Question

You own 10,000 shares of Microsoft stock. A good way to hedge the risk involved in owning this stock would be to buy some call options on Microsoft stock.
a. True
b. False

Answer 1

Answer: False

Explanation:

If you want to hedge the risk of owning the stock then that would mean that you want to take measures to ensure that you don't lose out if prices fall.

A call option is not the way to do this because call options are bought with the expectations that prices will go up. If you buy call options then and the prices fall, you would make a loss on both the call options and the stock that you own.

A good way to hedge this would be to take Put options on the stock. Put options help you benefit if prices fall because you would be allowed to sell at a certain price unaffected by the fall in prices.