Best The Alpha Exchange With Dean Curnutt Podcasts (2025)

1
John Marshall, Head of Derivatives Research, Goldman Sachs 1:00:46

2d ago1:00:46

1:00:46

It was a pleasure to welcome John Marshall, Head of Derivatives Research at Goldman Sachs, to the Alpha Exchange. Our conversation explores a number of critical topics starting with the meaningful growth of equity funds deploying options as part of a risk management overlay. John describes how covered call ETFs and systematic vol-selling funds have…

1
Sayings on Vol and Risk...A Fresh 10 21:05

5d ago21:05

21:05

Greetings and salutations loyal listeners, welcome to what promises to be another exciting addition to our Sayings on Vol and Risk. To set the table, last year, I did a 5-part series with 25 Sayings. These are concise statements I’ve wound up using many times over during the course of my career to help myself and others think about market risk. The…

1
Dan Villalon, Global Co-Head of Portfolio Solutions, AQR Capital Management 1:05:06

6d ago1:05:06

1:05:06

Today’s world of ETFs and mutual funds increasingly features new flavors, a popular one of which is derived from embedding optionality. There are plenty of ways in which one might contemplate risk managing and shaping the distribution of equity returns using options. Common strategies like overwriting create income, but limit upside. Others like th…

1
Mitchell Garfin, Co-Head of Leveraged Finance, BlackRock 54:10

13d ago54:10

54:10

With nearly three decades at BlackRock, Mitch Garfin brings a deep well of experience to his role as Co-head of Leveraged Finance, overseeing high yield and leveraged loan strategies for the firm. In this episode, we explore the evolution of the credit landscape — from structural shifts in the high-yield market that leave indices of higher credit q…

1
Sayings on Vol and Risk...A Fresh Five 19:10

14d ago19:10

19:10

In 2024, I did a 5-part podcast series called “25 Sayings on Vol and Risk”. These are observations I’ve found do a nice job of describing how markets work, or perhaps better said, how markets sometimes fail to work. Because markets are always teaching us lessons, I couldn’t help but add to the original 25 with five new sayings. I’ll follow up in sh…

1
Benjamin Bowler, Managing Director and Global Head of Equity Derivatives Research at Bank of America 53:59

29d ago53:59

53:59

As Global Head of Equity Derivatives Research at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Ben Bowler is helping the firm’s institutional client base understand the complex risk dynamics that impose themselves on today’s markets. His process often leads him across asset classes, looking for linkages and developing stress indices that may provide early warning…

1
Corey Hoffstein, CIO, Newfound Research 1:00:07

2M ago1:00:07

1:00:07

Corey Hoffstein, the Co-Founder and CIO of Newfound Research is among the investors expanding the financial product set available to the RIA community. A client segment that has long been fed a diet of 60/40 exposures, the high-net-worth community is finding the need to diversify beyond stock and bond exposure. Using their innovative approach to re…

1
The VIXgilantes Strike Back 31:56

2M ago31:56

31:56

In six short trading days from 4/2 to 4/9, the SPX realized as much vol as it did during the ENTIRE year of 2024. The protracted risk-off that began with the “Liberation Day” fallout ranks only behind Covid and the GFC in terms of severity using data going back to 1990. While we've likely moved past peak VIX, in the aftermath of recent chaos is an …

1
Matt King, Founder, Satori Insights 56:09

2M ago56:09

56:09

For Matt King, evaluating market risk is often about pinpointing vulnerabilities within the financial system. Over the many years he's been advising institutional investors, he's gone where the action is - in the dotcom era it was corporate balance sheets, in the pre-GFC period it was asset-backed CP and in the last decade it's been sovereigns and …

1
Steve Englander, Head of G10 FX and North America Macro Strategy, Standard Chartered 52:26

2M ago52:26

52:26

Market risk events come in all shapes and sizes, originating from unique sources of uncertainty. We've seen them all - valuation bubble unwinds, mortgage credit crashes, Fed policy shocks, even the shutdown of the US economy from Covid. Over the last month, investors have been forced to confront a new risk, that of the imposition of substantial tar…

