On the background of current global mortgage crisis the article discusses the housing market theory and particularly the methods and indicators used for the evaluation of long-term sustainability of house price trends. The authors provide the time series of such indicators for selected OECD...

This paper considers various options replication methods. Firstly, a specific type of barrier option, an up-and-out call, is considered. Other barrier options are briefly also described, and various types of barriers are considered. Secondly, a general definition of replication methods is...

Three approaches toward the determination of fixed swap rates are presented in this article: a swap as a portfolio of bonds with a fixed and floating coupon, a swap as a portfolio of forwards, and a swap as the difference between the cap and the floor (zero-collar). Later in the paper, credit...

Hedging strategies represent basic instrument used toward eliminating financial risk. Increasing volatility of financial markets and their globalization also lead to higher financial risks. These aspects are especially important for transitional and small open economies. The basic goal of the...

The Czech tax system is undergoing radical transformation. Among the many forthcoming changes, several features can be identified, which alter the structure of tax asymmetries. This paper uses an option-based model of direct taxation to examine a controversial new thin-capitalization rule,...

In general, there exist many ways to detect the fair value of financial derivatives. However, each of them is suitable for different purposes. For example, when the payoff function is not very simple or the underlying process is too complex, the approach of Monte Carlo simulation can be useful....

The paper deals with selected issues prevalent in the environment of regulated gas distribution. Regulation which ensures for investors an up-front known rate of return lead in valuation of an individual investment projects to obstacles we do not meet in other fully liberal markets. Solution of...

During the last few years the Czech Republic has witnessed a great boom in the area of a problematic and irrecoverable credit settlement. Late and substandard payments have become rather a tradition in the Czech way of doing business. Consequently the solution by selling receivables to the third...

Estimation of volatility of financial time series plays a crucial role in pricing derivatives. Volatility is often estimated from historical data; however, it is well known that volatility varies in time. We propose a method to choose a suitable length of historical data to estimate contemporary...

The paper deals with yield curve construction methods using coupon bonds in Czech bond market. Generally, there are more possibilities how to approach this problem: bootstraping, splines, parametric functions. Due to the lack of tradable public bonds and due to the fact that existing bonds do...