Symptoms And Symptoms Of Lyme Disease - 755 Words

Lyme disease is a bacterial illness that is transfused to humans via a bite from a tick infected with the disease. (Ticks are scientifically classified as Arachnida, a specific classification that also includes spiders.) The most common ticks known to carry Lyme disease are the Deer Tick and the Western Black-Legged Tick. The first manifestation of an infection is typically a rash, which may appear to resemble a bull s eye. The proliferation of the infection progressively brings on symptoms that include headache, fever, muscle and joint pain, fatigue and stiffness of the neck. Lyme disease goes undiagnosed because of the size of these ticks being the size of a peppercorn and unobserved by person that was bitten. In addition, numerous symptoms are like those of the flu and other bacterial infections. Laboratory evaluations may help facilitate at this stage, but may not always give a clear diagnosis. (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, 2016). Discussion topic s will consist of casual agents including a brief history, characteristics and means of infection from Lyme disease. Epidemiology comprised of the geographical distribution along with persons with prevalent risk factors of contracting Lyme disease. Also included will be how Lyme disease is transmitted and the pathogenesis of the bacterial agent. Signs, symptoms, and complications caused by Lyme disease. What the conclusion looks like for a person whom has been diagnosed along with treatmentShow MoreRelatedSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1454 Words   |  6 PagesIntroduction Lyme disease has been the most commonly reported vector-borne illness in the United States since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention started reporting it in 1991 [1]. It should be noted that Lyme disease does not occur everywhere in the US, and is heavily concentrated in upper Midwest and northeast United States [1]. This report has been compiled to provide recommendations for antimicrobial prophylactic treatment of Lyme disease once a patient encounters a tick bite. Lyme diseaseRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1485 Words   |  6 Pagesspreading to become the most common vector-borne disease that occurs in the Northern Hemisphere, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. This â€Å"hidden pandemic†, known as Lyme disease, is silently infecting hundreds of thousands of United States citizens each year, and numbers of new and untreated infections continue to climb as traditional treatments fail and doctors misdiagnose the condition. Spread by tick bites, Lyme disease has affected many lives and continues to infect countlessRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1997 Words   |  8 PagesIntroduction Lyme Disease is the number one tick-borne disease in the United States and in Massachusetts. It is considered a vector disease because it is spread through the bite of a black-legged tick (also known as a deer tick) that carries the bacterium, Borrelia burgdorferi. Lyme was first diagnosed in 1975 in Lyme, CT and the bacterium that causes Lyme was discovered in 1982 by Willy Burgdorfer (Todar, 2012, p. 1). Lyme disease spreads rapidly and can impact many different organ systemsRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1770 Words   |  8 Pages Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne disease in the United States. Despite this, adequate prevention is lacking and treatment measures are sometimes inadequate. Vaccinations for Lyme disease developed in the late 1990’s have since been withdrawn from the market, and research is currently underway to create a new vaccine. Educational programs have proven to show an increase in protective behaviors to prevent tick bites and tick-borne illnesses through increased knowledge of repellent useRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1598 Words   |  7 Pagesntroduction Lyme disease has been the most commonly reported vector-borne illness in the United States since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention started reporting it in 1991 [1]. It should be noted that Lyme disease does not occur everywhere in the US, and is heavily concentrated in upper Midwest and northeast United States [1]. This report has been compiled to provide recommendations for antimicrobial prophylactic treatment of Lyme disease once a patient encounters a tick bite. Lyme diseaseRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1897 Words   |  8 PagesBackground: Definition of the condition: Lyme disease is named after the town of Old Lyme in Connecticut, where the first cases of Lyme disease (LD) were discovered in 1975. About twelve children, who lived in the same area of this town, were diagnosed with arthritis which was discovered to be caused by Lyme disease (Levi et al., 2012). In 1982, a scientist named Willy Burgdorfer and his coworkers, established the link between ticks and the transmission of Borralis bacteria which is proven to resultRead MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease2008 Words   |  9 Pagesâ€Å"Lyme disease is caused by the spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi and is transmitted to humans by the bite of infected blacklegged ticks (Ixodes spp.). Early manifestations of infection include fever, headache, fatigue, and a characteristic skin rash called erythema migrans. Left untreated, late manifestations involving the joints, heart, and nervous system can occur. A Healthy People 2010 objective (14-8) is to reduce the annual incidence of Lyme disease to 9.7 new cases per 100,000 population in 10Read MoreSymptoms And Treatment Of Lyme Disease1710 Words   |  7 PagesaIntroduction Lyme disease has been the most commonly reported vector-borne illness in the United States since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention started reporting it in 19911. It should be noted that Lyme disease does not occur everywhere in the US, and is heavily concentrated in upper Midwest and northeast United States1. This report has been compiled to provide recommendations for antimicrobial prophylactic treatment of Lyme disease once a patient encounters a tick bite. Lyme disease is causedRead MoreLong Term Antibiotic Treatment Of Persistent Symptoms Attributed Lyme Disease2057 Words   |  9 PagesThe research question of this study was to determine if longer-term antibiotic treatment of persistent symptoms attributed to Lyme disease resulted in a better outcome than shorter-term antibiotic treatment1. Evaluate the review of related research. How well did the authors provide a context for the current research in light of previous literature and gaps in current literature and knowledge? In the introduction, the authors indicate that previous randomized, clinical trials have not provided sufficientRead MoreLyme Disease : A Rapidly Spreading Infectious Disease1666 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction Lyme disease is a rapidly spreading infectious disease in the United States, with over 25,000 confirmed cases in 2013.5 It was first discovered in the early-1970’s in the town of Lyme, Connecticut when a group of children started to present with rheumatoid arthritis symptoms. Some of these children presented with a rash and researchers connected the symptoms to occurring during peak tick season. By the mid-1970’s, the researchers began describing the symptoms and coining the term â€Å"Lyme disease†

