Questions tagged [american-options]

An option that may be exercised at any time before the expiration date.

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Exercising an American call option early

I have seen the rationale behind why it is never optimal to exercise an American call option early, but have a question about it. If the option strike price is $E=\$20$ and it expires at $T=1yr$, if ...
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3 answers
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How to choose a risk-neutral measure when the market is incomplete?

I am more of a probabilist than a financial mathematician. I am currently working on the features of American put options under a particular stochastic volatility model. Like most stochastic ...
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2 answers
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Implied Volatility from American options (binomial)

I am trying to get the implied volatility from options on commodity futures and I know it's possible to get it from the binomial american options (on an non-dividend paying stock). I believe it is ...
user2301's user avatar
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American Call: when it's European?

It is a rather well-spread fact that in Black-Scholes (BS) model for a stock with no dividends that follows Geometric Brownian Motion (GBM), the price of American call coincides with that of its ...
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10 votes
3 answers
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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?
gvkv's user avatar
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Constructing Volatility Smile from American Options

My question is about best practices for reconstructing volatility smiles for a fixed tenor from American option data. For simplicity/liquidity, I am currently considering options on SPY. I am ...
Mark's user avatar
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9 votes
1 answer
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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 ...
Andrew Christianson's user avatar
9 votes
1 answer
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Why were Laguerre polynomials a good choice of basis functions for American Monte Carlo?

I am implementing LSMC to price American options based on a custom model. I now need to make a choice of basis functions, so I am looking for the theoretical justification for using Laguerre ...
user54908's user avatar
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8 votes
2 answers
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American Options relation between greeks

Considering an American option in a Black-Scholes model, is there a relation between Vega and Gamma as it holds in the European case? I am aware an exact relation would be difficult to find. But in ...
Benoit Alessis's user avatar
8 votes
2 answers
876 views

What is the industry standard pricing model for CME-traded Eurodollar future (American) options?

The CME-traded Eurodollar futures option is an American option. What is the industry standard pricing model for this product? Does the industry practice to treat CME-traded Eurodollar futures ...
Little's user avatar
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8 votes
1 answer
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Issue Using QuantLib and Python to Calculate Price and Greeks for American Option With Discrete Dividends

I am having trouble using QuantLib with Python to calculate American options with discrete dividends. I am using Anaconda, Spyder, Python 3.6, and the most recent version of QuantLib. I created ...
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2 answers
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Least Square Monte Carlo - american Call Option

An American Call Option on an non dividend paying stock has the same value as a european one. I tired to compare the results given by the LSM with the results given by the B&S formular. It seems ...
student's user avatar
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1 answer
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Why should an american option be exercised when its price equals its intrinsic value

Mark Joshi states : "If the price of the american option equals its intrinsic value, we exercise and it would be an error not to do so. The reason is that once the option has been exercised, we hold ...
user30614's user avatar
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1 answer
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Does price of american (put) option exhibit smooth pasting in time direction under B-S model?

Let us consider the BS model and let $f(s,t)$ denote the price of an American put option with $t$ to expiry, then it is known the solution of the optimal stopping (when it is risk neutral) related to ...
Lost1's user avatar
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0 answers
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Random variable minus Integral of Ito Generator is a Martingale under what conditions?

I am reading about american option pricing and the variational inequality, and the book I am reading states, in the derivation of the variational inequality, the following is a martingale: $$M_s = U(s,...
Slade's user avatar
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American Swaption Heding with Malliavin Calculus

Hedging American Swaption Hello, I priced an American swaption using Black model with swap rates diffusion to find the european (call) price at t. $$ C_t = (\delta \sum_{j=n+1}^{M+1} Z_t^{T_j})[R(t,...
Lucas Morin's user avatar
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8 votes
4 answers
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American put option. Exercise time is a random variable, calculation of expected payoff

I got an American put option, where the payoff is $V_\tau = \max(K - X_{\tau}, 0)$ and $X_{\tau}$ is the price of an underlying at the stopping time $\tau < T$. The underlying follows a standard ...
Makina's user avatar
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7 votes
2 answers
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American put for negative interest rates

It is often explained, that the rule of thumb for exercising American options is to check when the benefit from the interest rate (sell the stock earlier, get the cash, put in the bank) is higher than ...
Ulysses's user avatar
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7 votes
2 answers
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The Upper Bound of an American Put Option

I have just read the following paragraph (in bold) and have a question on the upper bound of an american put option: http://www.sharemarketschool.com/option-valuation-upper-and-lower-bounds-part-...
kycwongp's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
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Implied vol and model calibration for an american option on a dividend paying stock - is there a market standard pricing model?