1
The Vol Shock Heard 'Round the World 24:09

2M ago24:09

24:09

Lenin purportedly said, “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” It’s difficult to understate how highly consequential these past few days have been. We live in an interconnected world of international rivalries, debt, trade, asset prices and economies. All kinds of tail probabilities become more live whe…

1
Campbel Harvey, Professor of Finance, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University 36:39

3M ago36:39

36:39

Best known for his seminal work on the information content of the US Treasury yield curve nearly 4 decades ago, Campbell Harvey has produced meaningful academic research in all corners of empirical finance. In this episode of the Alpha Exchange, I caught up with Campbell, now a Professor of Finance at Duke and Partner at Research Affiliates, on his…

1
GeoVolitics and Gold 27:23

3M ago27:23

27:23

In this discussion, I review the absolutely stunning level of volatility experienced by the S&P 500 right around this time 5 years ago, as the market crash resulting from the Covid shutdowns occurred. No asset – except volatility – can survive the liquidation that took place in March of 2020. I also focus on gold, which, to be clear and to repeat, …

1
Owen Lamont, Senior Vice President, Acadian Asset Management 54:50

3M ago54:50

54:50

Now a Portfolio Manager at Acadian Asset Management, Owen Lamont has had a long career in both the markets and in academic research on them. Earning a PhD in Economics from MIT in the 1990’s and then teaching at the University of Chicago shortly thereafter, Owen makes the point that these two storied institutions approach empirical finance from vas…

1
Roxton McNeal, QIS Lead Portfolio Manager, Simplify Asset Management 47:54

4M ago47:54

47:54

“This is not your father’s ETF market” would be one statement used to highlight the ever-expanding product mix available to investors via exchange traded funds. Today’s suite of ETFs embeds derivatives, targets non-traditional assets like private credit and crypto and can offer daily resetting leverage as well. Add to this, efforts to deliver expos…

1
GeoVolitics, Implied Correlation and Option Pricing 15:09

4M ago15:09

15:09

My process is about seeking out some alpha through analyzing a broad spectrum of prices, specifically the one’s that imply some probability. I will repeat that it is the options market, not the stock market that is the best economist in the world. Option contracts carry the dimensions of time – the expiration – and distance – the strike price and t…

1
Is There a Plumbing Problem in Equity Correlation? 21:11

4M ago21:11

21:11

Recently, DeepSeek, tariffs and earnings news have caused large moves in some stocks but not others, leaving fluctuations at the equity index level relatively tame. Will this volatility moderating run of low correlation continue? In this short podcast, I explore the recent history of extraordinary diversification in the US equity market along with …

1
Eric Balchunas, Senior ETF Analyst, Bloomberg Intelligence 46:09

5M ago46:09

46:09

It is said that death and taxes are the only two certainties in life. Add to these, the enormous growth of the ETF industry as a third irrefutable occurrence. Covering the landscape of exchange traded funds for Bloomberg is Eric Balchunas, a man steeped in the most plain vanilla of products like the SPY to the newest flavors of underlying exposures…

1
Anniversary Episode: Reflections on the Podcast 47:40

5M ago47:40

47:40

Since 2018, Dean Curnutt has been hosting discussions with market professionals, focused on topics such as portfolio construction, hedging, monetary policy and the impact of financial products on markets. Central to these conversations has been the exploration of an expert’s risk framework and how he or she goes about looking for opportunities. A l…

1
Digital Gold and Actual Gold 19:21

5M ago19:21

19:21

Good listeners welcome to 2025 and at the risk of offending Larry David and violating his strict 3 day statute of limitations, I gotta wish you a Happy New Year. The subject at hand is diversification. What composition of assets yields a favorable return with bearable drawdowns? After two straight years of 25+ percent returns on the SPX with just 1…