Anomalies in Option Pricing Free Essays

string(185) " shrewd investors will go short the first and long the second; that is, they will write calls and sell bonds \(borrow\), while simultaneously buying both puts and the underlying stock\." Anomalies in option pricing: the Black-Scholes model revisited New England Economic Review, March-April, 1996 by Peter Fortune This study is the third in a series of Federal Reserve Bank of Boston studies contributing to a broader understanding of derivative securities. The first (Fortune 1995) presented the rudiments of option pricing theory and addressed the equivalence between exchange-traded options and portfolios of underlying securities, making the point that plain vanilla options – and many other derivative securities – are really repackages of old instruments, not novel in themselves. That paper used the concept of portfolio insurance as an example of this equivalence. We will write a custom essay sample on Anomalies in Option Pricing or any similar topic only for you Order Now The second (Minehan and Simons 1995) summarized the presentations at â€Å"Managing Risk in the ’90s: What Should You Be Asking about Derivatives? â€Å", an educational forum sponsored by the Boston Fed. Related Results Trust, E-innovation and Leadership in Change Foreign Banks in United States Since World War II: A Useful Fringe Building Your Brand With Brand Line Extensions The Impact of the Structure of Debt on Target Gains Project Management Standard Program. The present paper addresses the question of how well the best-known option pricing model – the Black-Scholes model – works. A full evaluation of the many option pricing models developed since their seminal paper in 1973 is beyond the scope of this paper. Rather, the goal is to acquaint a general audience with the key characteristics of a model that is still widely used, and to indicate the opportunities for improvement which might emerge from current research and which are undoubtedly the basis for the considerable current research on derivative securities. The hope is that this study will be useful to students of financial markets as well as to financial market practitioners, and that it will stimulate them to look into the more recent literature on the subject. The paper is organized as follows. The next section briefly reviews the key features of the Black-Scholes model, identifying some of its most prominent assumptions and laying a foundation for the remainder of the paper. The second section employs recent data on almost one-half million options transactions to evaluate the Black-Scholes model. The third section discusses some of the reasons why the Black-Scholes odel falls short and assesses some recent research designed to improve our ability to explain option prices. The paper ends with a brief summary. Those readers unfamiliar with the basics of stock options might refer to Fortune (1995). Box 1 reviews briefly the fundamental language of options and explains the notation used in the paper. I. The Black-Scholes Model In 1973, Myron Scholes and the late Fischer Black published their seminal paper on option pricing (Black and Scholes 1973). The Black-Scholes model revolutionized financial economics in several ways. First, it contributed to our understanding of a wide range of contracts with option-like features. For example, the call feature in corporate and municipal bonds is clearly an option, as is the refinancing privilege in mortgages. Second, it allowed us to revise our understanding of traditional financial instruments. For example, because shareholders can turn the company over to creditors if it has negative net worth, corporate debt can be viewed as a put option bought by the shareholders from creditors. The Black-Scholes model explains the prices on European options, which cannot be exercised before the expiration date. Box 2 summarizes the Black-Scholes model for pricing a European call option on which dividends are paid continuously at a constant rate. A crucial feature of the model is that the call option is equivalent to a portfolio constructed from the underlying stock and bonds. The â€Å"option-replicating portfolio† consists of a fractional share of the stock combined with borrowing a specific amount at the riskless rate of interest. This equivalence, developed more fully in Fortune (1995), creates price relationships which are maintained by the arbitrage of informed traders. The Black-Scholes option pricing model is derived by identifying an option-replicating portfolio, then equating the option’s premium with the value of that portfolio. An essential assumption of this pricing model is that investors arbitrage away any profits created by gaps in asset pricing. For example, if the call is trading â€Å"rich,† investors will write calls and buy the replicating portfolio, thereby forcing the prices back into line. If the option is trading low, traders will buy the option and short the option-replicating portfolio (that is, sell stocks and buy bonds in the correct proportions). By doing so, traders take advantage of riskless opportunities to make profits, and in so doing they force option, stock, and bond prices to conform to an equilibrium relationship. Arbitrage allows European puts to be priced using put-call parity. Consider purchasing one call that expires at time T and lending the present value of the strike price at the riskless rate of interest. The cost is [C. sub. t] + X[e. sup. -r(T-t)]. (See Box 1 for notation: C is the call premium, X is the call’s strike price, r is the riskless interest rate, T is the call’s expiration date, and t is the current date. At the option’s expiration the position is worth the highest of the stock price ([S. sub. T]) or the strike price, a value denoted as max([S. sub. T], X). Now consider another investment, purchasing one put with the same strike price as the call, plus buying the fraction [e. sup. -q(T-t)] of one share of the stock. Denoting the put premium by P and the stock price by S, then the cost of this is [P. sub. t] + [e. sup. -q(T-t)][S. sub. t], and, at time T, the value at this position is also max([S. sub. T], X). (1) Because both positions have the same terminal value, arbitrage will force them to have the same initial value. Suppose that [C. sub. t] + X[e. sup. -r(T-t)] [greater than] [P. sub. t] + [e. sup. -q(T-t)][S. sub. t], for example. In this case, the cost of the first position exceeds the cost of the second, but both must be worth the same at the option’s expiration. The first position is overpriced relative to the second, and shrewd investors will go short the first and long the second; that is, they will write calls and sell bonds (borrow), while simultaneously buying both puts and the underlying stock. You read "Anomalies in Option Pricing" in category "Papers" The result will be that, in equilibrium, equality will prevail and [C. sub. t] + X[e. sup. r(T-t)] = [P. sub. t] + [e. sup. -q(T-t)][S. sub. t]. Thus, arbitrage will force a parity between premiums of put and call options. Using this put-call parity, it can be shown that the premium for a European put option paying a continuous dividend at q percent of the stock price is: [P. sub. t] = -[e. sup. -q(T-t)][S. sub. t]N(-[d. sub. 1]) + X[e. sup. -r(T-t)]N(-[d. sub. 2]) where [d. sub. 1] and [d. sub. 2] are defined as in