Suppose you hold LLL employee stock options representing options to buy 10,000 shares of LLL stock. You wish to hedge your position by buying put options with three-month expirations and a $22.50 strike price. Immediately after establishing your put options hedge, volatility for LLL stock suddenly jumps to 45 percent. This changes the number of put options required to hedge your employee stock options. LLL accountants estimated the value of these options using the Black-Scholes-Merton formula and the following assumptions:

S= current stock price = $20.72

K= option strike price = $23.15

r= risk-free interest rate = 0.043

= stock volatility = 0.29

T= time to expiration = 3.5 years

How many put option contracts are required? (Do not round intermediate calculations. Round your answer to the nearest whole number.)