Group Coursework 2023/24
Assignment Information
Course Code ECON4012
Course Title Financial Derivatives
Course Coordinator Yihan Zou
Weighting 40%
Question release date 05 October 2023 09:00 am
Submission date: 23 November 2023 12:00 pm
Grades and Feedback to be released on: TBC
Word limit / duration 8-10 minutes
Action to be taken if word limit is exceeded 20% reduction in overall grade
1. QUESTION/ DESCRIPTION OF ACTIVITY#
Prepare a group presentation based on a project focusing on hedging with futures
contracts.
Further details
(As it is a group presentation, please ensure that each member of the group contributes to the
presentation. Any member who is found to have not contributed to the presentation will lose
marks.)
The purpose of this assessment is to help you familiarize the actual trading of futures contracts and
enable a clearer understanding of its mechanisms and outcomes.
Format: The in-course assessment will be based on an 8-10 minute group presentation, involving teams
of 3-4 students. Each team will be tasked with the challenge of hedging the market risk of a chosen
asset using a relevant futures contract on a daily basis.
Details: Suppose that you will trade (either going long or short) an asset (or a portfolio) in a chosen
market from August 1st, 2023 to August 31st, 2023. Your objective is to select an appropriate futures
contract to hedge this investment. For the purpose of this exercise, you can disregard transaction costs,
margins, short-selling constraint and other typical trading constraints. Your main focus should be on
creating a hedge in a theoretically perfect market. All positions should be closed by August 31st, 2023.
Data sources: Teams can choose from a variety of markets that offer futures contracts, ranging from
commodities and equities to cryptocurrencies and even fish pool markets. For equity and commodity
market data: Yahoo Finance (www.finance.yahoo.com), Bloomberg, Datastream, or other reliable
sources. For cryptocurrency market data: CoinMarketCap (www.coinmarketcap.com) or CME Group
(www.cmegroup.com/markets/cryptocurrencies.html). For fish pool market data: Fishpool
(www.fishpool.eu).
By doing this project, you are expected to
1. Understand and explain the mechanism of the specific futures contract you choose;
2. Present appropriate tables, graphs, formulas or other details to discuss how you construct the
hedging positions and corresponding results (including hedging ratio, daily gains/losses, etc.);
3. Provide factors impacting on the hedging performance and explain why the performance is
good/bad. (Note: a bad hedging performance does not necessarily result in a low assessment
grade.)
This assessment is group-based in order to
• Develop skills required for data search, computations, and analytical methods.
• Enhance capabilities in interpreting figures, charts, and tables to provide critical insights.
• Enhance preparation skills required in developing high-quality presentation slides while
working as a team.
2. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FOR GROUP ASSIGNMENTS
Students will be provided with information regarding the groupwork policy.
Arrangements for forming groups and allocating roles
Students are allowed to organise themselves into groups (not more than 4 students in one group)
until the deadline of group choice. After the deadline has passed, remaining students will be
randomly allocated into groups of 3-4 each.
Groups must discuss the Business School's Assessed Groupwork Policy and agree how they will
apply it at their first meeting. The policy can be found on the Student Information Point.
Moodle forum
Group members must use the forum provided to interact to ensure that no student is disadvantaged
by not having a particular social media account.
Peer evaluation
- Not used.
Questions
If you have any questions about this coursework briefing, please read it carefully again to ensure you
fully understand it. If you still have questions, please post these on the Moodle Discussion Forum.
3. ASSESSMENT RUBRIC/ CRITERIA
Each presentation will be graded based on the following criteria:
1. Clarity: The presentation slides should be clear, directly related to the topic of futures contract
trading, and structured in a way that effectively conveys your hedging strategy and the reasoning
behind it.
2. Accuracy: The presentation slides should be accurate and should be free from any errors. In case
you present any calculations or datasets, please ensure that it is correct. This extends to any plots,
tables, hedging ratios, or daily gains/losses.
3. Critical Reasoning: Teams should demonstrate their ability to critically justify their choices and
assess their results throughout the project. This includes explaining their selection of a specific
futures contract and their hedging strategies, and providing thoughtful analysis and reasoning on the
results.
4. Use of figures, tables, graphics: The presentation of data and facts should be made visually
appealing by using figures, tables or graphics.
5. Presentation skills: The group members will be graded individually based on their presentation
skills during their turn. Please practice before the final presentation so that you could present
confidently.
6. Presentation summary: There should be a slide at the end of the presentation summarising all the
key topics discussed in it.
7. Formal citation of references: When presenting your critical reasoning and justifications, it's
imperative to base your arguments on credible sources. Whether you are referencing market
analysis, historical data, or expert opinions, always ensure that these sources are appropriately cited.
All the aforementioned criterion carries equal weight so pay attention to all the aspects of your
presentation.
4. FEEDBACK METHOD
Feedback on your assessment will normally be provided via Moodle. Generic (class-level)
feedback and grade profiles will normally be posted on Moodle.
Students can use academic staff office hours for additional feedback on your work.