Box 2. The importance of arbitrage in the pricing of options is clear. However, many option pricing models can be derived from the assumption of complete arbitrage. Each would differ according to the probability distribution of the price of the underlying asset. What makes the Black-Scholes model unique is that it assumes that stock prices are log-normally distributed, that is, that the logarithm of the stock price is normally distributed. This is often expressed in a â€Å"diffusion model† (see Box 2) in which the (instantaneous) rate of change in the stock price is the sum of two parts, a â€Å"drift,† defined as the difference between the expected rate of change in the stock price and the dividend yield, and â€Å"noise,† defined as a random variable with zero mean and constant variance. The variance of the noise is called the â€Å"volatility† of the stock’s rate of price change. Thus, the rate of change in a stock price vibrates randomly around its expected value in a fashion sometimes called â€Å"white noise. † The Black-Scholes models of put and call option pricing apply directly to European options as long as a continuous dividend is paid at a constant rate. If no dividends are paid, the models also apply to American call options, which can be exercised at any time. In this case, it can be shown that there is no incentive for early exercise, hence the American call option must trade like its European counterpart. However, the Black-Scholes model does not hold for American put options, because these might be exercised early, nor does it apply to any American option (put or call) when a dividend is paid. (2) Our empirical analysis will sidestep those problems by focusing on European-style options, which cannot be exercised early. A call option’s intrinsic value is defined as max(S – X,0), that is, the largest of S – X or zero; a put option’s intrinsic value is max(X – S,0). When the stock price (S) exceeds a call option’s strike price (X), or falls short of a put option’s strike price, the option has a positive intrinsic value because if it could be immediately exercised, the holder would receive a gain of S – X for a call, or X – S for a put. However, if S [less than] X, the holder of a call will not exercise the option and it has no intrinsic value; if X [greater than] S this will be true for a put. The intrinsic value of a call is the kinked line in Figure 1 (a put’s intrinsic value, not shown, would have the opposite kink). When the stock price exceeds the strike price, the call option is said to be in-the-money. It is out-of-the-money when the stock price is below the strike price. Thus, the kinked line, or intrinsic value, is the income from immediately exercising the option: When the option is out-of-the-money, its intrinsic value is zero, and when it is in the money, the intrinsic value is the amount by which S exceeds X. Convexity, the Call Premium, and the Greek Chorus The premium, or price paid for the option, is shown by the curved line in Figure 1. This curvature, or â€Å"convexity,† is a key characteristic of the premium on a call option. Figure 1 shows the relationship between a call option’s premium and the underlying stock price for a hypothetical option having a 60-day term, a strike price of $50, and a volatility of 20 percent. A 5 percent riskless interest rate is assumed. The call premium has an upward-sloping relationship with the stock price, and the slope rises as the stock price rises. This means that the sensitivity of the call premium to changes in the stock price is not constant and that the option-replicating portfolio changes with the stock price. The convexity of option premiums gives rise to a number of technical concepts which describe the response of the premium to changes in the variables and parameters of the model. For example, the relationship between the premium and the stock price is captured by the option’s Delta ([Delta]) and its Gamma ([Gamma]). Defined as the slope of the premium at each stock price, the Delta tells the trader how sensitive the option price is to a change in the stock price. (3) It also tells the trader the value of the hedging ratio. (4) For each share of stock held, a perfect hedge requires writing 1/[[Delta]. ub. c] call options or buying 1/[[Delta]. sub. p] puts. Figure 2 shows the Delta for our hypothetical call option as a function of the stock price. As S increases, the value of Delta rises until it reaches its maximum at a stock price of about $60, or $10 in-the-money. After that point, the option premium and the stock price have a 1:1 relationship. The increasing Delta also means that the hedging ratio falls as the stock price rises. At higher stock prices, fewer call options need to be written to insulate the investor from changes in the stock price. The Gamma is the change in the Delta when the stock price changes. (5) Gamma is positive for calls and negative for puts. The Gamma tells the trader how much the hedging ratio changes if the stock price changes. If Gamma is zero, Delta would be independent of S and changes in S would not require adjustment of the number of calls required to hedge against further changes in S. The greater is Gamma, the more â€Å"out-of-line† a hedge becomes when the stock price changes, and the more frequently the trader must adjust the hedge. Figure 2 shows the value of Gamma as a function of the amount by which our hypothetical call option is in-the-money. (6) Gamma is almost zero for deep-in-the-money and deep-out-of-the-money options, but it reaches a peak for near-the-money options. In short, traders holding near-the-money options will have to adjust their hedges frequently and sizably as the stock price vibrates. If traders want to go on long vacations without changing their hedges, they should focus on far-away-from-the-money options, which have near-zero Gammas. A third member of the Greek chorus is the option’s Lambda, denoted by [Lambda], also called Vega. (7) Vega measures the sensitivity of the call premium to changes in volatility. The Vega is the same for calls and puts having the same strike price and expiration date. As Figure 2 shows, a call option’s Vega conforms closely to the pattern of its Gamma, peaking for near-the-money options and falling to zero for deep-out or deep-in options. Thus, near-the-money options appear to be most sensitive to changes in volatility. Because an option’s premium is directly related to its volatility – the higher the volatility, the greater the chance of it being deep-in-the-money at expiration – any propositions about an option’s price can be translated into statements about the option’s volatility, and vice versa. For example, other things equal, a high volatility is synonymous with a high option premium for both puts and calls. Thus, in many contexts we can use volatility and premium interchangeably. We will use this result below when we address an option’s implied volatility. Other Greeks are present in the Black-Scholes pantheon, though they are lesser gods. The option’s Rho ([Rho]) is the sensitivity of the call premium to changes in the riskless interest rate. (8) Rho is always positive for a call (negative for a put) because a rise in the interest rate reduces the present value of the strike price paid (or received) at expiration if the option is exercised. The option’s Theta ([Theta]) measures the change in the premium as the term shortens by one time unit. (9) Theta