Maverick Manufacturing, Inc., must purchase gold in three months for use in its operations. Maverick’s management has estimated that if the price of gold were to rise
above $1,310 per ounce, the firm would go bankrupt. The current price of gold is $1,230 per ounce. The firm’s chief financial officer believes that the price of gold will either rise to $1,350 per ounce or fall to $1,120 per ounce over the next three months. Management wishes to eliminate any risk of the firm going bankrupt. The company can borrow and lend at the risk-free EAR of 4 percent.
a. Should the company buy a call option or a put option on gold? In order to avoid bankruptcy, what strike price and time to expiration would the company like this option to have?
b. How much should such an option sell for in the open market?
c. If no options currently trade on gold, is there a way for the company to create a synthetic option with identical payoffs to the option described above? If there is, how would the firm do it?
d. How much does the synthetic option cost? Is this greater than, less than, or equal to what the actual option costs? Does this make sense?