1
IBIT…the Hottest Option on the Planet 21:28

6M ago21:28

21:28

The subject at hand in this discussion is the unbelievable launch of options on IBIT, the bitcoin ETF. What I’d like to put forth is that the financial characteristics of the underlying asset – bitcoin - pave the way for IBIT options, already off to an amazing start, to become a critical industry risk management tool. The unique risk characteristic…

1
Ali Samadi, Managing Director, Equity Derivatives, Nomura Securities 51:54

6M ago51:54

51:54

The “flow desk” as it’s often called on the sell-side is about repeatability and scale in the service of institutional clients. It’s a competitive business with not a lot of margin for error, especially in a product like equity options where being on the wrong side of a misbehaving Greek could spell trouble. With this in mind, it was great to welco…

1
Michael Green, CFA, Portfolio Manager, Chief Strategist, Simplify Asset Management 55:10

6M ago55:10

55:10

A major theme of Alpha Exchange podcasts over the years has been the impact that financial products that live and breathe within the markets have on asset clearing prices. Events like the crash of 1987, the GFC, the 2018 XIV event or the unwind of short variance exposure in March 2020 come to mind as examples. More recently, the substantial growth …

1
Bitcoin, Price / Vol Spirals and MSTR 23:10

6M ago23:10

23:10

What follows are some of my recent thoughts on a favorite topic: the interaction between option prices and the assets upon which these options are written. Specifically, I share thoughts on price / vol spirals, which come in two flavors: a) the asset plummets and vol explodes b) the asset surges and vol explodes. In the first, which we might call "…

1
Victor Haghani, Founder and CIO, Elm Partners 55:53

6M ago55:53

55:53

It was a pleasure to welcome Victor Haghani, the Founder and CIO of Elm Wealth Management back to the Alpha Exchange for an engaging discussion on those turbo-charged financial products called leveraged ETFs. Our conversation is focused on the large product suite built around MicroStrategy, a software company whose mission appears to be solely focu…

1
20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price (Part 4) 14:53

7M ago14:53

14:53

Welcome back to the last installment of “20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price”. This 4-part series has been geared towards illustrating how the equity derivative salestrader can be a meaningful part of getting two institutional counterparties to “yes” with respect to the transfer of option risk. The salestrader, sitting between the trader and…

1
Rocky Fishman, Founder and CEO, Asym 500 LLC 45:35

7M ago45:35

45:35

It was a pleasure to welcome Rocky Fishman, Founder and CEO of derivatives advisory firm Asym 500 back to the Alpha Exchange. An area of specialty for Rocky is evaluating systematic trading strategies, like vol targeting, that live and breathe within equity markets and potentially sponsor feedback loops. The focus of our discussion, the growing uni…

1
20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price (Part 3) 16:40

7M ago16:40

16:40

Welcome to Part 3 of “20 Things to do Before You Ask for a Price”. To review, “20 Things” is a to-do list I developed more than 2 decades ago while running a derivative sales team. The desk committed a substantial amount of capital in pursuit of business, which made it easy to win trades but also easy to lose money in the process of winning those t…

1
Dominique Toublan, Head of US Credit Strategy, Barclays 50:04

7M ago50:04

50:04

While the SPX has enjoyed a banner year in 2024, a series of risk events have mattered, including the August 5th spike in the VIX and option pricing uncertainty into the US election. Credit spreads have generally behaved in benign fashion, however. What will 2025 bring for the world of credit and what risks should we pay attention to? With this in …

1
20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price (Part 2) 17:08

7M ago17:08

17:08

We are back, with installment number 2 of “20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price”. It’s a to-do list for the equity derivatives salestrader who chooses to be a relevant and constructive part of the option risk transfer process that a buy-side client and sell-side trader engage in. Small trades – like buying a pack of gum – can be consummated q…

