Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0470824905 ISBN 13: 9780470824900

Publisher: Wiley, 2011

The essential guide to financial instruments, logically presented

Fundamentals of Financial Instruments deals with the global financial markets and the instruments in which they trade. While most books on finance tend to be heavily mathematical, this book emphasizes the concepts in a logical, sequential fashion, introducing mathematical concepts only at the relevant times. As a result, the reader gains conceptual clarity reinforced by just the right level of technical detail to ensure a comprehensive exposure to the skills needed in the financial world.

• Establishes a strong foundation for understanding global markets
• Acts as an invaluable resource for those considering a career in the financial markets
• Offers an accessible yet in-depth treatise on modern financial instruments
• Presents a logical navigational path for a typical student of finance who is attempting to come to terms with the intricacies of the subject

Covering the fundamentals of various types of assets in a single volume, Fundamentals of Financial Instruments is a compact yet comprehensive one-stop reference for students and professionals in finance and economics.

From the Back Cover:

"This is a careful introduction to securities, securitized products, futures options and vanilla swaps covering their basic structure, market and trading and elementary pricing methods. It will appeal to readers requiring a gentle explanation of the fundamental concepts underlying the main classes of financial instruments, where every step is clearly illustrated by a simple numerical example. There are many specialized advanced mathematical texts on pricing and hedging financial instruments, but few other texts can compete with the clarity of Sunil Parameswaran's Fundamentals of Financial Instruments as an introduction to the general subject."
—Pofessor Carol Alexander, Chair of Financial Risk Management, ICMA Centre, Henley Business School at Reading Chair of the Board, Professional Risk Manager’s International Association

"his book is a comprehensive survey of financial instruments with illustrations to enable an assiduous reader to understand not only their definitions but also the mechanics and numerical implementation. It will prove a valuable reference."
—Professor Simon Benninga, Faculty of Management, Tel Aviv University

"The book contains an excellent and comprehensive coverage of all important financial products and instruments which are extensively used in financial markets. It provides the reader with the fundamentals of valuation, nature of the markets and a wide range of applications of these instruments. It will be a very useful text in MBA courses dealing with financial markets and instruments."
—Professor P.G. Apte, Professor, Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, India

From the Inside Flap:

Fundamentals of Financial Instruments is a comprehensive introduction to the full range of financial products commonly used in the financial markets. Author Sunil Parameswaran offers clear, worked examples of everything from basic equity and debt securities to complex instruments such as derivatives and mortgage-backed securities.

In addition to explaining the instruments, Parameswaran also outlines the structure and dynamics of the free-market system and clearly highlights the environment in which such financial instruments are traded.

Financial securities lend themselves naturally to a quantitative analysis. To ensure that readers, irrespective of their academic background, are able to navigate through the presentation, a detailed chapter is devoted to the topic of interest rates and the time value of money. Thereafter the focus shifts to the intricacies of various financial instruments, including:

• equity and preferred shares
• bonds
• money market instruments
• foreign exchange products
• derivatives
• mortgage-backed securities
• swaps.

The book is intended to serve as a standalone reference for market professionals and MBA students. It can also be used as a detailed reference for augmenting standard textbooks used in courses such as Financial Derivatives, Fixed Income Securities, and International Finance.