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History of Derivatives
ОглавлениеInvestors, farmers, and manufacturers have used derivatives for thousands of years to manage commercial and market risk. The classical philosopher Aristotle describes the Greek mathematician Thales making money off options contracts on olive presses as early as the sixth century BCE.2 Derivatives allow users to guard against gains or declines in the value of underlying physical or financial assets, such as agricultural commodities, interest rates, stocks, bonds, trading indices, or currencies. They do this without requiring the user to buy or sell the underlying assets. In this sense, derivatives are a form of insurance, but one that does not require the insured to incur a loss in order to recover.
American derivatives markets go back at least to the nineteenth century. The first were agricultural commodity futures markets in cities like New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis, New Orleans, and Kansas City. These markets allowed farmers, ranchers, and producers to hedge production costs and delivery prices. That, in turn, helped ensure that American consumers could always find plenty of food on grocery store shelves.
Derivatives markets are one reason why American consumers today enjoy stable prices in all manner of consumer finance, from auto loans to home mortgages. Derivatives markets influence the price and availability of the energy used to heat homes and run factories. They also help set the interest rates borrowers pay on home mortgages and the returns workers earn on their retirement savings. Airlines use derivatives, too. The reason carriers are willing to quote us a fare for a ticket on a flight six months from now is that they are hedging their future fuel costs. The same is true for oil producers and refiners.