Notes from the desk
What actually happens on a structured-products issuance desk when the market stops behaving — told from the inside, in plain English. These are the parts that never make it into a textbook: the hedge you unwind at a price that does not exist yet, the operational avalanche behind a knock-out, the trade-offs you only meet once you are the one issuing. Every note is anonymised — no employer, no sizes, no counterparties.
- 30 July 20265 min read
March 2023: I was long gamma into a banking crisis. I still lost money.
Long gamma and long vega into the bank-name vol spike — right about the crisis, right about the hedging, and losing money anyway by failing to monetize the convexity.
Read the note - 6 June 20265 min read
When a hundred turbos knock out at once — a structured-products desk on 24 February 2022
A gap through hundreds of barriers in one open. The hedge unwinds, the operational avalanche nobody teaches, and the vice of re-issuing leverage into a volatility spike.
Read the note - May 20264 min read
Right about the drop, wrong about the dividend — Bayer, February 2024
Long gamma and long vega into a 95% dividend cut — green on delta and vol, and still handing money back on the axis nobody watches: dividend risk and the forward, which grows with maturity.
Read the note