Suppose you had $100 in a savings account and the interest rate was 2% per year.
After 5 years, how much do you think you would have in the account if you left the money to grow?
When someone says that they're "buying American dollars" (USD), what type of asset are they probably buying? They're probably buying:
Question 315 foreign exchange rate, American and European terms
If the current AUD exchange rate is USD 0.9686 = AUD 1, what is the European terms quote of the AUD against the USD?
Question 319 foreign exchange rate, monetary policy, American and European terms
Investors expect the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to keep the policy rate steady at their next meeting.
Then unexpectedly, the RBA announce that they will increase the policy rate by 25 basis points due to fears that the economy is growing too fast and that inflation will be above their target rate of 2 to 3 per cent.
What do you expect to happen to Australia's exchange rate in the short term? The Australian dollar is likely to:
Question 321 foreign exchange rate, monetary policy, American and European terms
The market expects the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to increase the policy rate by 25 basis points at their next meeting.
Then unexpectedly, the RBA announce that they will increase the policy rate by 50 basis points due to high future GDP and inflation forecasts.
What do you expect to happen to Australia's exchange rate in the short term? The Australian dollar will:
Question 626 cross currency interest rate parity, foreign exchange rate, forward foreign exchange rate
The Australian cash rate is expected to be 2% pa over the next one year, while the Japanese cash rate is expected to be 0% pa, both given as nominal effective annual rates. The current exchange rate is 100 JPY per AUD.
What is the implied 1 year forward foreign exchange rate?
Question 246 foreign exchange rate, forward foreign exchange rate, cross currency interest rate parity
Suppose the Australian cash rate is expected to be 8.15% pa and the US federal funds rate is expected to be 3.00% pa over the next 2 years, both given as nominal effective annual rates. The current exchange rate is at parity, so 1 USD = 1 AUD.
What is the implied 2 year forward foreign exchange rate?
Question 606 foreign exchange rate, American and European terms
Which of the following FX quotes (current in October 2015) is given in American terms?
An American wishes to convert USD 1 million to Australian dollars (AUD). The exchange rate is 0.8 USD per AUD. How much is the USD 1 million worth in AUD?
A Chinese man wishes to convert AUD 1 million into Chinese Renminbi (RMB, also called the Yuan (CNY)). The exchange rate is 6.35 RMB per USD, and 0.72 USD per AUD. How much is the AUD 1 million worth in RMB?
Question 320 foreign exchange rate, monetary policy, American and European terms
Investors expect the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to decrease the overnight cash rate at their next meeting.
Then unexpectedly, the RBA announce that they will keep the policy rate unchanged.
What do you expect to happen to Australia's exchange rate in the short term? The Australian dollar is likely to:
Question 322 foreign exchange rate, monetary policy, American and European terms
The market expects the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to decrease the policy rate by 25 basis points at their next meeting.
Then unexpectedly, the RBA announce that they will decrease the policy rate by 50 basis points due to fears of a recession and deflation.
What do you expect to happen to Australia's exchange rate? The Australian dollar will:
Question 323 foreign exchange rate, monetary policy, American and European terms
The market expects the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to increase the policy rate by 25 basis points at their next meeting.
As expected, the RBA increases the policy rate by 25 basis points.
What do you expect to happen to Australia's exchange rate in the short term? The Australian dollar will:
In the 1997 Asian financial crisis many countries' exchange rates depreciated rapidly against the US dollar (USD). The Thai, Indonesian, Malaysian, Korean and Filipino currencies were severely affected. The below graph shows these Asian countries' currencies in USD per one unit of their currency, indexed to 100 in June 1997.
Of the statements below, which is NOT correct? The Asian countries':
Calculate the price of a newly issued ten year bond with a face value of $100, a yield of 8% pa and a fixed coupon rate of 6% pa, paid annually. So there's only one coupon per year, paid in arrears every year.
Calculate the price of a newly issued ten year bond with a face value of $100, a yield of 8% pa and a fixed coupon rate of 6% pa, paid semi-annually. So there are two coupons per year, paid in arrears every six months.
For a price of $100, Vera will sell you a 2 year bond paying semi-annual coupons of 10% pa. The face value of the bond is $100. Other bonds with similar risk, maturity and coupon characteristics trade at a yield of 8% pa.
For a price of $95, Nicole will sell you a 10 year bond paying semi-annual coupons of 8% pa. The face value of the bond is $100. Other bonds with the same risk, maturity and coupon characteristics trade at a yield of 8% pa.
Bonds A and B are issued by the same company. They have the same face value, maturity, seniority and coupon payment frequency. The only difference is that bond A has a 5% coupon rate, while bond B has a 10% coupon rate. The yield curve is flat, which means that yields are expected to stay the same.
Which bond would have the higher current price?
A two year Government bond has a face value of $100, a yield of 0.5% and a fixed coupon rate of 0.5%, paid semi-annually. What is its price?