is always negative because an option is less valuable the shorter the time remaining. The Black-Scholes Assumptions The assumptions underlying the Black-Scholes model are few, but strong. They are: * Arbitrage: Traders can, and will, eliminate any arbitrage profits by simultaneously buying (or writing) options and writing (or buying) the option-replicating portfolio whenever profitable opportunities appear. * Continuous Trading: Trading in both the option and the underlying security is continuous in time, that is, transactions can occur simultaneously in related markets at any instant. * Leverage: Traders can borrow or lend in unlimited amounts at the riskless rate of interest. Homogeneity: Traders agree on the values of the relevant parameters, for example, on the riskless rate of interest and on the volatility of the returns on the underlying security. * Distribution: The price of the underlying security is log-normally distributed with statistically independent price changes, and with constant mean and constant variance. * Continuous Prices: No discontinuous jumps occur in the price of the underlying security. * Transactions Costs: The cost of engaging in arbitrage is negligibly small. The arbitrage assumption, a fundamental proposition in economics, has been discussed above. The continuous trading assumption ensures that at all times traders can establish hedges by simultaneously trading in options and in the underlying portfolio. This is important because the Black-Scholes model derives its power from the assumption that at any instant, arbitrage will force an option’s premium to be equal to the value of the replicating portfolio. This cannot be done if trading occurs in one market while trading in related markets is barred or delayed. For example, during a halt in trading of the underlying security one would not expect option premiums to conform to the Black-Scholes model. This would also be true if the underlying security were inactively traded, so that the trader had â€Å"stale† information on its price when contemplating an options transaction. The leverage assumption allows the riskless interest rate to be used in options pricing without reference to a trader’s financial position, that is, to whether and how much he is borrowing or lending. Clearly this is an assumption adopted for convenience and is not strictly true. However, it is not clear how one would proceed if the rate on loans was related to traders’ financial choices. This assumption is common to finance theory: For example, it is one of the assumptions of the Capital Asset Pricing Model. Furthermore, while private traders have credit risk, important players in the option markets, such as nonfinancial corporations and major financial institutions, have very low credit risk over the lifetime of most options (a year or less), suggesting that departures from this assumption might not be very important. The homogeneity assumption, that traders share the same probability beliefs and opportunities, flies in the face of common sense. Clearly, traders differ in their judgments of such important things as the volatility of an asset’s future returns, and they also differ in their time horizons, some thinking in hours, others in days, and still others in weeks, months, or years. Indeed, much of the actual trading that occurs must be due to differences in these judgments, for otherwise there would be no disagreements with â€Å"the market† and financial markets would be pretty dull and uninteresting. The distribution assumption is that stock prices are generated by a specific statistical process, called a diffusion process, which leads to a normal distribution of the logarithm of the stock’s price. Furthermore, the continuous price assumption means that any changes in prices that are observed reflect only different draws from the same underlying log-normal distribution, not a change in the underlying probability distribution itself. II. Tests of the Black-Scholes Model. Assessments of a model’s validity can be done in two ways. First, the model’s predictions can be confronted with historical data to determine whether the predictions are accurate, at least within some statistical standard of confidence. Second, the assumptions made in developing the model can be assessed to determine if they are consistent with observed behavior or historical data. A long tradition in economics focuses on the first type of tests, arguing that â€Å"the proof is in the pudding. It is argued that any theory requires assumptions that might be judged â€Å"unrealistic,† and that if we focus on the assumptions, we can end up with no foundations for deriving the generalizations that make theories useful. The only proper test of a theory lies in its predictive ability: The theory that consistently predicts best is the best theory, regardless of the assumptions required to generate the theory. Tests based on assumptions are justified by the principle of â€Å"garbage in-garbage out. † This approach argues that no theory derived from invalid assumptions can be valid. Even if it appears to have predictive abilities, those can slip away quickly when changes in the eThe Data The data used in this study are from the Chicago Board Options Exchange’s Market Data Retrieval System. The MDR reports the number of contracts traded, the time of the transaction, the premium paid, the characteristics of the option (put or call, expiration date, strike price), and the price of the underlying stock at its last trade. This information is available for each option listed on the CBOE, providing as close to a real-time record of transactions as can be found. While our analysis uses only records of actual transactions, the MDR also reports the same information for every request of a quote. Quote records differ from the transaction records only in that they show both the bid and asked premiums and have a zero number of contracts traded. nvironment make the invalid assumptions more pivotal. The data used are for the 1992-94 period. We selected the MDR data for the SP 500-stock index (SPX) for several reasons. First, the SPX options contract is the only European-style stock index option traded on the CBOE. All options on individual stocks and on other indices (for example, the SP 100 index, the Major Market Index, the NASDAQ 100 index) are American options for which the Black-Scholes model would not apply. The ability to focus on a European-style option has several advantages. By allowing us to ignore the potential influence of early exercise, a possibility that significantly affects the premiums on American options on dividend-paying stocks as well as the premiums on deep-in-the-money American put options, we can focus on options for which the Black-Scholes model was designed. In addition, our interest is not in individual stocks and their options, but in the predictive power of the Black-Scholes option pricing model. Thus, an index option allows us to make broader generalizations about model performance than would a select set of equity options. Finally, the SP 500 index options trade in a very active market, while options on many individual stocks and on some other indices are thinly traded. The full MDR data set for the SPX over the roughly 758 trading days in the 1992-94 period consisted of more than 100 million records. In order to bring this down to a manageable size, we eliminated all records that