IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/29369.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Factor Model For Option Returns

Author

Listed:
  • Matthias Buechner
  • Bryan T. Kelly

Abstract

Due to their short lifespans and migrating moneyness, options are notoriously difficult to study with the factor models commonly used to analyze the risk-return trade-off in other asset classes. Instrumented principal components analysis solves this problem by tracking contracts in terms of their pricing-relevant characteristics via time-varying latent factor loadings. We find that a model with three latent factors prices the cross-section of option returns and explains more than 85% of the variation in a panel of monthly S&P 500 option returns from 1996 to 2017. In particular, we show that the IPCA factors can be rationalized via an economically plausible three-factor model consisting of a level, slope and skew factor. Finally, out-of-sample trading strategies based on insights from the IPCA model have significant alpha over previously studied option strategies.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthias Buechner & Bryan T. Kelly, 2021. "A Factor Model For Option Returns," NBER Working Papers 29369, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29369
    Note: AP
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w29369.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ofek, Eli & Richardson, Matthew & Whitelaw, Robert F., 2004. "Limited arbitrage and short sales restrictions: evidence from the options markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(2), pages 305-342, November.
    2. Dew-Becker, Ian & Giglio, Stefano & Kelly, Bryan, 2021. "Hedging macroeconomic and financial uncertainty and volatility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(1), pages 23-45.
    3. Peter Carr & Liuren Wu, 2020. "Option Profit and Loss Attribution and Pricing: A New Framework," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 75(4), pages 2271-2316, August.
    4. Joshua D. Coval & Tyler Shumway, 2001. "Expected Option Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(3), pages 983-1009, June.
    5. Kelly, Bryan T. & Pruitt, Seth & Su, Yinan, 2019. "Characteristics are covariances: A unified model of risk and return," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(3), pages 501-524.
    6. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:3:p:1367-1404 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Christopher S. Jones, 2006. "A Nonlinear Factor Analysis of S&P 500 Index Option Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(5), pages 2325-2363, October.
    8. Darrell Duffie & Jun Pan & Kenneth Singleton, 2000. "Transform Analysis and Asset Pricing for Affine Jump-Diffusions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(6), pages 1343-1376, November.
    9. Carr, Peter & Wu, Liuren, 2004. "Time-changed Levy processes and option pricing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 113-141, January.
    10. Peter Christoffersen & Mathieu Fournier & Kris Jacobs, 2018. "The Factor Structure in Equity Options," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(2), pages 595-637.
    11. Bjørn Eraker & Michael Johannes & Nicholas Polson, 2003. "The Impact of Jumps in Volatility and Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(3), pages 1269-1300, June.
    12. He, Zhiguo & Kelly, Bryan & Manela, Asaf, 2017. "Intermediary asset pricing: New evidence from many asset classes," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(1), pages 1-35.
    13. Donald R. Chambers & Matthew Foy & Jeffrey Liebner & Qin Lu, 2014. "Index Option Returns: Still Puzzling," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(6), pages 1915-1928.
    14. Gurdip Bakshi & Nikunj Kapadia, 2003. "Delta-Hedged Gains and the Negative Market Volatility Risk Premium," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(2), pages 527-566.
    15. Vasquez, Aurelio, 2017. "Equity Volatility Term Structures and the Cross Section of Option Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(6), pages 2727-2754, December.
    16. Goyal, Amit & Saretto, Alessio, 2009. "Cross-section of option returns and volatility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(2), pages 310-326, November.
    17. Eli Ofek & Matthew Richardson, 2003. "DotCom Mania: The Rise and Fall of Internet Stock Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(3), pages 1113-1137, June.
    18. Cao, Jie & Han, Bing, 2013. "Cross section of option returns and idiosyncratic stock volatility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1), pages 231-249.
