Derivatives and Beyond

Every derivative - from a simple wheat future to a synthetic CDO - is priced by a single, elegant idea: in a functioning market, you cannot get something for nothing. If two strategies deliver identical future cash flows, they must cost the same today. When they don’t, the gap is a profit waiting to be taken, and the taking of it is what makes markets work. Derivatives and beyond builds the entire edifice of derivatives theory from that one principle. Volume 1 lays the foundations: arbitrage and the Law of One Price, the institutional architecture of derivatives markets, the mechanics of futures and options contracts, the cost-of-carry pricing of forwards and futures, the interest-rate toolkit that underpins all discounting, and the design of hedging strategies using futures.Written for students building from scratch, exam candidates, and practitioners returning to theory, the book derives every formula from an economic argument before introducing the algebra, and grounds the models in real market episodes - from the Metallgesellschaft stack-and-roll disaster to Southwest Airlines’ jet-fuel hedges and the 2020 negative oil price event. Each chapter includes learning objectives, worked examples, solved problems, and a graded practice set, with a full glossary of key terms at the end of the volume.Master the one idea, and everything else follows.