Question 48 IRR, NPV, bond pricing, premium par and discount bonds, market efficiency
The theory of fixed interest bond pricing is an application of the theory of Net Present Value (NPV). Also, a 'fairly priced' asset is not over- or under-priced. Buying or selling a fairly priced asset has an NPV of zero.
Considering this, which of the following statements is NOT correct?
A two year Government bond has a face value of $100, a yield of 2.5% pa and a fixed coupon rate of 0.5% pa, paid semi-annually. What is its price?
Question 56 income and capital returns, bond pricing, premium par and discount bonds
Which of the following statements about risk free government bonds is NOT correct?
Hint: Total return can be broken into income and capital returns as follows:
###\begin{aligned} r_\text{total} &= \frac{c_1}{p_0} + \frac{p_1-p_0}{p_0} \\ &= r_\text{income} + r_\text{capital} \end{aligned} ###
The capital return is the growth rate of the price.
The income return is the periodic cash flow. For a bond this is the coupon payment.
The theory of fixed interest bond pricing is an application of the theory of Net Present Value (NPV). Also, a 'fairly priced' asset is not over- or under-priced. Buying or selling a fairly priced asset has an NPV of zero.
Considering this, which of the following statements is NOT correct?
A bond maturing in 10 years has a coupon rate of 4% pa, paid semi-annually. The bond's yield is currently 6% pa. The face value of the bond is $100. What is its price?
Bonds A and B are issued by the same Australian company. Both bonds yield 7% pa, and they have the same face value ($100), maturity, seniority, and payment frequency.
The only difference is that bond A pays coupons of 10% pa and bond B pays coupons of 5% pa. Which of the following statements is true about the bonds' prices?
A three year bond has a fixed coupon rate of 12% pa, paid semi-annually. The bond's yield is currently 6% pa. The face value is $100. What is its price?
Bonds X and Y are issued by different companies, but they both pay a semi-annual coupon of 10% pa and they have the same face value ($100), maturity (3 years) and yield (10%) as each other.
Which of the following statements is true?
Which one of the following bonds is trading at a discount?
A firm wishes to raise $20 million now. They will issue 8% pa semi-annual coupon bonds that will mature in 5 years and have a face value of $100 each. Bond yields are 6% pa, given as an APR compounding every 6 months, and the yield curve is flat.
How many bonds should the firm issue?
Which one of the following bonds is trading at par?
Question 207 income and capital returns, bond pricing, coupon rate, no explanation
For a bond that pays fixed semi-annual coupons, how is the annual coupon rate defined, and how is the bond's annual income yield from time 0 to 1 defined mathematically?
Let: ##P_0## be the bond price now,
##F_T## be the bond's face value,
##T## be the bond's maturity in years,
##r_\text{total}## be the bond's total yield,
##r_\text{income}## be the bond's income yield,
##r_\text{capital}## be the bond's capital yield, and
##C_t## be the bond's coupon at time t in years. So ##C_{0.5}## is the coupon in 6 months, ##C_1## is the coupon in 1 year, and so on.
Which one of the following bonds is trading at a premium?
An investor bought two fixed-coupon bonds issued by the same company, a zero-coupon bond and a 7% pa semi-annual coupon bond. Both bonds have a face value of $1,000, mature in 10 years, and had a yield at the time of purchase of 8% pa.
A few years later, yields fell to 6% pa. Which of the following statements is correct? Note that a capital gain is an increase in price.
Your friend just bought a house for $400,000. He financed it using a $320,000 mortgage loan and a deposit of $80,000.
In the context of residential housing and mortgages, the 'equity' tied up in the value of a person's house is the value of the house less the value of the mortgage. So the initial equity your friend has in his house is $80,000. Let this amount be E, let the value of the mortgage be D and the value of the house be V. So ##V=D+E##.
If house prices suddenly fall by 10%, what would be your friend's percentage change in equity (E)? Assume that the value of the mortgage is unchanged and that no income (rent) was received from the house during the short time over which house prices fell.
Remember:
### r_{0\rightarrow1}=\frac{p_1-p_0+c_1}{p_0} ###
where ##r_{0-1}## is the return (percentage change) of an asset with price ##p_0## initially, ##p_1## one period later, and paying a cash flow of ##c_1## at time ##t=1##.
Your friend just bought a house for $1,000,000. He financed it using a $900,000 mortgage loan and a deposit of $100,000.
In the context of residential housing and mortgages, the 'equity' or 'net wealth' tied up in a house is the value of the house less the value of the mortgage loan. Assuming that your friend's only asset is his house, his net wealth is $100,000.
If house prices suddenly fall by 15%, what would be your friend's percentage change in net wealth?
Assume that:
- No income (rent) was received from the house during the short time over which house prices fell.
- Your friend will not declare bankruptcy, he will always pay off his debts.
One year ago you bought $100,000 of shares partly funded using a margin loan. The margin loan size was $70,000 and the other $30,000 was your own wealth or 'equity' in the share assets.