    19. Mark Broadie & Mikhail Chernov & Michael Johannes, 2007. "Model Specification and Risk Premia: Evidence from Futures Options," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(3), pages 1453-1490, June.
    20. repec:bla:jfinan:v:58:y:2003:i:3:p:1113-1138 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Heston, Steven L, 1993. "A Closed-Form Solution for Options with Stochastic Volatility with Applications to Bond and Currency Options," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(2), pages 327-343.
    22. Black, Fischer & Scholes, Myron S, 1973. "The Pricing of Options and Corporate Liabilities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 637-654, May-June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Büchner, Matthias & Kelly, Bryan, 2022. "A factor model for option returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(3), pages 1140-1161.
    2. Ruan, Xinfeng & Zhang, Jin E., 2018. "Risk-neutral moments in the crude oil market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 583-600.
    3. Byun, Suk Joon & Jeon, Byoung Hyun & Min, Byungsun & Yoon, Sun-Joong, 2015. "The role of the variance premium in Jump-GARCH option pricing models," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 38-56.
    4. Bjørn Eraker & Aoxiang Yang, 2022. "The Price of Higher Order Catastrophe Insurance: The Case of VIX Options," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(6), pages 3289-3337, December.
    5. Augustyniak, Maciej & Badescu, Alexandru & Bégin, Jean-François, 2023. "A discrete-time hedging framework with multiple factors and fat tails: On what matters," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 232(2), pages 416-444.
    6. Kaeck, Andreas, 2013. "Asymmetry in the jump-size distribution of the S&P 500: Evidence from equity and option markets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(9), pages 1872-1888.
    7. Ruan, Xinfeng, 2020. "Volatility-of-volatility and the cross-section of option returns," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    8. Gang Li & Chu Zhang, 2010. "On the Number of State Variables in Options Pricing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 56(11), pages 2058-2075, November.
    9. Carverhill, Andrew & Luo, Dan, 2023. "A Bayesian analysis of time-varying jump risk in S&P 500 returns and options," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    10. Shackleton, Mark B. & Taylor, Stephen J. & Yu, Peng, 2010. "A multi-horizon comparison of density forecasts for the S&P 500 using index returns and option prices," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(11), pages 2678-2693, November.
    11. Amit Goyal & Alessio Saretto, 2022. "Are Equity Option Returns Abnormal? IPCA Says No," Working Papers 2214, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    12. Huang, Darien & Schlag, Christian & Shaliastovich, Ivan & Thimme, Julian, 2018. "Volatility-of-volatility risk," SAFE Working Paper Series 210, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    13. Audrino, Francesco & Fengler, Matthias R., 2015. "Are classical option pricing models consistent with observed option second-order moments? Evidence from high-frequency data," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 46-63.
    14. Henri Bertholon & Alain Monfort & Fulvio Pegoraro, 2006. "Pricing and Inference with Mixtures of Conditionally Normal Processes," Working Papers 2006-28, Center for Research in Economics and Statistics.
    15. Christoffersen, Peter & Jacobs, Kris & Ornthanalai, Chayawat & Wang, Yintian, 2008. "Option valuation with long-run and short-run volatility components," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(3), pages 272-297, December.
    16. Sanjay K. Nawalkha & Xiaoyang Zhuo, 2020. "A Theory of Equivalent Expectation Measures for Contingent Claim Returns," Papers 2006.15312, arXiv.org, revised May 2022.
    17. Neumann, Maximilian & Prokopczuk, Marcel & Wese Simen, Chardin, 2016. "Jump and variance risk premia in the S&P 500," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 72-83.
    18. Du Du & Dan Luo, 2019. "The Pricing of Jump Propagation: Evidence from Spot and Options Markets," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(5), pages 2360-2387, May.
    19. Bjørn Eraker, 2013. "The performance of model based option trading strategies," Review of Derivatives Research, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 1-23, April.
    20. Kevin Aretz & Ming-Tsung Lin & Ser-Huang Poon, 2023. "Moneyness, Underlying Asset Volatility, and the Cross-Section of Option Returns," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 27(1), pages 289-323.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G1 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29369. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.