were requests for quotes, selecting only records reflecting actual transactions. Some of these transaction records were cancellations of previous trades, for example, trades made in error. If a trade was canceled, we included the records of the original transaction because they represented market conditions at the time of the trade, and because there is no way to determine precisely which transaction was being canceled. We eliminated cancellations because they record the SP 500 at the time of the cancellation, not the time of the original trade. Thus, cancellation records will contain stale prices. This screening created a data set with over 726,000 records. In order to complete the data required for each transaction, the bond-equivalent yield (average of bid and asked prices) on the Treasury bill with maturity closest to the expiration date of the option was used as a riskless interest rate. These data were available for 180-day terms or less, so we excluded options with a term longer than 180 days, leaving over 486,000 usable records having both CBOE and Treasury bill data. For each of these, we assigned a dividend yield based on the SP 500 dividend yield in the month of the option trade. Because each record shows the actual SP 500 at almost the same time as the option transaction, the MDR provides an excellent basis for estimating the theoretically correct option premium and evaluating its relationship to actual option premiums. There are, however, some minor problems with interpreting the MDR data as providing a trader’s-eye view of option pricing. The transaction data are not entered into the CBOE computer at the exact moment of the trade. Instead, a ticket is filled out and then entered into the computer, and it is only at that time that the actual level of the SP 500 is recorded. In short, the SP 500 entries necessarily lag behind the option premium entries, so if the SP 500 is rising (falling) rapidly, the reported value of the SPX will be above (below) the true value known to traders at the time of the transaction Test 1: An Implied Volatility Test A key variable in the Black-Scholes model is the volatility of returns on the underlying asset, the SPX in our case. Investors are assumed to know the true standard deviation of the rate of return over the term of the option, and this information is embedded in the option premium. While the true volatility is an unobservable variable, the market’s estimate of it can be inferred from option premiums. The Black-Scholes model assumes that this â€Å"implied volatility† is an optimal forecast of the volatility in SPX returns observed over the term of the option. The calculation of an option’s implied volatility is reasonably straightforward. Six variables are needed to compute the predicted premium on a call or put option using the Black-Scholes model. Five of these can be objectively measured within reasonable tolerance levels: the stock price (S), the strike price (X), the remaining life of the option (T – t), the riskless rate of interest over the remaining life of the option (r), typically measured by the rate of interest on U. S. Treasury securities that mature on the option’s expiration date, and the dividend yield (q). The sixth variable, the â€Å"volatility† of the return on the stock price, denoted by [Sigma], is unobservable and must be estimated using numerical methods. Using reasonable values of all the known variables, the implied volatility of an option can be computed as the value of [Sigma] that makes the predicted Black-Scholes premium exactly equal to the actual premium. An example of the computation of the implied volatility on an option is shown in Box 3. The Black-Scholes model assumes that investors know the volatility of the rate of return on the underlying asset, and that this volatility is measured by the (population) standard deviation. If so, an option’s implied volatility should differ from the true volatility only because of random events. While these discrepancies might occur, they should be very short-lived and random: Informed investors will observe the discrepancy and engage in arbitrage, which quickly returns things to their normal relationships. Figure 3 reports two measures of the volatility in the rate of return on the SP 500 index for each trading day in the 1992-94 period. (10) The â€Å"actual† volatility is the ex post standard deviation of the daily change in the logarithm of the SP 500 over a 60-day horizon, converted to a percentage at an annual rate. For example, for January 5, 1993 the standard deviation of the daily change in lnSP500 was computed for the next 60 calendar days; this became the actual volatility for that day. Note that the actual volatility is the realization of one outcome from the entire probability distribution of the standard deviation of the rate of return. While no single realization will be equal to the â€Å"true† volatility, the actual volatility should equal the true volatility, â€Å"on average. † The second measure of volatility is the implied volatility. This was constructed as follows, using the data described above. For each trading day, the implied volatility on call options meeting two criteria was computed. The criteria were that the option had 45 to 75 calendar days to expiration (the average was 61 days) and that it be near the money (defined as a spread between SP 500 and strike price no more than 2. 5 percent of the SP 500). The first criterion was adopted to match the term of the implied volatility with the 60-day term of the actual volatility. The second criterion was chosen because, as we shall see later, near-the-money options are most likely to conform to Black-Scholes predictions. The Black-Scholes model assumes that an option’s implied volatility is an optimal forecast of the volatility in SPX returns observed over the term of the option. Figure 3 does not provide visual support for the idea that implied volatilities deviate randomly from actual volatility, a characteristic of optimal forecasting. While the two volatility measures appear to have roughly the same average, extended periods of significant differences are seen. For example, in the last half of 1992 the implied volatility remained well above the actual volatility, and after the two came together in the first half of 1993, they once again diverged for an extended period. It is clear from this visual record that implied volatility does not track actual volatility well. However, this does not mean that implied volatility provides an inferior forecast of actual volatility: It could be that implied volatility satisfies all the scientific requirements of a good forecast in the sense that no other forecasts of actual volatility are better. In order to pursue the question of the informational content of implied volatility, several simple tests of the hypothesis that implied volatility is an optimal forecast of actual volatility can be applied. One characteristic of an optimal forecast is that the forecast should be unbiased, that is, the forecast error (actual volatility less implied volatility) should have a zero mean. The average forecast error for the data shown in Figure 3 is -0. 7283, with a t-statistic of -8. 