This straightforward, accessible guide clearly explains what options are and how they work, their pros and cons, their relationship with stocks, and how to use them to gain leverage, generate extra income, and protect against adverse price movements.

THE OPTIONS INVESTING BESTSELLER--WITH CRITICAL NEW INSIGHT FOR TODAY'S TUMULTOUS MARKETS Written in an accessible, easy-to-read style, this new edition of Understanding Options provides everything you need to get started on the right foot in the increasingly popular options market. You'll learn what options are and how they work, their pros and cons, their relationship with stocks, and how to use them to gain leverage, generate extra income, and protect against adverse price movements. Understanding Options covers everything that has made it the go-to guide for novice investors--plus it has brand-new information and features, including: Updated facts, charts, and figures Expanded coverage of collars, credit and debit spreads, mini-options, the Greeks, and protective puts Key strategy insights from master options traders A critical look at trading options on ETFs Options simply are not as confusing as the other books make them seem. Written specifically for the novice, Understanding Options is the best, most inviting guide available for building a solid foundation in options investing.

It's not hard to understand why options trading continues to growin popularity, especially among sophisticated investors with largestock portfolios. Options are a cheaper and therefore, inherentlyless risky way of speculating on the price movements of stocks orother under-lying goods, yet, due to their volatility, they providemore price action per dollar than do stocks. And, when traded inconjunction with stock portfolios, options can significantlyenhance an investor's ability to manipulate the risk and returncharacteristics of their entire investment. Yet, despite these andother advantages of options, many investors shy away from thishighly lucrative type of speculation because of the seemingimpenetrability of many of its underlying concepts and technicalprinciples. Now in a book that demystifies options for financial professionals,Professor Robert W. Kolb, one of the nation's leading authoritieson the subject, provides readers with a solid grounding in theprinciples and practices of options trading. An excellent resourcefor investors who need to quickly get up to speed in options,Understanding Options offers a balanced presentation that buildsswiftly from the most basic concepts and terms to advanced tradingstrategies and techniques. Written in plain English and filled withreal-life examples and case studies, it schools readers in: * All essential terms, concepts, principles, and practices * Popular trading techniques and their payoffs * Option strategies * Option hedging * Formal trading models, including the Binomial and Merton models * Options on stock indexes, foreign currency, and futures * Option pricing in both the American and European markets * The options approach to corporate securities * And much more Concise yet comprehensive, authoritative yet highly accessible,Understanding Options gives you everything you need to feel rightat home in the lucrative world of options. Comprehensive, practical, authoritative--the fastest, mostaccessible route to the lucrative world of options From the basics of what an option is to advanced techniques forprofiting from options in a variety of markets, UnderstandingOptions covers all the bases. Written by a leading internationalauthority on options trading, this practical, hands-on guide offersdetailed, step-by-step coverage of option trading techniques andtheir payoffs, option strategies, European and American optionpricing, option hedging, and much more. It also explores options onstock indexes, foreign currency, and futures, and takes a closelook at the options approach to corporate securities. A concise, yet comprehensive, introduction to options for financialprofessionals * Gets you quickly up and running with all the essential knowledgeyou need to break into the options markets * Featuring a balanced presentation that moves swiftly from basicterms and concepts to advanced trading models * Packed with easy-to-follow examples and case studies that lucidlyillustrate all points covered

The first premise of this book is that farmers need access to options for improving their situation. In agricultural terms, these options might be manage ment alternatives or different crops to grow, that can stabilize or increase household income, that reduce soil degradation and dependence on off-farm inputs, or that exploit local market opportunities. Farmers need a facilitating environment, in which affordable credit is available if needed, in which policies are conducive to judicious management of natural resources, and in which costs and prices of production are stable. Another key ingredient of this facilitating environment is information: an understanding of which options are viable, how these operate at the farm level, and what their impact may be on the things that farmers perceive as being important. The second premise is that systems analysis and simulation have an impor tant role to play in fostering this understanding of options, traditional field experimentation being time-consuming and costly. This book summarizes the activities of the International Benchmark Sites Network for Agrotechnology Transfer (IBSNAT) project, an international initiative funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). IBSNAT was an attempt to demonstrate the effectiveness of understanding options through systems analysis and simulation for the ultimate benefit of farm households in the tropics and subtropics. The idea for the book was first suggested at one of the last IBSNAT group meetings held at the University of Hawaii in 1993.

Proven ways to increase profits while reducing risk in one of today’s fastest growing markets Finding a safe investment in today’s markets makes looking for that needle in a haystack seem easy. With a single whale able to move a market, herds of elephants ready to stampede after it, and a global computer network executing high-frequency trades in milliseconds, an investor might think stuffing cash under a mattress is safe financial planning. But those dollars have lost about 40 percent of their buying power in the last 20 years. Understanding ETF Options is the best way to protect and grow your assets in the financial climate ahead. This hands-on guidebook gives you a unique audience with options expert Kenneth Trester, who has traded on the exchanges since their inception in 1973. This book culls his experience in systems analysis, operations research, and investment management to help you diversify risk while profiting on market volatility. Through conversational explanations and real-world examples, it lays out how ETFs offer retail investors easy access to diversified financial value and demonstrates effective techniques to acquire, safeguard, and accrue wealth by trading options on these unique securities. Whether you are an experienced investor or have never executed a trade, Understanding ETF Options can get you up and running on the exchanges with confidence and control. It comes with such essential tools as the Fair Value Option tables and covers everything you need to know to trade ETF options successfully, including: An insider’s explanation of ETFs How to identify valuable ETFs How to avoid rogue waves Strategies for achieving your goals among the elephants, whales, and computers Professional traders’ secrets for option buying and writing As far as options are concerned, everything comes down to time and movement. Now is your time to make a move and put your future wealth into your own hands with Understanding ETF Options.

"Overall this book provides an excellent summary of the state of knowledge of term structure modelling. It combines a solid academic background with the practical experience of someone who works in the financial sector." Alan White and John Hull, A-J Financial Systems, Canada The modelling of exotic interest-rate options is such an important and fast-moving area, that the updating of the extremely successful first edition has been eagerly awaited. This edition re-focuses the assessment of various models presented in the first edition, in light of the new developments of modelling imperfect correlation between financial quantities. It also presents a substantial new chapter devoted to this revolutionary modelling method. In this second edition, readers will also find important new data dealing with the securities markets and the probabilistic/stochastic calculus tools. Other changes include: a new chapter on the issues arising in the pricing of several classes of exotic interest-rate instruments; and insights from the BDT and the Brennan and Schwartz approaches which can be combined into a new class of "generalised models". Further details can be found on the links between mean-reversion and calibration for important classes of models.