FX Options and Risk Management

In our globalized world, there are few areas of business left untouched by Foreign Exchange (FX) risk. This programme will lead you steadily from the basics to the state of the art, and give you the confidence to understand, price, risk-manage and apply a wide variety of FX derivatives products.

Delegates will gain a solid understanding of the FX markets and an insight into the products and methods that can be used for managing FX market risk. Examples and case studies are used throughout the course, both to illustrate concepts and to demonstrate the motivation behind the development of financial products.

A substantial part of the programme is devoted to workshop sessions, in which delegates are able to work through practical examples and case studies, helping them to understand and retain the knowledge to be applied back at work.

All delegates receive the latest edition of Dr Zareer Dadachanji's book "FX Barrier Options: A Comprehensive Guide for Industry Quants".

• FX Sales, traders, structurers, quants and relevant financial engineers
• Bank Treasury and other Asset Liability Management executives
• Central Bank and Government Treasury, and funding managers
• Insurance company and pension fund investment managers
• Asset managers and Hedge Funds
• Company finance executives and investment bankers
• Risk managers, finance, IPV professionals, auditors and accountants
• IT professionals
• Regulators

• Gain familiarity with a wide variety of FX derivatives
• Learn how to price, hedge and apply derivatives
• Analyze the payoffs and risks
• Gain understanding of both the necessary mathematics and the practical details

• Basic understanding of financial markets and basic knowledge of Microsoft Excel
• A basic familiarity with the FX market and of derivatives is recommended although not essential

The Foreign Exchange Spot Market

• Mechanism of FX spot trades
• Market conventions for quotation and settlement
• Currency triplets and the chain rule
• Bid-offer spreads, liquidity and depth
• The spot market ecosystem, electronic trading platforms
• Managed and restricted currencies: pegged exchange rates, onshore/offshore markets

FX Forwards and Futures

• FX market risk and the concept of hedging
• Forward contracts: strike calculation, settlement and market quotation conventions
• Mathematical formulae for the fair forward rate, with worked examples
• Electronic trading platforms
• How futures contracts work
• Trading on an exchange, margin treatment
• Payoff scenario analysis

Workshop: Manage FX Risk using a Forward Contract – Work through the lifecycle of an FX forward contract: calculate the fair forward rate; set the strike; specify the OTC contract; re-value your position through its life; settle the contract with the counterparty.

Currency Swaps

• Managing FX risk over extended time periods
• The structure of a currency swap and its use as a hedging/re-structuring tool
• Relationship with bonds and FX forwards

Introduction to Vanilla Options

• The concept of optionality
• Specification and mechanism of vanilla options

Workshop: Vanilla Option Pricing – Set up and price options with different traits, strikes and maturities. Examine the variation of price with trade parameters and market rates. Establish pricing rules of thumb.

Properties of Vanilla Options

• Put-Call parity and other risk relationships
• Properties of vanilla options: premium, P&L, time value, intrinsic value, moneyness
• Variation of premium with market and contract parameters
• Electronic trading platforms
• Market conventions for quotation – the 6 quotation styles and how to convert between them

Vanilla Options Structures

• Spreads, straddles, strangles, risk reversals, and other structures
• The risk characteristics of different structures and their relative merits for hedging or speculation
• Scenario analysis

Workshop: Managing FX Risk using a Risk Reversal – Assess an FX risk position. Devise and explain a vanilla structure hedge. Specify the parameters of the structure. Perform scenario analysis.

FX Exotic Options – Variations on the Vanilla Option

• Cash settlement
• Late delivery
• European digitals
• Quanto and self-quanto options

FX Exotic Options – Barrier Options

• Barrier-contingent vanilla options
• Knock-Out types, Knock-In types, KIKOs
• Barrier-contingent payments and forwards

FX Structured Products

• Introduction to notes
• Structured deposits / investments
• Structured forwards

Workshop: Managing FX Risk using a Dual-Currency Investment (DCI) – Explore the FX risk in a DCI under multiple currency views. Demonstrate how vanilla options can be used to manage the risk. Structure a Dual-Currency Investment. Analyze different outcome scenarios.

The Black-Scholes Model

• The process model for FX spot price
• Overview of the derivation and solution of the valuation PDE
• Pricing formulae for vanilla options

Black-Scholes Risk Management and the Greeks

• The Greeks: delta, gamma, vega, volgamma, vanna, rho, theta
• The special significance of delta and its different flavours
• Local vs. non-local risk

Workshop: Risk-managing an option portfolio – Calculate spot and volatility risks. Identify what risks are carried by each position. Demonstrate the offsetting of risks between positions.

Implied Volatility

• Definition and calculation
• Implied volatility smiles, term structures and surfaces
• Describing and specifying the smile. Option structures revisited.
• Delta quotation and the conventions of the FX vanilla option market
• Volatility interpolation using implied volatility models

Smile Pricing

• Pricing exotics under different smile models
• A tour of smile pricing models: local volatility, Heston, SABR, mixed local/stochastic volatility
• Theoretical value and skew to TV

Smile Risk Management

• Managing term structure risk and volatility surface risk
• Sticky strike vs. sticky delta

Volatility Products

• Volatility swaps and variance swaps
• Forward volatility agreements
• Volatility cone

Multi-Currency Products

• FX basket products, quanto feature
• Black-Scholes treatment: volatility triangles and correlations
• Dealing with multiple volatility smiles: correlation skew

Workshop: Design a presentation to a treasury department explaining how the use of various derivatives can reduce its risk. Calculate payoff and Greek profiles. Compare unhedged and hedged risks. Optimize derivative parameters.