The interest rate on the margin loan was 7.84% pa.
Over the year, the shares produced a dividend yield of 4% pa and a capital gain of 5% pa.
What was the total return on your wealth? Ignore taxes, assume that all cash flows (interest payments and dividends) were paid and received at the end of the year, and all rates above are effective annual rates.
Hint: Remember that wealth in this context is your equity (E) in the house asset (V = D+E) which is funded by the loan (D) and your deposit or equity (E).
Question 408 leverage, portfolio beta, portfolio risk, real estate, CAPM
You just bought a house worth $1,000,000. You financed it with an $800,000 mortgage loan and a deposit of $200,000.
You estimate that:
- The house has a beta of 1;
- The mortgage loan has a beta of 0.2.
What is the beta of the equity (the $200,000 deposit) that you have in your house?
Also, if the risk free rate is 5% pa and the market portfolio's return is 10% pa, what is the expected return on equity in your house? Ignore taxes, assume that all cash flows (interest payments and rent) were paid and received at the end of the year, and all rates are effective annual rates.
Question 800 leverage, portfolio return, risk, portfolio risk, capital structure, no explanation
Which of the following assets would you expect to have the highest required rate of return? All values are current market values.
Question 959 negative gearing, leverage, capital structure, interest tax shield, real estate
Last year, two friends Gear and Nogear invested in residential apartments. Each invested $1 million of their own money (their net wealth).
Apartments cost $1,000,000 last year and they earned net rents of $30,000 pa over the last year. Net rents are calculated as rent revenues less the costs of renting such as property maintenance, land tax and council rates. However, interest expense and personal income taxes are not deducted from net rents.
Gear and Nogear funded their purchases in different ways:
- Gear used $1,000,000 of her own money and borrowed $4,000,000 from the bank in the form of an interest-only loan with an interest rate of 5% pa to buy 5 apartments.
- Nogear used $1,000,000 of his own money to buy one apartment. He has no mortgage loan on his property.
Both Gear and Nogear also work in high-paying jobs and are subject personal marginal tax rates of 45%.
Which of the below statements about the past year is NOT correct?
Meier and Tarhan (2006) conducted an interesting survey of corporate managers. The results are copied in Table 7 below. What proportion of managers are evaluating levered projects correctly?
| Table 7: Consistency between hurdle rate and the calculation of cash flows | |||||||
| Hurdle rate | Cash flow calculation (see below notes) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (i) | (ii) | (iii) | (iv) | (v) | Other | Total | |
| WACC | 11.3% | 34.8% | 1.7% | 3.5% | 18.3% | 1.7% | 71.3% |
| Equity levered | 0.0% | 2.6% | 0.9% | 0.0% | 0.9% | 0.9% | 6.1% |
| Equity unlevered | 1.7% | 1.7% | 0.9% | 0.9% | 1.7% | 0.9% | 7.8% |
| Other | 2.6% | 5.2% | 1.7% | 0.9% | 3.5% | 0.9% | 14.8% |
| Total | 16.5% | 44.4% | 5.2% | 5.2% | 24.4% | 4.4% | 100.0% |
The rows of the cross-tabulation indicate what the self-reported hurdle rate represents and the columns denote five different ways to calculate cash flows, (i) to (v), plus the “other” category. Each cell then displays the fraction of all 113 respondents for a given combination of what the hurdle rate represents and how the firm calculates its cash flows when evaluating a project.
The definitions of the cash flow calculations (i)-(v) are as follows:
(i) Earnings before interest and after taxes (EBIAT) + depreciation
(ii) Earnings before interest and after taxes (EBIAT) + depreciation – capital expenditures – net change in working capital
(iii) Earnings
(iv) Earnings + depreciation
(v) Earnings + depreciation – capital expenditures – net change in working capital
Assume that the WACC is after tax, the required return on unlevered equity is the WACC before tax, all projects are levered, the benefit of interest tax shields should be included in the valuation, earnings = net profit after tax (NPAT) and EBIAT = EBIT*(1-tc) which is often also called net operating profit after tax (NOPAT).
What proportion of managers are evaluating levered projects correctly?
A stock has a beta of 0.5. Its next dividend is expected to be $3, paid one year from now. Dividends are expected to be paid annually and grow by 2% pa forever. Treasury bonds yield 5% pa and the market portfolio's expected return is 10% pa. All returns are effective annual rates.
What is the price of the stock now?
A stock has a beta of 1.2. Its next dividend is expected to be $20, paid one year from now.
Dividends are expected to be paid annually and grow by 1.5% pa forever.
Treasury bonds yield 3% pa and the market portfolio's expected return is 7% pa. All returns are effective annual rates.
What is the price of the stock now?
A stock has a beta of 1.5. The market's expected total return is 10% pa and the risk free rate is 5% pa, both given as effective annual rates.
What do you think will be the stock's expected return over the next year, given as an effective annual rate?
A stock has a beta of 1.5. The market's expected total return is 10% pa and the risk free rate is 5% pa, both given as effective annual rates.
