Chapter II: Understanding Price Volatility behaviour is essential to assessing the risk associated with positions across different time spans. |
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This chart shows Volatility for Range Resources Corp., defined to be the price range as a portion of the average price: For instance, on 7/27/2010 the average price was 37.64 with a range of 3.02, indicating a Daily Volatility of 8%. Daily Volatility (the daily range as a portion of the daily average price) is plotted in green. Blue is Weekly Volatility, which is the weekly range as a portion of the weekly average price. It is important to avoid confusing this with the weekly average of the daily volatility, which is a completely different concept. The red plot shows the actual price. Volatility, as measured through various intervals, ( Daily, Weekly, Monthly and Quarterly) is plotted according to color. According to academic theory, Volatility is exactly equal to Risk. But investors often make a distinction between these two concepts. The different character of Volatility as seen in different time frames, lends some support to the investor's view. During 18 years, the Average Quarterly Volatility of RRC stock price has been 37% while the Average Daily Volatility has been 4%. |
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You may be familiar with the "yield curve" which shows how interest bearing yields vary according to term. Each Volatility Curve is a snapshot in time. As the timespan across which Volatility is measured increases, the Volatility is expected to increase. However, as seen in this plot of the RRC Volatility Curve, the increase is not constant. |
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A frequency distribution of the green points on the first chart (the daily volatility) yields this histogram. |
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In a similar vein, the Frequency Distribution of the Quarterly Volatility is plotted here. This is the distribution of the values plotted in purple on the top chart from this page. |
Refined Volatility Risk Analysis for RRC : |
| Wednesday, July 28, 2010: We have news on W.W. Grainger, Inc., ticker symbol GWW. Signs of an over-bought condition have become noticable. Also, there are breaking events concerning Cummins Inc. and Quest Diagnostics Incorporated. From the News Archive: (7/27/2010 ) Favorable events happened at Lexmark International, Inc., Range Resources Corp., and Zimmer Holdings, Inc.. Meanwhile, bad news came from QUALCOMM, Inc.. |