22. This indicates that implied volatility is a biased forecast of actual volatility. A second characteristic of an optimal forecast is that the forecast error should not depend on any information available at the time the forecast is made. If information were available that would improve the forecast, the forecaster should have already included it in making his forecast. Any remaining forecasting errors should be random and uncorrelated with information available before the day of the forecast. To implement this â€Å"residual information test,† the forecast error was regressed on the lagged values of the SP 500 in the three days prior to the forecast. 11) The F-statistic for the significance of the regression coefficients was 4. 20, with a significance level of 0. 2 percent. This is strong evidence of a statistically significant violation of the residual information test. The conclusion that implied volatility is a poor forecast of actual volatility has been reached in several other studies using different methods and data. For example, Canina and Figlewski ( 1993), using data for the SP 100 in the years 1983 to 1987, found that implied volatility had almost no informational content as a prediction of actual volatility. However, a recent review of the literature on implied volatility (Mayhew 1995) mentions a number of papers that give more support for the forecasting ability of implied volatility. Test 2: The Smile Test One of the predictions of the Black-Scholes model is that at any moment all SPX options that differ only in the strike price (having the same term to expiration) should have the same implied volatility. For example, suppose that at 10:15 a. m. on November 3, transactions occur in several SPX call options that differ only in the strike price. Because each of the options is for the same interval of time, the value of volatility embedded in the option premiums should be the same. This is a natural consequence of the fact that the variability in the SP 500’s return over any future period is independent of the strike price of an SPX option. One approach to testing this is to calculate the implied volatilities on a set of options identical in all respects except the strike price. If the Black-Scholes model is valid, the implied volatilities should all be the same (with some slippage for sampling errors). Thus, if a group of options all have a â€Å"true† volatility of, say, 12 percent, we should find that the implied volatilities differ from the true level only because of random errors. Possible reasons for these errors are temporary deviations of premiums from equilibrium levels, or a lag in the reporting of the trade so that the value of the SPX at the time stamp is not the value at the time of the trade, or that two options might have the same time stamp but one was delayed more than the other in getting into the computer. This means that a graph of the implied volatilities against any economic variable should show a flat line. In particular, no relationship should exist between the implied volatilities and the strike price or, equivalently, the amount by which each option is â€Å"in-the-money. † However, it is widely believed that a â€Å"smile† is present in option prices, that is, options far out of the money or far in the money have higher implied volatilities than near-the-money options. Stated differently, deep-out and far-in options trade â€Å"rich† (overpriced) relative to near-the-money options. If true, this would make a graph of the implied volatilities against the value by which the option is in-the-money look like a smile: high implied volatilities at the extremes and lower volatilities in the middle. In order to test this hypothesis, our MDR data were screened for each day to identify any options that have the same characteristics but different strike [TABULAR DATA FOR TABLE 1 OMITTED] prices. If 10 or more of these â€Å"identical† options were found, the average implied volatility for the group was computed and the deviation of each option’s implied volatility from its group average, the Volatility Spread, was computed. For each of these options, the amount by which it is in-the-money was computed, creating a variable called ITM (an acronym for in-the-money). ITM is the amount by which an option is in-the-money. It is negative when the option is out-of-the-money. ITM is measured relative to the SP 500 index level, so it is expressed as a percentage of the SP 500. The Volatility Spread was then regressed against a fifth-order polynomial equation in ITM. This allows for a variety of shapes of the relationship between the two variables, ranging from a flat line if Black-Scholes is valid (that is, if all coefficients are zero), through a wavy line with four peaks and troughs. The Black-Scholes prediction that each coefficient in the polynomial regression is zero, leading to a flat line, can be tested by the F-statistic for the regression. The results are reported in Table 1, which shows the F-statistic for the hypothesis that all coefficients of the fifth-degree polynomial are jointly zero. Also reported is the proportion of the variation in the Volatility Spreads, which is explained by variations in ITM ([R. sup. 2]). The results strongly reject the Black-Scholes model. The F-statistics are extremely high, indicating virtually no chance that the value of ITM is irrelevant to the explanation of implied volatilities. The values of [R. sup. 2] are also high, indicating that ITM explains about 40 to 60 percent of the variation in the Volatility Spread. Figure 4 shows, for call options only, the pattern of the relationship between the Volatility Spread and the amount by which an option is in-the-money. The vertical axis, labeled Volatility Spread, is the deviation of the implied volatility predicted by the polynomial regression from the group mean of implied volatilities for all options trading on the same day with the same expiration date. For each year the pattern is shown throughout that year’s range of values for ITM. While the pattern for each year looks more like Charlie Brown’s smile than the standard smile, it is clear that there is a smile in the implied volatilities: Options that are further in or out of the money appear to carry higher volatilities than slightly out-of-the-money options. The pattern for extreme values of ITM is more mixed. Test 3: A Put-Call Parity Test Another prediction of the Black-Scholes model is that put options and call options identical in all other respects should have the same implied volatilities and should trade at the same premium. This is a consequence of the arbitrage that enforces put-call parity. Recall that put-call parity implies [P. sub. t] + [e. sup. -q(T – t)][S. sub. t] = [C. sub. t] + [Xe. sup. -r(T – t)]. A put and a call, having identical strike prices and terms, should have equal premiums if they are just at-the-money in a present value sense. If, as this paper does, we interpret at-the-money in current dollars rather than present value (that is, as S = X rather than S = [Xe. sup. -r(t – q)(T – t)]), at-the-money puts should have a premium slightly below calls. Because an option’s premium is a direct function of its volatility, the requirement that put premiums be no greater than call premiums for equivalent at-the-money options implies that implied volatilities for puts be no greater than for calls. For each trading day in the 1992-94 period, the difference between implied volatilities for at-the-money puts and calls having the same expiration dates was computed, using the [+ or -]2. 5 percent criterion used above. (12) Figure 5 shows this difference. While puts sometimes have implied volatility less than calls, the norm is for higher implied volatilities for puts. Thus, puts tend to trade â€Å"richer† than equivalent calls, and the Black-Scholes model does not pass this put-call parity test. How to cite Anomalies in Option Pricing, Papers