In the last 5 minutes, bad economic news was released showing a higher chance of recession. Over this time the share market fell by 1%. The risk free rate was unchanged.
What do you think was the stock's historical return over the last 5 minutes, given as an effective 5 minute rate?
The market's expected total return is 10% pa and the risk free rate is 5% pa, both given as effective annual rates.
A stock has a beta of 0.7.
What do you think will be the stock's expected return over the next year, given as an effective annual rate?
The market's expected total return is 10% pa and the risk free rate is 5% pa, both given as effective annual rates.
A stock has a beta of 0.7.
In the last 5 minutes, bad economic news was released showing a higher chance of recession. Over this time the share market fell by 2%. The risk free rate was unchanged. What do you think was the stock's historical return over the last 5 minutes, given as an effective 5 minute rate?
Question 244 CAPM, SML, NPV, risk
Examine the following graph which shows stocks' betas ##(\beta)## and expected returns ##(\mu)##:
Assume that the CAPM holds and that future expectations of stocks' returns and betas are correctly measured. Which statement is NOT correct?
Assets A, B, M and ##r_f## are shown on the graphs above. Asset M is the market portfolio and ##r_f## is the risk free yield on government bonds. Assume that investors can borrow and lend at the risk free rate. Which of the below statements is NOT correct?
Question 778 CML, systematic and idiosyncratic risk, portfolio risk, CAPM
The capital market line (CML) is shown in the graph below. The total standard deviation is denoted by σ and the expected return is μ. Assume that markets are efficient so all assets are fairly priced.
Which of the below statements is NOT correct?
Question 807 market efficiency, expected and historical returns, CAPM, beta, systematic risk, no explanation
You work in Asia and just woke up. It looked like a nice day but then you read the news and found out that last night the American share market fell by 10% while you were asleep due to surprisingly poor macro-economic world news. You own a portfolio of liquid stocks listed in Asia with a beta of 1.6. When the Asian equity markets open, what do you expect to happen to your share portfolio? Assume that the capital asset pricing model (CAPM) is correct and that the market portfolio contains all shares in the world, of which American shares are a big part. Your portfolio beta is measured against this world market portfolio.
When the Asian equity market opens for trade, you would expect your portfolio value to:
Question 810 CAPM, systematic and idiosyncratic risk, market efficiency
Examine the graphs below. Assume that asset A is a single stock. Which of the following statements is NOT correct? Asset A:
A common phrase heard in financial markets is that ‘high risk investments deserve high returns’. To make this statement consistent with the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), a high amount of what specific type of risk deserves a high return?
Investors deserve high returns when they buy assets with high:
Question 988 variance, covariance, beta, CAPM, risk, no explanation
| Price Data Time Series | |||||||||||
| Sourced from Yahoo Finance Historical Price Data | |||||||||||
| Date | S&P500 Index (^GSPC) | Apple (AAPL) | |||||||||
| Open | High | Low | Close | Adj close | Open | High | Low | Close | Adj close | ||
| 2007, Wed 3 Jan | 1418 | 1429 | 1408 | 1417 | 1417 | 12.33 | 12.37 | 11.7 | 11.97 | 10.42 | |
| 2008, Wed 2 Jan | 1468 | 1472 | 1442 | 1447 | 1447 | 28.47 | 28.61 | 27.51 | 27.83 | 24.22 | |
| 2009, Fri 2 Jan | 903 | 935 | 899 | 932 | 932 | 12.27 | 13.01 | 12.17 | 12.96 | 11.28 | |
| 2010, Mon 4 Jan | 1117 | 1134 | 1117 | 1133 | 1133 | 30.49 | 30.64 | 30.34 | 30.57 | 26.6 | |
| Source: Yahoo Finance. | |||||||||||
Which of the following statements about the above table which is used to calculate Apple's equity beta is NOT correct?
Select the most correct statement from the following.
'Chartists', also known as 'technical traders', believe that:
Fundamentalists who analyse company financial reports and news announcements (but who don't have inside information) will make positive abnormal returns if:
A managed fund charges fees based on the amount of money that you keep with them. The fee is 2% of the end-of-year amount, paid at the end of every year.
This fee is charged regardless of whether the fund makes gains or losses on your money.
The fund offers to invest your money in shares which have an expected return of 10% pa before fees.
You are thinking of investing $100,000 in the fund and keeping it there for 40 years when you plan to retire.
How much money do you expect to have in the fund in 40 years? Also, what is the future value of the fees that the fund expects to earn from you? Give both amounts as future values in 40 years. Assume that:
- The fund has no private information.
- Markets are weak and semi-strong form efficient.
- The fund's transaction costs are negligible.
- The cost and trouble of investing your money in shares by yourself, without the managed fund, is negligible.
- The fund invests its fees in the same companies as it invests your funds in, but with no fees.
The below answer choices list your expected wealth in 40 years, and then the fund's expected wealth in 40 years.
