Books about Derivatives from Amazon.com

Inside markets, innovation, and risk

Why do markets keep crashing and why are financial crises greater than ever before? As the risk manager to some of the leading firms on Wall Street–from Morgan Stanley to Salomon and Citigroup–and a member of some of the world’s largest hedge funds, from Moore Capital to Ziff Brothers and FrontPoint Partners, Rick Bookstaber has seen the ghost inside the machine and vividly shows us a world that is even riskier than we think. The very things done to make markets safer, have, in fact, created a world that is far more dangerous. From the 1987 crash to Citigroup closing the Salomon Arb unit, from staggering losses at UBS to the demise of Long-Term Capital Management, Bookstaber gives readers a front row seat to the management decisions made by some of the most powerful financial figures in the world that led to catastrophe, and describes the impact of his own activities on markets and market crashes. Much of the innovation of the last 30 years has wreaked havoc on the markets and cost trillions of dollars. A Demon of Our Own Design tells the story of man’s attempt to manage market risk and what it has wrought. In the process of showing what we have done, Bookstaber shines a light on what the future holds for a world where capital and power have moved from Wall Street institutions to elite and highly leveraged hedge funds..
Price: $9.49 [Notify me when price goes down.]

“I had been in derivatives for over 25 years. Many traders hadn't been born when I stumbled accidentally into the arcane world of derivatives trading. The Indonesians were at the fag end of that career. How did I get there? I had followed the money. I had ridden the tide and currents of financial markets. I had not known very much then. Even now I only knew the many unknowns. How did I get here? It was a very long story. Send Traders, Guns and Money is that story…..”

Warren Buffet once labelled derivatives “financial weapons of mass destruction”. Unlike the military kind, financial WMD are not hard to find.  Many great companies use them.  These businesses use derivatives to make money or protect them from risk. It’s a simple case of greed or fear.  Or is it?

In derivatives, whoever you are, there are things that you don’t know that you don’t know. These are the real risks of derivatives. They’re generally left to the client to discover.   So, if you’re entering the dazzling world of derivatives, ask yourself this: What do I know? What do I need to know? What don’t I know? What am I doing?

You can find the answers in Traders, Guns & Money, a sensational and controversial first-person account of the business of derivatives trading and the financial products industry in the spirit of Liar’s Poker.  It is a true insider’s view of the business of trading and marketing derivatives for a living.  It details the nature of the business, the players, how money is made and lost, and the deceptions that underlie the entire process.

Funny and poignant, and written in a wry and wickedly comic style, the book provides the ordinary reader with an insight into the seeming madness that underlies financial markets and the out-of-control process that is trading in complex financial products that few understand.

Traders, Guns & Money  throws light on the culture, games, and pure deceptions played out every day in trading rooms around the world, and played out with other people’s money.  It describes the processes by which a small group of gifted, if avaricious, individuals parlay their knowledge of the arcane world of financial products into wealth, leaving shareholders, clients, regulators, and the tax paying ordinary public to bear most of the risk.

This is the story of how one set of clients discovered the perils of unknowns in a derivatives deal.  This tale will leave you amazed, and this book will make it all clear.In the sometimes dazzling world of derivatives, Traders Guns & Money shows you how we got here and tells it how it is. Go on, follow the money.

An accessible companion and a wise counsel, Traders, Guns & Money weaves together three core themes:

Known unkowns: if you’re entering the dazzling world of derivatives, ask yourself this:  What do I know? What do I need to know? What don’t I know? What am I doing? This book will make it all clear.

Follow the money: an insider’s, expert witness account of the rise and rules of the world of derivatives.  This book will show you how we got here and tell it how it is

Send traders guns & money:  the story of how one set of clients discovered the perils of unknowns in a derivatives deal .  This tale will leave you amazed, but wiser.

"Ever since Warren Buffett memorably described derivatives as "financial weapons of mass destruction" there has been a thriller waiting to be written about them.  Derivatives have frightened otherwise right-thinking people for some time. In part this reflects a natural tendency to fear what we do not understand."  Financial Times

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Price: $17.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Updated and revised to reflect the most current information, this introduction to futures and options markets is ideal for those with a limited background in mathematics.

Based on Hull's Options, Futures and Other Derivatives, one of the best-selling books on Wall Street, this book presents an accessible overview of the topic without the use of calculus. Packed with numerical samples and accounts of real-life situations, the Fifth Edition effectively guides readers through the material while providing them with a host of tangible examples.

For professionals with a career in futures and options markets, financial engineering and/or risk management.

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Price: $75.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

To keep up with a market in flux, traders need the greeks--the best technique for valuing options and executing trades regardless of market direction Trading Option Greeks explains the five greeks and how and when to use them. A valuable guide for both the institutional investor looking for a comprehensive valuation technique and the up-and-coming active trader interested in taking the next step, this new book covers the greeks in more detail and with more examples than ever before..
Price: $33.76 [Notify me when price goes down.]

