics. Doing so for the same time period I get a file consisting of 62558 rows of call prices & ...
12k views

### Calculating spot rate of interest

You are given the following information regarding the domestic government fixed-interest bond market: The current price of a one-year bond paying coupons at a rate of $4.5$% per annum and redeemed ...
1k views

### Resources for finding scholarly research on topics in quantitative finance?

A friend and I have taken up an interest in quantitative finance, and we're pretty much starting from scratch—neither of us have backgrounds in finance, but rather electrical engineering and ...
2k views

### Longstaff-Schwartz (Least Squares Monte Carlo) applied to American Options

I'm working on an implementation in R of Longstaff & Schwartz method from the this 2001 article. I've managed to build code that replicates their prices in table 1 (p. 127), but only for the ones ...
2k views

### how do you evaluate an FX market EMS?

My firm is investigating FX EMS systems to see if we can reduce execution costs for our trading strategies that involve FX (not low latency). The liquidity providers are a few major banks. We're ...
122 views

### Can Central Index Keys (CIKs) issued by the SEC be reassigned?

Suppose company A has CIK 0000012345 and ceases to exist. At some later time, company B registers with the SEC to submit filings. Is it possible that company B will be assigned the same CIK ...
23k views

### How to compute Implied Volatility Calculation?

We all know if you back out of the BS option pricing model you can derive and solve what the options is "implying" as its volatility. However, what is the formula used to derive Implied Volatility ...
226 views

### Stress testing covariance

Going one level beyond stressed scenarios, to parameters e.g. for a VaR measure: what are the most common approaches for stressing a covariance/correlation matrix, especially taking portfolio exposure ...
392 views

### Using cointegration to prove that a long-short strategy is market neutral (in CAPM sense)

I am trying to prove that a long-short strategy invested according to the cointegrated relationship from Engle-Granger's. So essentially I'm trying to show that the return $r_{XY}$ of the portfolio (X ...
118 views

### How are option expiration dates decided?

I looked at the CBOE website and they say the expiration is the Saturday following the third Friday of each month. However, I look up an options chain for Google, for example, and I see three ...
2k views

### Best tool to generate cashflow diagrams

I often have to generate cashflow diagrams. I was wondering if anyone has a good tool to generate them in either $\LaTeX$ or a picture?
285 views

### PCA Variances and Principal Portfolio Variances

In Meucci's paper called "Managing Diversification" he mentions that: "Indeed, the eigenvalues A correspond to the variances of these uncorrelated portfolios" I tried to replicate it but found they ...
442 views

### How do you know if if an option is priced correctly?

Besides obvious extreme examples (ie volatility going to infinity, infinite time, zero time, or zero volatility, deep OTM/ITM ) how does one gauge if an option is 'correct' or at least in the ...
378 views

I am considering a product composed of 10 underlying assets. The maturity is 5 year. Each year if the performance of the equi-weighted portfolio reach a barrier, it pays a coupon. My question concern ...
3k views

### Call option arbitrage opportunity

I am having trouble wrapping my head around some text provided to us by our lecturer (unfortunately he is currently unavailable). If we let $c$ be the price of a European call option, $S_0$ the ...
Given the portfolio return $R$ and the benchmark return $B$, I want to define a risk indicator, measuring the ability to beat the benchmark ($R>B$), given the downside risk taken; the latter not ...