1
20 Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price (Part 1) 13:14

7M ago13:14

13:14

I wanted to welcome you all to a new, 4-part series of the Alpha Exchange, “Twenty Things to Do Before You Ask for a Price”. In short, this is my thinking on what a derivatives salesperson ought to do instinctively and nearly instantaneously in his or her interaction with a trader colleague being asked to price option risk for a client. These 20 th…

1
Post Election Reflection (on Vol) 16:14

7M ago16:14

16:14

A resounding Trump win. A collapse in vol. Bitcoin “number go up”. And up. And up. The French Whale on Polymarket got paid. A star was born in Scott Jennings. The Fed eased. And, Powell, in the words of DiCaprio in Wolf of Wall Street said, “I ain’t f’n leaving”. That’s the summary. But there’s lots more to explore and in this short pod I aim to pr…

1
Shailesh Gupta, Head of Structural Alpha, Simplify Asset Management 49:56

8M ago49:56

49:56

Of all the concepts focused on throughout the discussions hosted on the Alpha Exchange, the notion of “carry” is one of my favorites. In its most basic definition, carry measures the income or cost to holding an asset in the steady state, when nothing changes. Underpinning the assessment of value in any option trade or strategy is a view on the fav…

1
Meb Faber, Founder and CEO, Cambria Investment Management 56:37

8M ago56:37

56:37

It was a pleasure to host a discussion with Meb Faber, the Founder and CEO of Cambria Asset Management. Our conversation begins with the question of whether it’s a good idea to buy the market at an all time high. To this, Meb argues it’s actually a great idea, pointing to the data and that markets in an uptrend continue to move higher. We incorpora…

1
The DOTS (Discounting of Trump Success) 21:14

8M ago21:14

21:14

Is Trump in the price? Wall Street is asking this question. In this podcast, I walk through how the market prices implied volatility around the US Election, focusing on the SPX, TLT and even DJT. As option premiums are much higher than justified by recent realized, there’s an enormous vol risk premium, the result of a withdrawal of vol supply. Ther…

1
Hedge When You Can, Not When You Have to 15:58

8M ago15:58

15:58

In this short podcast, I make the case for doing what doesn’t come naturally - taking defensive action when times are good. The first portion of the discussion assesses event risk premium into and after consequential macro events like Brexit and prior US elections. The main shared attribute is that implied vol remains elevated into the event, even …

1
The Opera of Option Prices 16:48

8M ago16:48

16:48

In China, the “vol shot” heard round the world occurred recently with the Chinese government throwing the kitchen sink at the economy and market, seeking to revive the relatively lifeless patient. As it usually does, at least temporarily, it worked. Insofar as asset price reaction that is. An explosion in volumes ensued as did the classic “stock up…

1
Option Prices are Singing 15:45

9M ago15:45

15:45

Option prices - by incorporating time (expiry) and distance (strike) - give us many more dimensions than a mere flat price like the SPX or a single stock. If the stock market speaks, then the option market sings. It's my strong contention that option prices are singing out loud right now, begging for attention. The market was largely unchanged on t…

1
ODTE? No, OTTD! 15:36

9M ago15:36

15:36

The gamma and theta characteristics of ODTE are attached at the hip. But the zero day to expiration straddle on last Wednesday’s Fed day was no normal ODTE. We might call this straddle a OTTD straddle. Zero theta to decision. The Fed decision isn’t just a date on the calendar. It’s a specific time of day on that date. It’s not like NFP which comes …

1
Kris Abdelmessih, Co-Founder, Moontower AI 51:04

9M ago51:04

51:04

Most of the discussions on the Alpha Exchange podcast consist of guests sharing views on market risk and portfolio construction. To be sure that leads the conversations down the path of monetary policy, positioning, inflation and growth. There’s a great deal of consideration around the price of optionality and the correlation of assets. But what ab…

