Pricing of Forwards and Futures
- 02:52
Learn how to calculate the fair price for an equity future or an equity forward.
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Transcript
The price of a forward contract is the price at which the two counterparties to that trade are agreeing today to trade at in the future on the forward delivery date. This concept equally applies to futures contracts. That forward or futures price, however, is not determined based on expectations of what the underlying assets market price will be on the future of forward delivery date, but rather, it's determined based on arbitrage free principles. The logic behind this is that if you were looking to go long of a forward or futures position where you're looking to benefit the underlying asset price increases above that forward or futures price prior to the future delivery date. Having a long forward or futures position is economically the same as owning the underlying asset today since under either approach or benefit if the underlying asset price increases and lose if it goes down. And since both of those alternatives, buying the underlying asset today and holding it or agreeing today to buy the underlying asset through the forward or futures market. Since they're both available today, they should both cost you the same over the forward period. So what does it cost us to buy the underlying asset through the cash market today and hold it through the forward period? Well, the first thing you have to pay to buy the underlying asset is the cash price today. So that's our first cost in calculating the fair forward or futures price. The second thing is assuming that we don't have any money to start off with, we might need to borrow some money to be able to buy that underlying asset today through the cash market. And if we do borrow money, we're gonna have to pay some interest on those borrowed funds. So that is another cost that would be incurred if you bought the underlying asset in the cash market today and held it through the forward period. However, if you were to buy the underlying asset in the cash market today and hold it through to the forward delivery date and then some dividends were paid, this is a gain that you would make offsetting some of that cost of buying that stock in the cash market today. So that would be the overall cost of buying the underlying asset and holding it through the forward period. And this is how we get through to the forward price. Taking all of those elements together, shown in the formula at the bottom of this slide, cash price minus any dividends that you won't receive if you're accessing the stock through the forward market until you actually take delivery on a delivery date plus any interest costs that you won't incur if you access the stock through the forward market 'cause you won't have had to borrow any money to buy the underlying asset today if you're accessing it through the forward market.