for the value of a European put or call option, or an American call option with zero dividend . In equation (1) is time, is the stock price, is the exercise price, is the risk free interest rate, is the continuous dividend, and is the stock volatility. The parameter , and may be either constant, or functions of time. In the latter case their average instantaneous values over the remaining life of the option should be provided to d03ndf. An auxiliary routine d03nef is available to compute such averages from values at a set of discrete times. Equation (1) is subject to different boundary conditions depending on the type of option. For a call option the boundary condition is
where is the maturity time of the option. For a put option the equation (1) is subject to
d03ndf also returns values of the Greeks
s30abf also computes the European option price given by the Black–Scholes–Merton formula together with a more comprehensive set of sensitivities (Greeks).
Further details of the analytic solution returned are given in Section 9.1.
4References
Hull J (1989) Options, Futures and Other Derivative Securities Prentice–Hall
Wilmott P, Howison S and Dewynne J (1995) The Mathematics of Financial Derivatives Cambridge University Press
5Arguments
1: – IntegerInput
On entry: specifies the kind of option to be valued:
A European call option.
An American call option.
A European put option.
Constraints:
, or ;
if , .
2: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Input
On entry: the exercise price .
Constraint:
.
3: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Input
On entry: the stock price at which the option value and the Greeks should be evaluated.
Constraint:
.
4: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Input
On entry: the time at which the option value and the Greeks should be evaluated.
Constraint:
.
5: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Input
On entry: the maturity time of the option.
Constraint:
.
6: – Logical arrayInput
On entry: specifies whether or not various arguments are time-dependent. More precisely, is time-dependent if and constant otherwise. Similarly, specifies whether is time-dependent and specifies whether is time-dependent.
7: – Real (Kind=nag_wp) arrayInput
Note: the dimension of the array r
must be at least
if , and at least otherwise.
On entry: if then must contain the constant value of . The remaining elements need not be set.
If then must contain the value of at time t and must contain its average instantaneous value over the remaining life of the option:
The auxiliary routine d03nef may be used to construct r from a set of values of at discrete times.
8: – Real (Kind=nag_wp) arrayInput
Note: the dimension of the array q
must be at least
if , and at least otherwise.
On entry: if then must contain the constant value of . The remaining elements need not be set.
If then must contain the constant value of and must contain its average instantaneous value over the remaining life of the option:
The auxiliary routine d03nef may be used to construct q from a set of values of at discrete times.
9: – Real (Kind=nag_wp) arrayInput
Note: the dimension of the array sigma
must be at least
if , and at least otherwise.
On entry: if then must contain the constant value of . The remaining elements need not be set.
If then must contain the value of at time t, the average instantaneous value , and the second-order average , where:
The auxiliary routine d03nef may be used to compute sigma from a set of values at discrete times.
Constraints:
if , ;
if ,
, for .
10: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
On exit: the value of the option at the stock price s and time t.
11: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
12: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
13: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
14: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
15: – Real (Kind=nag_wp)Output
On exit: the values of various Greeks at the stock price s and time t, as follows:
16: – IntegerInput/Output
On entry: ifail must be set to , or to set behaviour on detection of an error; these values have no effect when no error is detected.
A value of causes the printing of an error message and program execution will be halted; otherwise program execution continues. A value of means that an error message is printed while a value of means that it is not.
If halting is not appropriate, the value or is recommended. If message printing is undesirable, then the value is recommended. Otherwise, the value is recommended. When the value or is used it is essential to test the value of ifail on exit.
On exit: unless the routine detects an error or a warning has been flagged (see Section 6).
6Error Indicators and Warnings
If on entry or , explanatory error messages are output on the current error message unit (as defined by x04aaf).
Errors or warnings detected by the routine:
On entry, .
Constraint: , or .
On entry, is not equal to with American call option.
.
On entry, .
Constraint: .
On entry, .
Constraint: .
On entry, .
Constraint: .
On entry, and .
Constraint: .
On entry, .
Constraint: .
An unexpected error has been triggered by this routine. Please
contact NAG.
See Section 7 in the Introduction to the NAG Library FL Interface for further information.
Your licence key may have expired or may not have been installed correctly.
See Section 8 in the Introduction to the NAG Library FL Interface for further information.
Dynamic memory allocation failed.
See Section 9 in the Introduction to the NAG Library FL Interface for further information.
7Accuracy
Given accurate values of r, q and sigma no further approximations are made in the evaluation of the Black–Scholes analytic formulae, and the results should, therefore, be within machine accuracy. The values of r, q and sigma returned from d03nef are exact for polynomials of degree up to .
8Parallelism and Performance
Background information to multithreading can be found in the Multithreading documentation.
d03ndf is not threaded in any implementation.
9Further Comments
9.1Algorithmic Details
The Black–Scholes analytic formulae are used to compute the solution. For a European call option these are as follows:
where
is the cumulative Normal distribution function and is its derivative
The functions , , and are average values of , and over the time to maturity:
The Greeks are then calculated as follows:
Note: that is obtained from substitution of other Greeks in the Black–Scholes partial differential equation, rather than differentiation of . The values of , and appearing in its definition are the instantaneous values, not the averages. Note also that both the first-order average and the second-order average appear in the expression for . This results from the fact that is the derivative of with respect to , not .
For a European put option the equivalent equations are:
The analytic solution for an American call option with is identical to that for a European call, since early exercise is never optimal in this case. For all other cases no analytic solution is known.
10Example
This example solves the Black–Scholes equation for valuation of a -month American call option on a non-dividend-paying stock with an exercise price of $. The risk-free interest rate is 10% per annum, and the stock volatility is 40% per annum.
The option is valued at a range of times and stock prices.