To be financially literate in today's market, business students must have a solid understanding of derivatives concepts and instruments and the uses of those instruments in corporations. The Second Edition has an accessible mathematical presentation, and more importantly, helps students gain intuition by linking theories and concepts together with an engaging narrative that emphasizes the core economic principles underlying the pricing and uses of derivatives..
Price: $144.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Dynamic Hedging is the definitive source on derivatives risk. It provides a real-world methodology for managing portfolios containing any nonlinear security. It presents risks from the vantage point of the option market maker and arbitrage operator. The only book about derivatives risk written by an experienced trader with theoretical training, it remolds option theory to fit the practitioner's environment. As a larger share of market exposure cannot be properly captured by mathematical models, noted option arbitrageur Nassim Taleb uniquely covers both on-model and off-model derivatives risks.

The author discusses, in plain English, vital issues, including:

• The generalized option, which encompasses all instruments with convex payoff, including a trader's potential bonus.
• The techniques for trading exotic options, including binary, barrier, multiasset, and Asian options, as well as methods to take into account the wrinkles of actual, non-bellshaped distributions.
• Market dynamics viewed from the practitioner's vantage point, including liquidity holes, portfolio insurance, squeezes, fat tails, volatility surface, GARCH, curve evolution, static option replication, correlation instability, Pareto-Levy, regime shifts, autocorrelation of price changes, and the severe flaws in the value at risk method.
• New tools to detect risks, such as higher moment analysis, topography exposure, and nonparametric techniques.
• The path dependence of all options hedged dynamically

Dynamic Hedging is replete with helpful tools, market anecdotes, at-a-glance risk management rules distilling years of market lore, and important definitions. The book contains modules in which the fundamental mathematics of derivatives, such as the Brownian motion, Ito's lemma, the numeraire paradox, the Girsanov change of measure, and the Feynman-Kac solution are presented in intuitive practitioner's language.

Dynamic Hedging is an indispensable and definitive reference for market makers, academics, finance students, risk managers, and regulators.

The definitive book on options trading and risk management

"If pricing is a science and hedging is an art, Taleb is a virtuoso." —Bruno Dupire, Head of Swaps and Options Research, Paribas Capital Markets

"This is not merely the best book on how options trade, it is the only book." —Stan Jonas, Managing Director, FIMAT-Société Générale

"Dynamic Hedging bridges the gap between what the best traders know and what the best scholars can prove." —William Margrabe, President, The William Margrabe Group, Inc.

"The most comprehensive, insightful, intuitive work on the subject. It is instrumental for both beginning and experienced traders."—

"A tour de force. That rare find, a book of great practical and theoretical value. Taleb successfully bridges the gap between the academic and the real world. Interesting, provocative, well written. Each chapter worth a fortune to any current or prospective derivatives trader."—Victor Niederhoffer, Chairman, Niederhoffer Investments.
Price: $57.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Stochastic Calculus for Finance evolved from the first ten years of the Carnegie Mellon Professional Master's program in Computational Finance. The content of this book has been used successfully with students whose mathematics background consists of calculus and calculus-based probability. The text gives both precise statements of results, plausibility arguments, and even some proofs, but more importantly intuitive explanations developed and refine through classroom experience with this material are provided. The book includes a self-contained treatment of the probability theory needed for stochastic calculus, including Brownian motion and its properties. Advanced topics include foreign exchange models, forward measures, and jump-diffusion processes.

This book is being published in two volumes. The first volume presents the binomial asset-pricing model primarily as a vehicle for introducing in the simple setting the concepts needed for the continuous-time theory in the second volume.

Chapter summaries and detailed illustrations are included. Classroom tested exercises conclude every chapter. Some of these extend the theory and others are drawn from practical problems in quantitative finance.

Advanced undergraduates and Masters level students in mathematical finance and financial engineering will find this book useful.

Steven E. Shreve is Co-Founder of the Carnegie Mellon MS Program in Computational Finance and winner of the Carnegie Mellon Doherty Prize for sustained contributions to education.

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Price: $28.53 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Schaum's has Satisfied Students for 50 Years.

Now Schaum's Biggest Sellers are in New Editions!

For half a century, more than 40 million students have trusted Schaum's to help them study faster, learn better, and get top grades. Now Schaum's celebrates its 50th birthday with a brand-new look, a new format with hundreds of practice problems, and completely updated information to conform to the latest developments in every field of study.

Schaum's Outlines-Problem Solved

More than 100,000 sold!

This book has been updated to reflect the latest course scope and sequence. Review problems have been added after key chapters as well as more supplementary practice problems. An informal level discussion of limits, continuity, and derivatives has also been added, as well as additional information on the algebra of the dot product, exponential form of complex numbers, and conic sections in polar coordinates-plus business applications such as average rate of change, price/demand and science applications, including projectiles.

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Price: $9.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A new and updated edition of the most readable, comprehensive text available on derivatives markets.

• Utilizes an even more applied approach than previous editions
  
• Provides an excellent balance between introductory and advanced topics
  
• Extensively updated to incorporate and explicate development in the field including the areas of electronic trading platforms, globalization of markets, hedge funds, financial scandals involving derivatives, and government regulation
  
• Revised to include over 50 text boxes with applied vignettes on topical issues, product profiles, and historical anecdotes

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Price: $51.75 [Notify me when price goes down.]