Black Scholes

Black Scholes: How is it pronounced??

  • Black -'shoals'

    Votes: 17 65.4%
  • Black - 'Skoles'

    Votes: 9 34.6%

  • Total voters
    26

Effkay

Well-known member
Messages
299
Likes
2
Does anyone who trades options regularly know the ins and outs of pricing them using the formula? I've been told that learning it is a waste of time. Surely that can't be?

Also look at the vote....it's been bugging me!!!!
 
Last edited:
You don't need to learn the formula as such, but you should be aware of the components which are used to calculate option prices.

Basically, factors affecting option pring are....

Price of underlying, strike price, time to expiry, risk-free interest rate, and the "great unknown" - VOLATILITY
 
Warning!

Effkay said:
Does anyone who trades options regularly know the ins and outs of pricing them using the formula? I've been told that learning it is a waste of time. Surely that can't be?

Also look at the vote....it's been bugging me!!!!

Effkay,

beware that you may come into contact with actuaries on this issue - probably not worth the risk.
 
gcb01 said:
Effkay,

beware that you may come into contact with actuaries on this issue - probably not worth the risk.

if you are serious about trading oiptions then you should know it inside out....you should know all the greek profiles for all stratagies and you should be using this equation (or modified) all the time.......surely you'd want to know the fair value of something before you trade it?
 
sidinuk said:
Long Term Capital Management swore by it!

not really!!!!!! for a start they wouldn't just use the BS you know of and secondly their hedges were not properly put on, hence.....

So your comment is pointless!!!!!!
 
sidinuk said:
Long Term Capital Management swore by it!

As I recall, the Principals of LTCM invented it, refined it and even got a Nobel prize for it ! (The formula that is - not the LTCM debacle) :devilish:
 
Scholes was one of the founding principles of LTCM. I quote from 'When Genius Failed':

"Indeed, many of Long-Term's trades were attempts to exploit spreads that, in its view, reflected an inaccurate estimate of future volatility risk - the one risk that (to Long-Term) really counted. Such strategies had evolved directly from the Black-Scholes formula."

My comment was flippant, but not completely pointless!!

Black-Scholes assumes constant volatilty and as my old mum used to say, "assumption is the mother of all f**k-ups, son".
 
sidinuk said:
Black-Scholes assumes constant volatilty and as my old mum used to say, "assumption is the mother of all f**k-ups, son".


sunday lunch in your house must have been a riot! :cheesy:
 
Effkay said:
Anybody got a formula to calculate historical volatility please?

do a search on the net for "volatility" and you will find the equation...this forum is rubbish for writing maths down....
 
Top