Delta Hedging Questions
Delta Hedging Questions
Delta Hedging Questions
Question 1
An investor has written 100 European call options (K = $20, T = 1) on non-dividend paying
Carlton Ltd. shares. The current share price is $15, the volatility of Carlton shares is 20% per
annum, and the risk-free rate is 10% per annum. Each option entitles the holder to buy one
Carlton share. Find the delta of each option and explain how the investor could delta hedge
his exposure.
Question 2
A financial institution has the following portfolio of over the counter options on XYZ
Corporation shares:
The current XYZ stock price is $30. An exchange traded call option with a delta of 0.6
currently sells for $6. Each option covers one XYZ share.
a) How could the investor delta hedge her exposure using the stock?
b) How could the investor delta hedge her exposure using the exchange traded call?
Question 3
Consider a 4 month put option on a stock index. The current value of the index is 305 points,
the strike price is 300 points, the dividend yield is 3% per annum, the risk-free rate is 8% per
annum and the volatility of the index is 25% per annum. Assume a Black-Scholes-Merton
world.
a) Find the delta, gamma, and theta of the option
N.B Theta calculation is an extension and is not examinable. The relevant formula can be located
on page 386 in the 8th edition.
Question 4
Consider a European call option on a non dividend paying stock when the stock price is
$10.00, the strike price is $12.00, the risk-free interest rate is 6% per annum, the volatility is
40% per annum, and there is 2 years to maturity? (Use the Black-Scholes-Merton model).
b) Use the delta of the option to estimate the value of the option after the change
c) Use the delta and gamma of the option to estimate the value of the option after the
change.
Question 5
Consider a portfolio consisting of n1 units of security1 (value V1, delta δ1, gamma Γ1) and
n2 units of security2 (value V2, delta δ2, gamma Γ2) where both securities are affected by
the same source of uncertainty being the price of an underlying stock. A traded call option on
a) What position in the call option is necessary to make the portfolio gamma neutral?
b) What position in the stock is necessary to make the revised portfolio delta neutral?
Question 6
Suppose the current price of (non dividend paying) ABC Limited shares is $20 and in 3
months time it will be either $22 or $18. Assume the risk free interest rate is 12% per annum
and markets are frictionless. Assume you have a portfolio of 10,000 ABC shares and you
want to use portfolio insurance to protect the value of the portfolio from falling below $21
Hint: rather than buying long puts with a strike of $21, you are required to create a long put
synthetically. This can be done using the one period binomial model.
b) Show the cash-flows now and in 3 months time on the insured portfolio.
c) Hull suggests the following (slightly) different strategy – invest only the proceeds from
the sale of the stock in riskless bonds i.e. . Repeat part (b) under Hull's strategy
Question 7
What does it mean to assert that the theta of an option position is -0.1 when time is measured
in years? If a trader feels that neither a stock price nor its implied volatility will change, what