Question 780 mispriced asset, NPV, DDM, market efficiency, no explanation
A company advertises an investment costing $1,000 which they say is under priced. They say that it has an expected total return of 15% pa, but a required return of only 10% pa. Of the 15% pa total expected return, the dividend yield is expected to be 4% pa and the capital yield 11% pa. Assume that the company's statements are correct.
What is the NPV of buying the investment if the 15% total return lasts for the next 100 years (t=0 to 100), then reverts to 10% after that time? Also, what is the NPV of the investment if the 15% return lasts forever?
In both cases, assume that the required return of 10% remains constant, the dividends can only be re-invested at 10% pa and all returns are given as effective annual rates. The answer choices below are given in the same order (15% for 100 years, and 15% forever):
Question 338 market efficiency, CAPM, opportunity cost, technical analysis
A man inherits $500,000 worth of shares.
He believes that by learning the secrets of trading, keeping up with the financial news and doing complex trend analysis with charts that he can quit his job and become a self-employed day trader in the equities markets.
What is the expected gain from doing this over the first year? Measure the net gain in wealth received at the end of this first year due to the decision to become a day trader. Assume the following:
- He earns $60,000 pa in his current job, paid in a lump sum at the end of each year.
- He enjoys examining share price graphs and day trading just as much as he enjoys his current job.
- Stock markets are weak form and semi-strong form efficient.
- He has no inside information.
- He makes 1 trade every day and there are 250 trading days in the year. Trading costs are $20 per trade. His broker invoices him for the trading costs at the end of the year.
- The shares that he currently owns and the shares that he intends to trade have the same level of systematic risk as the market portfolio.
- The market portfolio's expected return is 10% pa.
Measure the net gain over the first year as an expected wealth increase at the end of the year.
Here's an excerpt from an interview between Magellan fund co-founder Hamish Douglass and AFR reporter Vesna Poljak, which appeared in the Australian Financial Review article ‘It's all about interest rates: Hamish Douglass’, 19 July 2019:
Take a business growing at 4 per cent a year, with a cost of equity of 10 per cent based off a 5 per cent risk-free rate and a 5 per cent market risk premium: you would value that at around 16.6 times free cashflow.
Now take a business growing at the same rate, with a 4 per cent risk free rate. At a 9 per cent cost of equity that would command a 20 times multiple, he says.
At a 3 per cent risk-free rate, the cost of equity is 8 per cent, and the multiple is 25.
Finally at 2 per cent – 'which is where the world is at the moment' – the same business would be worth around 33 times free cashflow.
In August 2021, the RBA overnight cash rate and 3 year Australian government treasury bond yield were both 0.1% pa. If this low risk-free yield was expected to persist forever, what approximate equity price-to-cashflow multiple would that imply for a business expected to grow at 4% pa in perpetuity with a 5% equity risk premium?
Which of the following statements about Macaulay duration is NOT correct? The Macaulay duration:
Below is a table showing GMO's 2016 estimates of different assets' durations, appearing in Slater (2017).
If you were certain that interest rates would fall more than the market expects, into what asset might you allocate more funds?
Find the Macaulay duration of a 2 year 5% pa annual fixed coupon bond which has a $100 face value and currently has a yield to maturity of 8% pa. The Macaulay duration is:
Find the Macaulay duration of a 2 year 5% pa semi-annual fixed coupon bond which has a $100 face value and currently has a yield to maturity of 8% pa. The Macaulay duration is:
Question 871 duration, Macaulay duration, modified duration, portfolio duration
Which of the following statements about Macaulay duration is NOT correct? The Macaulay duration:
Question 872 duration, Macaulay duration, modified duration, portfolio duration
A fixed coupon bond’s modified duration is 20 years, and yields are currently 10% pa compounded annually. Which of the following statements about the bond is NOT correct?
Which of the following statements about bond convexity is NOT correct?
Question 999 duration, duration of a perpetuity with growth, CAPM, DDM
A stock has a beta of 0.5. Its next dividend is expected to be $3, paid one year from now. Dividends are expected to be paid annually and grow by 2% pa forever. Treasury bonds yield 5% pa and the market portfolio's expected return is 10% pa. All returns are effective annual rates.
What is the Macaulay duration of the stock now?
A trader buys one crude oil futures contract on the CME expiring in one year with a locked-in futures price of $38.94 per barrel. If the trader doesn’t close out her contract before expiry then in one year she will have the:
A trader sells one crude oil futures contract on the CME expiring in one year with a locked-in futures price of $38.94 per barrel. The crude oil spot price is $40.33. If the trader doesn’t close out her contract before expiry then in one year she will have the:
In general, stock prices tend to rise. What does this mean for futures on equity?
Which of the following statements about futures contracts on shares is NOT correct, assuming that markets are efficient?
When an equity future is first negotiated (at t=0):
The current gold price is $700, gold storage costs are 2% pa and the risk free rate is 10% pa, both with continuous compounding.
