Fix Hedge Currency Risk with Futures

Here is a quick example. A Japanese airline wishes to buy a Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Payment will be made in US dollars. Plane will cost around $200 million. Every one percent change in the value of the Yen versus the dollar will change the cost of the delivered airline by $2 million. In the last few months the USD YEN currency pair has varied by 5% from high to low. That would translate to a difference of $10 million in what the Japanese airline might have to pay to Boeing. There are a couple of ways that the Japanese airline might use to reduce currency risk. The first is to buy currency futures. The airline will pick a futures contract that will come due around the time that the airplane will be delivered. They will not need to spend any money with the futures contract but will obligate themselves to purchase dollars for YEN at the contract price on the settlement date. This strategy fixes their cost of doing business as of the expiration dates of their futures contracts but has its drawbacks. Rather the company will buy options and on the options expiration dates will only need to execute the contracts involved if doing so is profitable.

Hedge Currency Risk with Foreign Currency Options Trading

The better alternative in this situation is to buy calls or puts on the USD with the YEN. When to buy calls is when the trader believes that the USD will go up in value versus the YEN by the time that payment is due. When to buy puts is when the trader believes that the USD will fall in value by the time in that payment is due. If the dollar does, in fact, go up in value the trader executes the options contract and buys dollars at the strike price of the contract, the original value of the dollar versus the Yen. As the figures noted above demonstrate, a savings of $10 million on this sort of contract is possible. The trader would only buy puts in this instance if his company already has money set aside in dollars to pay for the plane. If the dollar plummets in value the trader who has purchased puts on the dollar with the Yen can simply exit his contract and take the profit. Thus he will have the same benefit is if he had kept Yen and converted at the time of payment. Speculators can use all of the same techniques but do so in seeking profit in whichever currency pair they are trading.

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One of the many advantages of options is that it could be traded online without much of a hassle. There are many brokers that saw the advantage that trading in options could bring in terms of profits, and they started offering options trading, as well.

Forex option trading makes for smart investing. As only the price of the option itself is at stake, the trader minimizes his risks and maximizes his profits without having to deal with market makers and futures, which are even more complicated.

With Forex options, a trader could buy or sell certain spot contracts at a fixed price and at a certain date. The trader could sell the options before it expires, or secure a position within the spot foreign currency. Once the option is exercised, the spot market immediately assumes a “spot” position.

Once an option is purchased, the buying trader must pay the selling trader the initial financial investment. Once an option is purchased in Forex option trading, no other financial obligation will need to be met until the time for the option contract expires. As soon as the expiration date appears on the horizon, the buyer of the option will need to purchase the currency’s spot position, or sell the option at its strike price.