American Capped Call Options with Constant Cap

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This Demonstration shows the maximization process of an American capped call option with a constant cap (or barrier). Because the capped call must be instantly exercised if the underlying asset price rises above a predetermined price , which is called the "cap" or "cap price", its value never exceeds the value of the standard American call. Thus, identifying the cap
that maximizes the capped call payoff function
, we obtain a lower bound
for the American call price. Moreover, the evaluation of the capped call payoff function derivative with respect to the cap, while the underlying asset price approaches the cap from below, provides a lower approach
for the American call optimal exercise boundary
[1]. Finally, after replacing
with
in Kim's integral equation [2], an upper bound
for the American call price is obtained. Thus the capped call option is really a tool used to bracket the pricing of the commonly traded American option.
Contributed by: Michail Bozoudis (February 2016)
Suggested by: Michail Boutsikas
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
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M. Broadie and J. Detemple [3] developed an analytical formula to estimate American capped call options. In order to approximate an American call payoff , they use the value of a capped call written on the same asset [1]. If the price of the underlying asset is
, when
the payoff of a capped call option is
, where
is the strike price and
is the cap. The payoff is the same as a standard American option, except that the cap
limits the maximum possible payoff. Since the policy of exercising when the asset price reaches the constant cap
is an admissible policy for the American option,
for any
.
Hence a lower bound is still obtained after optimizing over
:
.
The determination of is a simple univariate differentiable optimization problem for any given
. In this Demonstration, Mathematica's built-in function NMaximize is applied.
The evaluation of the capped call payoff function derivative with respect to the cap, while the underlying asset price approaches the cap from below, leads to an exercise boundary , where
is the American call optimal early exercise boundary at time
. The boundary
is the solution to the equation
, where
.
In this Demonstration, the Newton–Raphson technique is applied to solve . Moreover, M. Broadie and J. Detemple [1] prove that an upper bound
for the American call price is obtained, after replacing the optimal early exercise boundary function
with
in Kim's integral equation [2]. The integral in Kim's equation represents the early exercise premium and is approximated by Simpson's rule.
References
[1] M. Broadie and J. Detemple, "American Option Valuation: New Bounds, Approximations, and a Comparison of Existing Methods," The Review of Financial Studies, 9(4), 1996 pp. 1211–1250.
[2] I. J. Kim, “The Analytic Valuation of American Options,” The Review of Financial Studies, 3(4), 1990 pp. 547–572.
[3] M. Broadie and J. Detemple, "American Capped Call Options on Dividend Paying Assets," The Review of Financial Studies, 8(1), 1995 pp. 161–191.
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