This paper examines the determinants of commodity futures hedging and of risk premia arising from covariation of the futures price with stock market returns, and with the revenues of producers. Owing to supply shocks that stochastically redistribute real wealth (surplus) between producers and consumers, and to limited participation in the futures market, the total risk premium in the model is not proportional to the contract's covariance with aggregate consumption. Stock market variability interacts with the incentive to hedge, causing the producer hedging component of the risk premium to increase (decrease) with income elasticity, for a normal (inferior) good. Production costs that depend on output raise the premium. We argue that output and demand shocks will typically be positively correlated, raising the premium. High supply elasticity reduces the absolute hedging premium by reducing the variability of spot price and revenue.
Using proprietary energy futures position data, we provide evidence that mean hedger profits are negative while speculator (especially hedge fund) profits are positive; that speculators and hedgers who hold long (short) positions when likely hedgers in aggregate are net short (long) have higher profits than traders whose net positions align with likely hedgers; and that profits on long positions vary inversely with inventories and directly with price volatility. These findings are consistent with the risk premium, hedging pressure, and modern theory of storage hypotheses, respectively. Further, our findings suggest that commodity futures momentum may be due largely to hedging pressure.
This paper undertakes an econometric investigation into the presence of risk premium in commodity futures markets. The statistical tests are derived from a formal model of asset pricing and are applied to futures prices in a variety of commodity markets. The results suggest that for several commodities there is evidence of a time varying risk premium, particularly in futures contracts maturing six months ahead. The implications of the study for the efficiency of the futures markets and the costs of using these markets for hedging are also noted.
Master's Thesis from the year 2013 in the subject Business economics - Banking, Stock Exchanges, Insurance, Accounting, grade: 1,7, University of Mannheim, language: English, abstract: The commodity futures contract is an agreement to deliver a specific amount of commodity at a future time . There are usually choices of deliverable grades, delivery locations and delivery dates. Hedging belongs to one of the fundamental functions of futures market. Futures can be used to help producers and buyers protect themselves from price risk arising from many factors. For instance, in crude oil commodities, price risk occurs due to disrupted oil supply as a consequence of political issues, increasing of demand in emerging markets, turnaround in energy policy from the fossil fuel to the solar and efficient energy, etc. By hedging with futures, producers and users can set the prices they will receive or pay within a fixed range. A hedger takes a short position if he/she sells futures contracts while owning the underlying commodity to be delivered; a long position if he/she purchases futures contracts. The commonly known basis is defined as the difference between the futures and spot prices, which is mostly time-varying and mean-reverting. Due to such basis risk, a naïve hedging (equal and opposite) is unlikely to be effective. With the popularity of commodity futures, how to determine and implement the optimal hedging strategy has become an important issue in the field of risk management. Hedging strategies have been intensively studied since the 1960s. One of the most popular approaches to hedging is to quantify risk as variance, known as minimum-variance (MV) hedging. This hedging strategy is based on Markowitz portfolio theory, resting on the result that “a weighted portfolio of two assets will have a variance lower than the weighted average variance of the two individual assets, as long as the two assets are not perfectly and positively correlated.” MV strategy is quite well accepted, however, it ignores the expected return of the hedged portfolio and the risk preference of investors. Other hedging models with different objective functions have been studied intensively in hedging literature. Due to the conceptual simplicity, the value at risk (VaR) and conditional value at risk (C)VaR have been adopted as the hedging risk objective function. [...]
We construct long-short factor mimicking portfolios that capture the hedging pressure risk premium of commodity futures. We consider single sorts based on the open interests of either hedgers or speculators, as well as double sorts based on both positions. The long-short hedging pressure portfolios are priced cross-sectionally and offer Sharpe ratios that systematically exceed those of long-only benchmarks. Further tests show that the hedging pressure risk premiums rise with the volatility of commodity futures markets and that the predictive power of hedging pressure over cross-sectional commodity futures returns is different from the previously documented forecasting power of past returns and the slope of the term structure.
We identify two types of risk premia in commodity futures returns: spot premia related to the risk in the underlying commodity, and term premia related to changes in the basis. Sorting on forecasting variables such as the futures basis, return momentum, volatility, inflation, hedging pressure, and liquidity, results in sizable spot premia in the high-minus-low sorted portfolios between 5% and 14% per annum and term premia between 1% and 3% per annum. We show that a single factor, the high-minus-low portfolio from basis sorts, explains the cross-section of spot premia. Two additional basis factors are needed to explain the term premia.
Seminar paper from the year 2003 in the subject Business economics - Banking, Stock Exchanges, Insurance, Accounting, grade: A, Wright State University (Raj Soin College of Business), language: English, abstract: Abstract Undertaking business always involves taking risk. The future development of a company and their business is more uncertain the higher the risk that the company is facing. Risk management is a important factor in operating business. With the development of future markets entrepreneurs and investors obtained another risk management tool that made it possible to reduce risk. Futures are derivatives that can be used either for speculating or risk management. Especially in the area of financial futures, a rapid growth could be observed during the last few decades. Almost every month a new type of contract appears to meet the needs of a continuously growing corporate and institutional market. This paper considers future contracts as hedging application to reduce price risk. Futures are standardized contracts to buy or sell an asset in the future. There are various types of futures which differ in the type of the underlying asset. Futures are traded at organized exchanges. We consider the trading of future, their requirements, and market participants and their motivation. Different commercial users of future contracts hedge in different ways. A long hedge is used to reduce price risk of an anticipated purchase whereas a short hedge reduces the price risk of an asset that is already held. If there is no exact, the hedgers needs matching, contract available, the hedger should use a cross hedging strategy. With all these strategies the hedger takes, to the asset opposite, a position in the future market that is highly correlated with the change in price of the asset in the spot market. Losses in one market are offset by gains in the other market. For a successful hedge it is essential to choose an appropriate contract and hedge ratio. Faults can result in losses. The example of hedging a stock portfolio shows the application of an index future and presents the behavior of the hedged portfolio in different scenarios of stock market development.
A collection of 70 influential articles which cover a range of topics, including stock indexes, arbitrage, portfolio insurance, volatility and the October 1987 crash, price distributions, theories and determinants of hedging, portfolio selection with futures, institutions, market characteristics, speculation, pricing, efficiency, interest rates and insurance, and foreign currencies. In addition, the editor has written introductory essays for each volume which analyze speculation and hedging, explore the relatively new idea that futures markets can be modelled as chaotic processes, and demystify financial futures while presenting evidence of their benefits. No subject index. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