In terms of calibrating a pricing model to observed prices for American options on a dividend paying stock, is there a standard way of doing this in practice? My initial thought was to use CRR ...
AShortSqueeze's user avatar
7 votes
2 answers
922 views

What's the connection between implied vol curve of SPX and SPY?

I think there should be an obvious connection of the two implied vol curves from the SPX and SPY markets since the underlying of SPX is SP500, while the underlying of SPY is a ETF which tracks sp500 ...
DeepRed's user avatar
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7 votes
0 answers
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recent developments in American options?

I have read the paper written by Egloff (2005) using machine learning techniques to solve the optimal stopping problem. Is there any development in pricing American options during 2005-2016? (based ...
Lookout's user avatar
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0 answers
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Pricing an American call under the CGMY model

I am pricing an American call under the CGMY model ($0 < Y < 1$) with strike $K$ at grid point $(x_i,\tau_j)$ where $x_i=x_{min}+i\,\Delta x $ for $i=0,1,...N$ and $\Delta x=\frac{x_{max}-x_{min}...
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6 votes
1 answer
769 views

Why aren't american put options martingales?

I don't understand what's wrong in the following argument. Assume that we have a no-arbitrage market where the following products are traded: a risky asset $S$, a risk-free bond $B$, an American put ...
chalk's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
3k views

Implied Dividend from American Options (in practice)

I just tried to price the implied dividend for a few active, liquid options markets using current prices and I am not convinced my results are accurate. I am using American options, and using the put-...
Jared's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
866 views

Soft American Options

On Page 24-25 of N. Taleb's "Dynamic Hedging" the author talks about "Soft American Options" A soft American option (also called a pseudo-European option) is only subjected to early exercise from ...
athos's user avatar
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1 answer
401 views

Intuition behind American Option pricing

The price of an American option is given by $$V_n = \max\left(G_n,\frac{pV_{n +1}H^d + qV_{n + 1}H^u}{1 + r}\right)$$ where p, q are the risk neutral probabilities. I have two questions: How can ...
user7348's user avatar
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1 answer
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What is the point of the regression in Longstaff Schwartz method?

In the Longstaff and Schwartz method of pricing American options, what is the point of the regressions at each step? The goal is to approximate an optimal stopping time for each path. However, why ...
Efeo's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
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Modified bisection formula for deriving implied volatility for a dividend paying american option

I am trying to work out the formula for calculating the implied volatility of an american option on a stock paying dividends (discrete payments or annualized yield). On page 171 of Haug The ...
Homunculus Reticulli's user avatar
6 votes
2 answers
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Importance Sampling for pricing options with longstaff and schwartz

I have been asking this similar question before. However, I really want to be concrete and get and concrete explanation. I have been reading the paper by Moreni and try to implement the same ...
Elekko's user avatar
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6 votes
2 answers
12k views

Value of American Call vs Value of European Call when using implicit finite differences

I calculated values for put options (european and american) using the implicit finite difference method and compared them to black/scholes values. The values for american put options are higher than ...
FreshF's user avatar
  • 301
6 votes
1 answer
326 views

Upper bound concerning Snell envelope

Consider a non-negative continuous process $X = \left (X_t \right)_ {t\geq 0}$ satisfying $ \mathbb E \left \{ \bar X \right\}< \infty $ (where $ \bar X =\sup _{0\leq t \leq T} X_t $) and its ...
Paul's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
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How to price lookback american option when its payment is distributed during its life

I would like to price a floating strike american lookback with a particular feature: I don't want to charge upfront the client, rather I would like to insert a "running fee", some sort of a dividend. ...
Mitch76's user avatar
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6 votes
0 answers
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Implied volatility from American options using python

I am currently trying to construct volatility surface from american option prices (using Cox-Ross-Rubinstein tree) in Python 2.7. Below you can find the code I came up with. Any corrections would be ...
jakub's user avatar
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5 votes
3 answers
1k views

Convexity of an American put option

Is the price of an American put on an underlying without dividend convex with respect to the strike?
Hans's user avatar
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5 votes
1 answer
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Least Squares Monte Carlo

Could you explain to me in words (no formulas) the concept of the Least Squares Monte Carlo method to price an American style option?
Nasser Bin's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
1k views

Is it possible to have only one volatility surface for american options (that fits both calls and puts)?

