SPAN margin

This one is not written up yet

The definition above is the short version. A full explanation — how it works, a worked example and the exam traps — is still being written. In the meantime the chapter below covers it in context.

Written up from the same chapter

• Central counterpartyThe clearing corporation that interposes itself in every exchange trade, becoming buyer to every seller and seller to every buyer, so neither side carries the other's credit risk.
• ClearingThe daily accounting step that reconciles what every party owes and is owed on its open and closed positions, and turns a day of trades into one net obligation per member.
• Conversion factorThe multiplier that scales a futures settlement price into a fair invoice price for each bond in the deliverable basket, by valuing that bond at the notional 7% yield.
• Extreme Loss MarginA flat 3.5 per cent margin collected on cash-market positions to cover losses falling outside what the VaR margin is designed to capture.
• Invoice priceThe cash a buyer pays the seller on physical delivery: the futures settlement price multiplied by the delivered bond's conversion factor, plus its accrued interest, scaled by the contract amount.
• Liquid Net WorthThe part of a merchant banker's net worth deployed in unencumbered liquid assets, counted after a prescribed haircut on each asset type — a second capital test that net worth alone cannot satisfy.