This study analyzes the loss potential arising from investments into CDS for a sample of large U.S. and German mutual funds. Further, it investigates whether the comments funds make on CDS use in periodic fund reports are consistent with the disclosed CDS holdings. For several funds in the U.S.,...

This study provides a comprehensive overview of the use of credit default swaps by U.S. corporate bond funds and analyzes in detail whether certain characteristics of managers, in addition to the fundamentals of a fund, determine how their use these credit derivatives. Results suggest that a...

This study provides a comprehensive overview of the use of credit default swaps by U.S. corporate bond funds and analyzes in detail whether certain characteristics of managers, in addition to the fundamentals of a fund, determine how their use these credit derivatives. Results suggest that a...

This study analyzes the loss potential arising from investments into CDS for a sample of large U.S. and German mutual funds. Further, it investigates whether the comments funds make on CDS use in periodic fund reports are consistent with the disclosed CDS holdings. For several funds in the U.S.,...

We study the problem of optimal timing to buy/sell derivatives by a risk-averse agent in incomplete markets. Adopting the exponential utility indifference valuation, we investigate this timing flexibility and the associated delayed purchase premium. This leads to a stochastic control and optimal...

In a well-functioning futures market, the futures price at expiration equals the price of the underlying asset. This condition failed to hold in grain markets for most of 2005-10. During this period, futures contracts expired up to 35% above the cash grain price. We develop a rational...

This paper presents a new methodology for hedging long-term financial derivatives written on an illiquid asset. The proposed hedging strategy combines dynamic trading of a correlated liquid asset (e.g. the market index) and static positions in market-traded options such as European puts and...

We discuss the valuation of credit derivatives in extreme regimes such as when the time-to-maturity is short, or when payoff is contingent upon a large number of defaults, as with senior tranches of collateralized debt obligations. In these cases, risk aversion may play an important role,...

We develop a methodology for index tracking and risk exposure control using financial derivatives. Under a continuous-time diffusion framework for price evolution, we present a pathwise approach to construct dynamic portfolios of derivatives in order to gain exposure to an index and/or market...

This book provides a systematic study on the optimal timing of trades in markets with mean-reverting price dynamics. We present a financial engineering approach that distills the core mathematical questions from different trading problems, and also incorporates the practical aspects of trading,...