What should be the 3 year gold futures price?
You believe that the price of a share will fall significantly very soon, but the rest of the market does not. The market thinks that the share price will remain the same. Assuming that your prediction will soon be true, which of the following trades is a bad idea? In other words, which trade will NOT make money or prevent losses?
A man just sold a call option to his counterparty, a lady. The man has just now:
A European call option will mature in ##T## years with a strike price of ##K## dollars. The underlying asset has a price of ##S## dollars.
What is an expression for the payoff at maturity ##(f_T)## in dollars from owning (being long) the call option?
A European call option will mature in ##T## years with a strike price of ##K## dollars. The underlying asset has a price of ##S## dollars.
What is an expression for the payoff at maturity ##(f_T)## in dollars from having written (being short) the call option?
A European put option will mature in ##T## years with a strike price of ##K## dollars. The underlying asset has a price of ##S## dollars.
What is an expression for the payoff at maturity ##(f_T)## in dollars from having written (being short) the put option?
Question 432 option, option intrinsic value, no explanation
An American style call option with a strike price of ##K## dollars will mature in ##T## years. The underlying asset has a price of ##S## dollars.
What is an expression for the current intrinsic value in dollars from owning (being long) the American style call option? Note that the intrinsic value of an option does not subtract the premium paid to buy the option.
Which of the following statements about option contracts is NOT correct? For every:
After doing extensive fundamental analysis of a company, you believe that their shares are overpriced and will soon fall significantly. The market believes that there will be no such fall.
Which of the following strategies is NOT a good idea, assuming that your prediction is true?
Question 636 option, option payoff at maturity, no explanation
Which of the below formulas gives the payoff ##(f)## at maturity ##(T)## from being long a call option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T## and the exercise price be ##X_T##.
Question 638 option, option payoff at maturity, no explanation
Which of the below formulas gives the payoff ##(f)## at maturity ##(T)## from being long a put option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T## and the exercise price be ##X_T##.
Question 639 option, option payoff at maturity, no explanation
Which of the below formulas gives the payoff ##(f)## at maturity ##(T)## from being short a put option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T## and the exercise price be ##X_T##.
Which one of the below option and futures contracts gives the possibility of potentially unlimited gains?
A trader buys one crude oil European style call option contract on the CME expiring in one year with an exercise price of $44 per barrel for a price of $6.64. The crude oil spot price is $40.33. If the trader doesn’t close out her contract before maturity, then at maturity she will have the:
Which of the below formulas gives the profit ##(\pi)## from being long a call option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T##, the exercise price be ##X_T## and the option price be ##f_{LC,0}##. Note that ##S_T##, ##X_T## and ##f_{LC,0}## are all positive numbers.
Which of the below formulas gives the profit ##(\pi)## from being short a call option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T##, the exercise price be ##X_T## and the option price be ##f_{LC,0}##. Note that ##S_T##, ##X_T## and ##f_{LC,0}## are all positive numbers.
Which of the below formulas gives the profit ##(\pi)## from being short a put option? Let the underlying asset price at maturity be ##S_T##, the exercise price be ##X_T## and the option price be ##f_{LP,0}##. Note that ##S_T##, ##X_T## and ##f_{LP,0}## are all positive numbers.
A trader sells one crude oil European style call option contract on the CME expiring in one year with an exercise price of $44 per barrel for a price of $6.64. The crude oil spot price is $40.33. If the trader doesn’t close out her contract before maturity, then at maturity she will have the:
Which of the following statements about call options is NOT correct?
A trader just bought a European style put option on CBA stock. The current option premium is $2, the exercise price is $75, the option matures in one year and the spot CBA stock price is $74.
Which of the following statements is NOT correct?
Question 584 option, option payoff at maturity, option profit
Which of the following statements about European call options on non-dividend paying stocks is NOT correct?
A company runs a number of slaughterhouses which supply hamburger meat to McDonalds. The company is afraid that live cattle prices will increase over the next year, even though there is widespread belief in the market that they will be stable. What can the company do to hedge against the risk of increasing live cattle prices? Which statement(s) are correct?
(i) buy call options on live cattle.
(ii) buy put options on live cattle.
(iii) sell call options on live cattle.
Select the most correct response:
Below are 4 option graphs. Note that the y-axis is payoff at maturity (T). What options do they depict? List them in the order that they are numbered.
Question 708 continuously compounding rate, continuously compounding rate conversion
Convert a 10% continuously compounded annual rate ##(r_\text{cc annual})## into an effective annual rate ##(r_\text{eff annual})##. The equivalent effective annual rate is:
Which of the following interest rate quotes is NOT equivalent to a 10% effective annual rate of return? Assume that each year has 12 months, each month has 30 days, each day has 24 hours, each hour has 60 minutes and each minute has 60 seconds. APR stands for Annualised Percentage Rate.