The One Percent Research Paper free essay sample

The documentary deals with the disparity between the wealthy elite and the citizenry and how they are both so far removed from one another. â€Å"As of 2010, the top 1% of households (the upper class) owned 35. 4% of all privately held wealth. † (Domhoff, 2010, The Wealth Distribution, para. 1). The producer and interviewer presents this film through many wealthy American businessmen, critics, economists and even his own family to explain this major social gap that exists on our home front. When looking at the differences side-by-side, it is hard to grasp that we all live in the same place, the United States of America. The film was created by Jamie Johnson, the heir to one of America’s most affluent families. Being born with a â€Å"silver spoon,† Jamie never really had anything to worry about in life from private schools to private jets, equestrian clubs and charitable dinner parties. But, he always felt something was missing in his life and he couldn’t quite put a finger on it. We will write a custom essay sample on The One Percent Research Paper or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The fortune that Jamie inherited on his 21st birthday was from one of the wealthiest family-owned companies in the United States, Johnson and Johnson. THE ONE PERCENTPage 3 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 His great grandfather â€Å"started the company in 1886† (Johnson and Johnson, 1997) and it continued to grow well beyond imagination. Jamie would always wonder what made him deserve this prosperous lifestyle. After self-examination, Jamie was determined to investigate some of the questions haunting him in his head about the wealth disparity in America. Attempting to bring his mind to ease, he decided to create this documentary, â€Å"The One Percent. † Within the first few minutes of the film I noticed a sign labeled â€Å"Private Property Members Only. To me the sign is showing how the wealthy pride themselves in being part of such an elite club. Meanwhile, on the other side of the spectrum, the working class feel like they are not truly part of society at all. In the beginning of the documentary you see the Johnson’s having a family meeting. At first it looks normal, but they are not discussing chores around the house. It is a â€Å"family meeting† with their financial wealth and money management advisors. The meeting is centered on managing their wealth and assets and essentially turning their millions in to more millions. The consensus from the advisors is that every year the family fortune tenfold and they continue to become richer and richer. Jamie seems to be upsetting his father with the making of this documentary and the advisors seem hesitant to talk about money and wealth on camera. THE ONE PERCENTPage 4 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 His father’s initial reaction is that his son’s documentary is nonsense, but something that might have a huge ripple effect if taken seriously. Jamie does a great job trying to get answers and asking difficult questions to the wealthy elite of America. The footage he presents is of people giving their most honest views and thoughts and it is evident there is a huge gap between the wealthy and the poor. Jamie Johnson interviewed numerous people within different social classes. They ranged from Milton Freedman and Steve Forbes, who owns his own private cruise ship, to some local residents of the south side of Chicago, who live in poverty without locks on their mailboxes. Jamie is presenting the social gap with visuals broken down buildings compared to mansions, a homeless man asking for money compared to fancy beach resorts and post hurricane Katrina victims with private country clubs. A poignant moment that stood out to me in the documentary was when Jamie interviewed Nicole Buffet, the granddaughter of Warren Buffet through marriage (his son Peter’s ex-wife’s daughter. ) It was comforting to watch and I feel even Jamie felt a sense of self-awareness as he interviewed the young female. She seemed so confident in who she was but most of all peaceful, content and happy with the simple things in life. In this situation, you can see money seems to be the root of all evil. Even to the point of ridding someone of your family that has great memories of you. THE ONE PERCENTPage 5 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 She talked of her â€Å"grandpa† as the loving man she knows him as (not as multimillion dollar business man. ) In response to her participation in the documentary, he wrote to her â€Å"I have not emotionally or legally adopted you as a grandchild, nor have the rest of my family adopted you as a niece of cousin. † (Schroeder, 2008, p. 976) He disclaims her as a granddaughter despite all the good she says about him just because of her role in the film. People argue that Buffet was not out of place because Nicole was adopted or a step child and was not part of his immediate family. I thought the same until I stumbled upon an article written in The Wall Street Journal. The article stated â€Å"Susan Buffett, Warrens first wife, who died in 2004, named Nicole in her will as one of her adored grandchildren and left her $100,000. She added that Nicole shall have the same status and benefits as if they were children of my son, Peter A. Buffett. † Also, â€Å"a source close to the family says Nicole spent very little time with Warren Buffett over the years but that he paid for Nicoles school and living expenses until she was 28. Nicole says that Mr. Buffetts reaction may have reflected his philosophy about wealth. Sharing my experience as a Buffett was stepping outside the box, she says. † (Frank, R. 2008). Another part of the film that stood out to me is when Jamie interviewed the taxi cab driver and I did like what the man had to say. He said, â€Å"My family is one of the richest families in the world, but not with money. With love, kindness, tolerance and patience. Qualities that are worth more than money and you can’t buy that. † THE ONE PERCENTPage 6 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 This showed the much clear distinction in values between the rich and the working class. Comparing what the taxi driver had said to the values of Warren Buffet who wrote his granddaughter disclaiming because she did not support the family lifestyle, which would you prefer? Watching this documentary I came to find that with money also comes a fear of losing that money and becoming consumed by it. Along with money comes the changing of your values and whole aspect on life. It allows families in America to move up in class, often times allowing them to adopt different ideas and different family values. After viewing this documentary my analysis on the disparity of the wealth gap is that it is reality and there isn’t much we can do about it. I am able to see what people have to go through to make it to the top. Business men do not become who they are by being nice to people. They have to be aggressive in the business world, cut throat, sharp and willing to do whatever it takes to achieve their