# Cost of liquidation

In the text book on Risk Management by John Hull, The cost of liquidation is defined as one half of spread between bid price and ask price.

Investopedia justifies the one half factor by saying that we are concerned with only the sell part of the trade. This is not convincing.

I personally feel that The cost of liquidation should be plainly bid-ask spread without any factor. Can anyone please clarify.

• If the cost of liquidating the position is "the bid ask spread" then what is the cost of acquiring the position, zero? The entering and exiting cost must add up to the bid ask spread. Jun 16 '17 at 20:15
• @noob2 The cost of acquiring the position is the offer price; The cost of exiting the position is the negative of bid price. Both will add up to the spread. Jun 16 '17 at 20:22
• You prefer to consider that there is only one transaction cost, Hull prefers to consider that there are two: half of it at the beginning (when you buy) and half when you sell. As long as you are consistent, you are both right. It is a convention. Jun 16 '17 at 20:28
• @noob2 okay. That makes sense. Thank you Jun 16 '17 at 20:40
• If only spreads were static :) Jun 17 '17 at 0:55

$$\eta(q) = a \,\psi + \kappa\,\sigma\sqrt{\frac{q}{\bar V}}$$
where $q$ is your traded quantity, $\psi$ the bid-ask spread, $\sigma$ the volatility, $\bar V$ the average daily volume, and $a$ and $\kappa$ are parameters you need to fit on your data. It is important to use your own data because it will capture your trading habits (types of algo you use --see Chap 3 of the book-- for instance).