Question 710 continuously compounding rate, continuously compounding rate conversion
A continuously compounded monthly return of 1% ##(r_\text{cc monthly})## is equivalent to a continuously compounded annual return ##(r_\text{cc annual})## of:
Question 711 continuously compounding rate, continuously compounding rate conversion
A continuously compounded semi-annual return of 5% ##(r_\text{cc 6mth})## is equivalent to a continuously compounded annual return ##(r_\text{cc annual})## of:
An effective monthly return of 1% ##(r_\text{eff monthly})## is equivalent to an effective annual return ##(r_\text{eff annual})## of:
An effective semi-annual return of 5% ##(r_\text{eff 6mth})## is equivalent to an effective annual return ##(r_\text{eff annual})## of:
Question 691 continuously compounding rate, effective rate, continuously compounding rate conversion, no explanation
A bank quotes an interest rate of 6% pa with quarterly compounding. Note that another way of stating this rate is that it is an annual percentage rate (APR) compounding discretely every 3 months.
Which of the following statements about this rate is NOT correct? All percentages are given to 6 decimal places. The equivalent:
Which of the following quantities is commonly assumed to be normally distributed?
If a variable, say X, is normally distributed with mean ##\mu## and variance ##\sigma^2## then mathematicians write ##X \sim \mathcal{N}(\mu, \sigma^2)##.
If a variable, say Y, is log-normally distributed and the underlying normal distribution has mean ##\mu## and variance ##\sigma^2## then mathematicians write ## Y \sim \mathbf{ln} \mathcal{N}(\mu, \sigma^2)##.
The below three graphs show probability density functions (PDF) of three different random variables Red, Green and Blue.
Select the most correct statement:
The below three graphs show probability density functions (PDF) of three different random variables Red, Green and Blue.
Which of the below statements is NOT correct?
The below three graphs show probability density functions (PDF) of three different random variables Red, Green and Blue. Let ##P_1## be the unknown price of a stock in one year. ##P_1## is a random variable. Let ##P_0 = 1##, so the share price now is $1. This one dollar is a constant, it is not a variable.
Which of the below statements is NOT correct? Financial practitioners commonly assume that the shape of the PDF represented in the colour:
The symbol ##\text{GDR}_{0\rightarrow 1}## represents a stock's gross discrete return per annum over the first year. ##\text{GDR}_{0\rightarrow 1} = P_1/P_0##. The subscript indicates the time period that the return is mentioned over. So for example, ##\text{AAGDR}_{1 \rightarrow 3}## is the arithmetic average GDR measured over the two year period from years 1 to 3, but it is expressed as a per annum rate.
Which of the below statements about the arithmetic and geometric average GDR is NOT correct?
Question 811 log-normal distribution, mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages
Which of the following statements about probability distributions is NOT correct?
Question 719 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate
A stock has an arithmetic average continuously compounded return (AALGDR) of 10% pa, a standard deviation of continuously compounded returns (SDLGDR) of 80% pa and current stock price of $1. Assume that stock prices are log-normally distributed. The graph below summarises this information and provides some helpful formulas.
In one year, what do you expect the median and mean prices to be? The answer options are given in the same order.
Question 720 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate
A stock has an arithmetic average continuously compounded return (AALGDR) of 10% pa, a standard deviation of continuously compounded returns (SDLGDR) of 80% pa and current stock price of $1. Assume that stock prices are log-normally distributed.
In 5 years, what do you expect the median and mean prices to be? The answer options are given in the same order.
Question 723 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate
Here is a table of stock prices and returns. Which of the statements below the table is NOT correct?
| Price and Return Population Statistics | ||||
| Time | Prices | LGDR | GDR | NDR |
| 0 | 100 | |||
| 1 | 99 | -0.010050 | 0.990000 | -0.010000 |
| 2 | 180.40 | 0.600057 | 1.822222 | 0.822222 |
| 3 | 112.73 | 0.470181 | 0.624889 | 0.375111 |
| Arithmetic average | 0.0399 | 1.1457 | 0.1457 | |
| Arithmetic standard deviation | 0.4384 | 0.5011 | 0.5011 | |
Question 779 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate
Fred owns some BHP shares. He has calculated BHP’s monthly returns for each month in the past 30 years using this formula:
###r_\text{t monthly}=\ln \left( \dfrac{P_t}{P_{t-1}} \right)###He then took the arithmetic average and found it to be 0.8% per month using this formula:
###\bar{r}_\text{monthly}= \dfrac{ \displaystyle\sum\limits_{t=1}^T{\left( r_\text{t monthly} \right)} }{T} =0.008=0.8\% \text{ per month}###He also found the standard deviation of these monthly returns which was 15% per month:
###\sigma_\text{monthly} = \dfrac{ \displaystyle\sum\limits_{t=1}^T{\left( \left( r_\text{t monthly} - \bar{r}_\text{monthly} \right)^2 \right)} }{T} =0.15=15\%\text{ per month}###Assume that the past historical average return is the true population average of future expected returns and the stock's returns calculated above ##(r_\text{t monthly})## are normally distributed. Which of the below statements about Fred’s BHP shares is NOT correct?