1
Elections Have (Vol) Consequences 14:20

9M ago14:20

14:20

“Elections have consequences”. So said former US President Barack Obama. He probably didn’t have our trusty fear gauge, the VIX, in mind, but he may as well have. We are one day away from the US presidential debate. I am not sure this one can deliver the same fireworks that resulted from June 27th. It may devolve into a food fight, with each side h…

1
Lessons from the Rowdy VIX 15:05

10M ago15:05

15:05

Three hundred odd years ago, Sir Isaac Newton told us that “no great discovery was ever made without a bold guess.” My sense is he didn’t have the order book in Emini futures in mind, but his words do translate well to our world of financial instruments. In this short pod, I revisit the events of August 5th, a day when prices normally well discover…

1
Kathryn Rooney Vera, Chief Strategist, StoneX Group Inc. 39:46

10M ago39:46

39:46

Now the Chief Market Strategist at StoneX, Kathryn Rooney Vera comes from humble beginnings. As a teenager she cleaned houses in order to contribute to her family’s finances. In college, she changed her major to finance from liberal arts, seeing a more direct path to a well-compensated career. She would ultimately settle into the study of economics…

1
VIX Went Cray Cray 14:04

10M ago14:04

14:04

When an accident occurs, the insurance claims adjuster produces a report. What does said report tell us? The yen’s largely one way path lower took a dramatic turn that saw it rally by roughly 9% over just 3 weeks. The pricing fallout was everywhere – in curves, credit, correlation, convexity and carry. That’s a bunch of C’s, isn’t it. The cause of …

1
Vineer Bhansali, Founder and CIO, LongTail Alpha 50:23

10M ago50:23

50:23

Vineer Bhansali was recently among a small group of athletes who achieved the unthinkable, a 135 mile run in scorching heat, wind gusts and rain, all while traversing both the lowest and highest elevation points in North America. The Badwater 135 is considered the most difficult Ultra Marathon, an undertaking in which a guiding philosophy is, simpl…

1
Oliver Brennan, FX Volatility Strategist, BNP Paribas 53:13

10M ago53:13

53:13

Even if very short-lived, market vol episodes as protracted as that of Monday August 5th, demand our attention. In seeking some understanding of the why of successive 10% NKY moves and a 65 pre-open handle on the VIX, it was a pleasure to welcome Oliver Brennan to the Alpha Exchange. An FX vol strategist at BNP, Oliver brings theoretical training i…

1
Markets are Never Say Never 17:20

10M ago17:20

17:20

What a week in markets and one that should give us a lot to chew on with respect to how and why risk episodes materialize. There are certainly some conclusions at the ready and first and foremost is that vol is the only anti-fragile asset. In the trading action on Monday, August 5th, we see the reflexive nature of vol exposures and the manner in wh…

1
Dan Greenhaus, Chief Strategist, Solus Alternative Asset Management LP 55:18

10M ago55:18

55:18

With deep roots on the sell-side, serving in strategist roles at both Miller Tabak and BTIG, Dan Greenhaus is now Chief Strategist at Solus Asset Managment, a multi-billion dollar AuM firm with expertise in distressed and high yield investing. Our conversation considers economics in theory and practice, differentiating classic academic training fro…

1
Lisa O'Connor, Head of Global Model Portfolios & Co-CIO for Multi-Asset Solutions, BlackRock 40:27

11M ago40:27

40:27

With early career roots in both equity derivatives and relative value fixed income, Lisa O’Connor is now the Co-CIO of Multi-Strategy Assets and Solutions at BlackRock. Here she oversees her team’s development and delivery of a long only, systematic asset allocation process on behalf of the firm’s clients. Our discussion first considers some of the…

1
Man and Markets On Wire 15:36

11M ago15:36

15:36

“Walking on a tightrope” is an idiom that conjures the notion of danger – of exceptionally little margin of safety and of particularly significantconsequences should things not go as planned. Markets feel this way - asset prices are full, Sharpe ratios high, correlations low, political polarization intensifying. In this discussion, we review the re…

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