Certain commodity producers face uncertain output and price, but can trade financial derivatives on price. I consider how best to use a put option on price. I introduce the variance surface, which is a data visualization technique that shows the level of variance across a grid of values for the...

Tail hedging is a portfolio management strategy meant to reduce the risk of large losses. For an investor who holds a stock market index fund, the strategy entails buying out of the money put options on the index. Research suggests the strategy works well in practice and I explore the returns to...

In this paper I develop a theoretical model to analyze policy that restricts who can own land. I briefly review research related to such policy in Saskatchewan, Canada, and identify a standard supply-demand model that I extend in several ways. First, I replicate results for how policy affects...