5. PREPARING YOUR ASSESSMENT
Video creation
1. Choose the method for video creation, noting that the maximum file size limit on
Moodle is 230MB. Methods include:
o Universal Capture
o Other accepted formats: MP4, .M4V, .MOV, .ogv, .webm
o Mobile devices
o Another method such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams
2. Please use this file naming convention: GroupNo_CourseCode_QuestionNo. e.g.
Group3_ACCFIN4099_1. If there is no question choice, use 1 as the default.
Referencing and bibliography
You should reference your sources appropriately and list these in a bibliography. The
bibliography is excluded from your word limit. You should use the ‘Harvard’ referencing
system, as detailed below for written coursework.
In the text, use the following referencing conventions:
• Smith (1999) argues that…. or
• It has been argued that……. (Smith, 1999).
• If you use a direct quote, use quotation marks and cite the page number as well as
the author and date, i.e. (Smith, 1999, p. 4).
If you have two items by the same author in the same year, refer to one as ‘a’ and the other
as ‘b’, i.e. Smith (1999a) and Smith (1999b).
6. SUBMITTING
A designated member of the group must submit in accordance with the stated time
and date on page 1. See below for information if you are unable to do so.
1. Check your file name (see above).
2. Check that you have used an accepted file type (MP4, .M4V, .MOV, .ogv, .webm).
3. One group member will upload your video to the designated section of the Moodle
course, which will be clearly signposted.
4. Try to upload your video at least 30 minutes before the deadline (page 1) in case you
encounter any technical issues. You will be able to resubmit the video as often as
you like until the submission deadline.
5. All group members will upload a peer assessment and self-reflection form, using the
naming convention GroupNo_CourseCode_StudentNo. e.g.
Group3_ACCFIN4099_2371231.
6. Complete the Declaration of Originality (see below) on behalf of the group.
Declaration of Originality
When you upload your video on Moodle, you will be required to select a checkbox to confirm
that you agree with the University’s Declaration of Originality which applies to all academic
work, as follows:
I confirm that this assignment is my own work and I have:
• Read and understood the guidance on plagiarism provided on the Student
Information Point Moodle course including the University of Glasgow Statement on
Plagiarism.
• Clearly referenced, in both the text and the bibliography or references, all sources
used in the work.
• Fully referenced (including page numbers) and used inverted commas for all text
quoted from books, journals, web etc.
• Provided the sources for all tables, figures, data etc. that are not my own work.
• Not made use of the work of any other student(s) past or present without
acknowledgement. This includes any of my own work, that has previously, or
concurrently, been submitted for assessment, either at this or any other institution,
including school.
• Not sought or used the services of any professional agencies to produce this work.
• In addition, I understand that any false claim in respect of this work will result in
disciplinary action in accordance with University regulations.
Extensions and non-submission with good cause
Please refer to the Student Information Point Moodle course for relevant information.
There is no reassessment opportunity for this assessment.
Late submission penalties
In the absence of good cause, late submission penalties will be applied as explained in
Student Information Point Moodle course.
7. STUDENT CONDUCT
Referencing and bibliography
For information, please go to the University Library webpage.
Plagiarism
For advice and more information, please go to:
• Student Learning Development web pages
• University Plagiarism Statement
If you make use of AI at any point in your research or writing process, no matter at what
stage, you must acknowledge the use of that source/platform as you would any other piece
of evidence/material in your submission.
Turnitin
Your coursework will be processed through Turnitin for similarity checking. You can submit
a draft of your coursework to Turnitin before submitting your final copy. You will find
information about using Turnitin in the Student Information Point Moodle [USIP]
8. GENERATIVE AI
Generative AI offers many new opportunities for learning and the development of academic
skill although, like any technology, it must be used judiciously. Students should consider the
data protection and privacy issues that can be caused by using AI. Consider how your
personal information will be used before signing up to AI tools and ensure you read any data
protection policies before interacting with AI. You should not feel pressured into using AI
tools if you are uncomfortable with the data protection or privacy issues. Bear in mind that
responses to AI queries can be biased due to the inherent biases present in their training
data. This can lead to unfair and discriminatory responses.
Copying (including paraphrasing) AI responses to queries would be considered as
plagiarism, as it would for copying the response from any internet search.
Further information can be found here.
9. EXTENSIONS AND NON-SUBMISSION WITH GOOD CAUSE
Extension of up to 5 days
If you experience extenuating circumstances which prevent you from completing your
assessment by the deadline, you can request an extension of up to 5 days via Moodle.
Good cause for non-submission, late submission and extension of more than
5 days
We understand that during your studies, events that you cannot control (e.g., death of a
family member, personal circumstances, physical and mental ill health, etc.) may impact
your ability to perform well in or complete assessments.
If you are experiencing such circumstances, you can submit a good cause claim in
MyCampus.
You have five working days from the assessment deadline date to submit your good cause
claim. If you are prevented from submitting your claim within five days for good reason, you
must detail this in your claim. You will receive an acknowledgement on MyCampus when
you submit. After you have submitted your claim, you have five working days to retract it.
If you have any questions, please contact your subject team:
business-accounting-finance@glasgow.ac.uk
business-economics@glasgow.ac.uk
business-management@glasgow.ac.uk