Question 792 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate, log-normal distribution, confidence interval
A risk manager has identified that their investment fund’s continuously compounded portfolio returns are normally distributed with a mean of 10% pa and a standard deviation of 40% pa. The fund’s portfolio is currently valued at $1 million. Assume that there is no estimation error in the above figures. To simplify your calculations, all answers below use 2.33 as an approximation for the normal inverse cumulative density function at 99%. All answers are rounded to the nearest dollar. Assume one month is 1/12 of a year. Which of the following statements is NOT correct?
Question 926 mean and median returns, return distribution, arithmetic and geometric averages, continuously compounding rate
The arithmetic average continuously compounded or log gross discrete return (AALGDR) on the ASX200 accumulation index over the 24 years from 31 Dec 1992 to 31 Dec 2016 is 9.49% pa.
The arithmetic standard deviation (SDLGDR) is 16.92 percentage points pa.
Assume that the log gross discrete returns are normally distributed and that the above estimates are true population statistics, not sample statistics, so there is no standard error in the sample mean or standard deviation estimates. Also assume that the standardised normal Z-statistic corresponding to a one-tail probability of 2.5% is exactly -1.96.
If you had a $1 million fund that replicated the ASX200 accumulation index, in how many years would the median dollar value of your fund first be expected to lie outside the 95% confidence interval forecast?
A one year European-style call option has a strike price of $4.
The option's underlying stock currently trades at $5, pays no dividends and its standard deviation of continuously compounded returns is 47% pa.
The risk-free interest rate is 10% pa continuously compounded.
Use the Black-Scholes-Merton formula to calculate the option price. The call option price now is:
A one year European-style put option has a strike price of $4.
The option's underlying stock currently trades at $5, pays no dividends and its standard deviation of continuously compounded returns is 47% pa.
The risk-free interest rate is 10% pa continuously compounded.
Use the Black-Scholes-Merton formula to calculate the option price. The put option price now is:
Question 903 option, Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing, option on stock index
A six month European-style call option on the S&P500 stock index has a strike price of 2800 points.
The underlying S&P500 stock index currently trades at 2700 points, has a continuously compounded dividend yield of 2% pa and a standard deviation of continuously compounded returns of 25% pa.
The risk-free interest rate is 5% pa continuously compounded.
Use the Black-Scholes-Merton formula to calculate the option price. The call option price now is:
Question 794 option, Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing, option delta, no explanation
Which of the following quantities from the Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing formula gives the Delta of a European call option?
Where:
###d_1=\dfrac{\ln[S_0/K]+(r+\sigma^2/2).T)}{\sigma.\sqrt{T}}### ###d_2=d_1-\sigma.\sqrt{T}=\dfrac{\ln[S_0/K]+(r-\sigma^2/2).T)}{\sigma.\sqrt{T}}###Question 795 option, Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing, option delta, no explanation
Which of the following quantities from the Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing formula gives the Delta of a European put option?
Question 796 option, Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing, option delta, no explanation
Which of the following quantities from the Black-Scholes-Merton option pricing formula gives the risk-neutral probability that a European call option will be exercised?
A stock has a beta of 0.5. Its next dividend is expected to be $3, paid one year from now. Dividends are expected to be paid annually and grow by 2% pa forever. Treasury bonds yield 3% pa and the market risk premium (MRP) is 6% pa. All returns are effective annual rates.
Which of the following statements is NOT correct?
Canaccord conducts a sensitivity analysis of the Israeli pharmaceutical firm InterCure's (INCR) estimated share price in figure 33 on page 30:
Estimate the Macaulay duration of INCR's equity. The Macaulay duration is approximately:
A levered firm has only 2 assets on its balance sheet with the below market values and CAPM betas. The risk free rate is 3% pa and the market risk premium is 5% pa. Assume that the CAPM is correct and all assets are fairly priced.
| Balance Sheet Market Values and Betas | ||
| Balance sheet item | Market value ($m) | Beta |
| Cash asset | 0.5 | 0 |
| Truck assets | 0.5 | 2 |
| Loan liabilities | 0.25 | 0.1 |
| Equity funding | ? | ? |
Which of the following statements is NOT correct?
A levered firm has only 2 assets on its balance sheet with the below market values and CAPM betas. The risk free rate is 3% pa and the market risk premium is 5% pa. Assume that the CAPM is correct and all assets are fairly priced.
| Balance Sheet Market Values and Betas | ||
| Balance sheet item | Market value ($m) | Beta |
| Cash asset | 0.5 | 0 |
| Truck assets | 0.5 | 2 |
| Loan liabilities | 0.25 | 0.1 |
| Equity funding | ? | ? |
The firm then pays off (retires) all of its loan liabilities using its cash. Ignore interest tax shields.
Which of the following statements is NOT correct? All answers are given to 6 decimal places. This event led to a: