Customer Reviews

Handbook of Hybrid Instruments: Convertible Bonds, Preferred Shares, Lyons, Elks, Decs and Other Mandatory Convertible Notes

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This book is completely useless. From the view of a quant, the author merely states the highlights/features of various structured derivative products as described in the prospectus. This information is readily available on FreeEdgar. No insights are offered what so ever. His typical description of the valuation method consists of "Merrill has developed a model similar to ours[the author's]... The model takes into account volatility, interest rate, ..." And that's it.
On the topic of whether the issuer should early call, Mr. Nelken's "conclusions" range from calling when the market price is below call price, to at call price, to above call price, and finally to way above call price. This is done through summarizations of other researchers' reports. Again, no opinions or analysis; merely book reports.
And finally, the not-advertised-as-demo CD-ROM is as useful as a coaster on a camping trip. There's no user guide for operating instructions. Not that it is necessary since most functions are disabled in the demo. But there are links to files I don't have.