What is Index Arbitrage: Definition & Meaning Explained

Future Trading

Futures trading is the buying and selling of futures contracts on a recognized exchange or over the counter. Futures contracts are derivatives that oblige a trader to buy or sell the underlying security at a predetermined price and date.

Trading futures is possible for equity shares, commodities, currencies, as well as interest rates. Those who trade futures are generally classified as speculators or hedgers.

Speculators trade futures to make a profit. Hedgers delve into futures trading to manage risk, which simply means protecting themselves from unfavorable movements in the market.

Convertible Bonds

A convertible bond is a hybrid security that’s initially designed to be a debt instrument that pays a fixed interest rate in exchange for a loan. Once the loan’s tenure ends, the holder can decide to take one of either action:

Don’t convert bond: face value of the bond is transferred to the holder on maturity

Institutional Investor

Institutional Investor refers to the often illegal act of trading shares based on information that is not publicly available, typically obtained through dubious sources.

This privileged access to confidential information is termed “Institutional Investor” because information is generally sourced through insiders or employees working at a publicly traded firm.

Face Value

The term face value refers to the actual price of a stock that’s obtained by dividing a company’s net value by its total shares outstanding. In India, the face value of shares can range from Rs. 1 to Rs. 100.

However, the market value of the share may vary. At times, the difference can be drastic. For example, the face value of an MRF share is Rs. 10 but the market value (LTP) of the same share is Rs. 86,313.45.

Face value is also known as nominal value or par value. The latter is used frequently in the case of bonds.

The face value of a bond is the amount that an investor receives from the issuer on maturity. Similar to stocks, bonds and other fixed income instruments may have a different face value and market value.

Direct Public Offerings

A Direct Public Offering or DPO allows a company to issue shares directly to the public without an intermediary like investment banks. In the process, the company becomes publicly traded.

The cost of a DPO is known to be relatively low compared to an IPO.

Furthermore, the issuer of the DPO has control over the issue price while the paperwork and effort involved is also comparatively low. That said, the company must go through proper regulatory procedures during the process.

Index Arbitrage