Put-Call Parity does not hold for american options. Hence, I don't see how it would be possible to have one surface that would encompass both calls and puts. For example: Let pick a call lying in the ...
Rodrigo's user avatar
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3 answers
573 views

Can call options be priced with Least-Squares Monte Carlo?

I have been reading about Least-Squares Monte Carlo (using Longstaff & Schwartz algorithm) for option pricing. So far, I have only read examples that uses LSMC for american/bermudan PUT options ...
Elekko's user avatar
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1 answer
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Comparison of the American and European call deltas

Suppose the interest rate is zero. A stock with price $S(t)$ at time $t$ pays only one dividend at time $t_1$ such that $S(s_+)=S(t_1^-)q$ where $q\in[0,1]$ is a constant. Consider a European call and ...
Hans's user avatar
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5 votes
1 answer
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How can one value a Bermudan option?

A Bermudan option allows early exercise at predefined dates, e.g. at maturity equal to $t_1$, $t_2$, $t_3$,...; hence , would its value be the sum of 3 discounted European options with 1-year ...
emcor's user avatar
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5 votes
2 answers
418 views

Machine learning for non optimal behaviour

I was working on the pricing of complex bermudean swaption when I noticed that the exercise is often (very) subobptimal. It seems that the clients are more sensitive to past growth or drop in rates ...
Lucas Morin's user avatar
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5 votes
1 answer
160 views

Convergence rate of Bermudan to American option

When trying to value an American option we often use grid-based methods (e.g. Monte Carlo in combination with Longstaff Schwartz; or Finite Difference Methods). As such, we are in fact estimating the ...
Landscape's user avatar
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5 votes
1 answer
146 views

Methodology for handling short american options in a back test

Given that an American option can be exercised at any time, how does one handle algorithmically shorting an American option in a back test? I am not sure what the best practice is to simulate the ...
pyCthon's user avatar
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5 votes
0 answers
299 views

Delta-hedge experiment of American Put option

I am trying to run a delta-hedge experiment for an American Put option but there's a (systematic) hedge error which I cannot seem to understand or fix. My implementation is found in the bottom of this ...
Landscape's user avatar
  • 548
5 votes
0 answers
185 views

Why Vasicek model on a tree is a bad choice for pricing American option on credit prepayment?

I have an American option on a credit prepayment, i.e. the holder of the option can prepay the remaining credit if the interest rate falls below the initial strike. The pricing of this option was done ...
Hasek's user avatar
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0 answers
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Optimized search for yield-to-worst of a callable bond

Suppose that I need to find the yield-to-worst of a callable bond, and that the option is American (call any time). The bond may have step-up coupons and/or non-constant call price (oprion strike). ...
Dimitri Vulis's user avatar
5 votes
0 answers
79 views

Are radial basis functions popular in least squares monte carlo option pricing?

In a Longstaff-Schwarz setting option on several underlyings can be priced using least squares monte carlo. Using suitable set of basis functions, continuation values can be approximated using ...
Kate 's user avatar
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5 votes
0 answers
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LSM American Option pricing with dividends

Under the Longstaff-Schwartz LSM method for an American call, how should I account for a continuous dividend paying stock? I assume that it'll needs to be accounted for when simulating the underlying ...
user6467's user avatar
4 votes
3 answers
560 views

A paradox about the American Put option price

Suppose a put option on a stock $S(t)$ following a Geometric Brownian motion is given, with strike $K$ and maturity $T$. Let us denote its price at time $t$ by $p(t,S(t))$. Now, by no-arbitrage ...
RandomGuy's user avatar
  • 636
4 votes
4 answers
14k views

Early execise of American Call on Non-Dividend paying stock.

Let us consider an American call option with strike price K and the time to maturity be T. Assume that the underlying stock does not pay any dividend. Let the price of this call option is C$^a$ today ...
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