This paper proves that the optimal exercise time for the holder of an American option depends upon the physical drift of the underlying asset and the utility of the option holder. We illustrate our results by applying them to several families of utility functions, namely the CARA, the HARA, and...

We explain the ideas behind the valuation of options with early exercise features, so called American options. We also aim to clarify some popular misconceptions about when an American option should be exercised. These misconceptions seem to be prevalent among both academics and practitioners.

The modelling of credit risk, credit derivatives and non-hedgeable securities in general is currently in a poor state. Ideas from equity options theory have been adopted for credit risk, but have not been adapted for the peculiarities of this more complex world. This brief paper is a review and...

The passport option is a call option on the balance of a trading account. The option holder retains the gain from trading, while the writer is liable for the loss. Multi-asset passport options and passport options with discrete constraints are studied. For the first ones the pricing equations...