dreams. That might come with risks or even mean walking all over people. But, sometimes to make a difference, you have to ride through hell to make it to heaven. This might be a hard pill for some people to swallow, but, it is reality and it is the truth. People have not become moguls overnight singing KUM-BAH-YA and dancing around a fire. Las Vegas was built on mob money before it was cleaned up and presented with a new face by entrepreneur investing. This is business. You have to be able to stomach it and it is not for the weak hearted. I would therefore have to agree with what I have seen in the documentary regarding Jamie’s father and his behavior. THE ONE PERCENTPage 7 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 He did what he had to do to get to where he is today even though he inherited his thrown. In my personal opinion, if you look hard enough you will always find dirt and the top of the social ladder. You do not only have to be rich for that either, all of humanity is flawed in its own way. I do not believe that everyone was born to be a millionaire. However, I do believe that in our own way, if we preserve and strive to work hard, we are all able to be â€Å"millionaires† in our own eyes and live fulfilling lives and contribute to making our society a better place to live. Being unemployed, uneducated and living off welfare is not fair to the people who work hard to pay taxes to support their fellow citizens. I consider it to be a lazy and irresponsible way of life. However, it is a choice in life you have. The money is out there for the taking so it is also your prerogative whether you choose to go out and get it or not. Make your decision wisely and keep your values in mind while climbing the social ladder if that is the route you decide to take. THE ONE PERCENTPage 8 Ryan M. Kerrick Mr. Richard Cannella English Composition II March 18, 2012 REFERENCES Johnson and Johnson. (1997). History of Johnson and Johnson. Retrieved from http://www. jnj. com/connect/about-jnj/company-history/ Schroeder, A. (2008). The Snowball: Warren Buffet and the Business of Life. Domhoff, G. (2010). Wealth, Income, and Power: The Wealth Distribution. Retrieved from http://whorulesamerica. net/power/wealth. html Frank, R. (2008). The Wall Street Journal: The Rich Man’s Michael Moore. Retrieved from http://online. wsj. com/article/SB120371859381786725. html? mod=fpa_mostpop

Social Networks free essay sample

Also according to Lenhart and Madden, â€Å"Adults are much less likely than teens to have a profile on a social network website. About three in ten (35%) adult internet users age 18 and older have a profile on a social networking site like MySpace, Facebook or LinkedIn†(2007). How ever, teenagers are twice as likely as adults in use of these websites. Some others use it because they do not have friends in real life and they wish to make new but somehow they are afraid, and they can write anything they want to say without any fear by using social networks. Social networking technology does affect negatively on people as it causes family problems, it can be dangerous for people and it can change behavior for the worse. Social networking causes many family problems that can affect relations. As a fact, family relations are sensitive and small problems can turn to big issues if they didn’t find the right solutions for them. We will write a custom essay sample on Social Networks or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page These networks take the happy moments that people can spend with family, because children prefer to sit with their computers than family, so it makes distance between the family members. Children prefer to hide their emotions and problems from their own family to tell a stranger about it and it makes them trust strangers not relatives. Why does this happen? Social networking is turning to be the best choice for children and adults to spend time. It could be nothing more than they want some independence from their parents and freedom from parents involved. Some children want to say things to their friends who are the same age and they feel they understand them more than parents. Families are suffering with the problems websites are causing. For example, two girls committed suicide because some abuse on social networks and because of pictures that were spread on Internet from these websites. These stories was in a news website that talked about two girls one committed suicide because of sexting, and the other one because of some abuse on social networks from her friends (ABC News). Other problems we can mention are teenagers got addicted to these social networks and that is a sign of behavior changing negatively. These problems for sure increase with time and affect people who use social networks and every one who is around them. The reasons why these problems are huge is because social networks never stops producing new things that attract teens and adults and encourage them to use them more and more. Adults and teenagers invite their friends and tell them to join these networks, as they are fun. Parents are aware about these problems and of course they are trying their best to find solutions for them. Some research happened to show the opinion of parents who have children with social network profiles, â€Å"Research by YouGov showed a quarter of children aged six to 11 spend an hour a day on social networking such as Facebook and Twitter. But only one-in-10 uses the Internet daily for homework†. Extra parents of older children were distressed concerning their offspring’s grades skidding as a consequence of online distractions (mirror news, 2011). This research shows that parents are really aware and worried about social networks and the negative effects of them on their children, and supports the negative side of using social networks. These social networks can be dangerous and harmful. Teens and adults, who do not care about what will happen, they are not aware of the danger that these etworks can make, are using social networks. â€Å"Though the user’s privacy settings determine whether they can be contacted by strangers or friends, many youth may not realize or use these privacy settings, thus exposing them to online predators† (Wolak, et al, 2007). There are lots of social networks, and people from many different countries use them to find new friends and make online relations. The fact is that, in social networks teens meet wrong people who use them in wrong way. These meetings can also lead to a real life meeting and outing and here the danger increases. Teens who decide to meet new people from Internet and bring them to their real life, may not tell their parents about it, and here the problem takes a wrong direction in many cases. Basically, in social networks teens and adults are more likely to meet these wrong people and believe them. Some people pretend to be friend then divulging personal information and then they can enter others profile, they maybe send messages to other people about anything they that will damage their computers. These fraud people can send viruses using others name and spread it on Internet. Fake identities are also a big problem happens in this social networking world. Some make fake identities to get attention and it is not a problem usually, problem begins when they spread wrong information about this person that harms someone else. â€Å"Their motives could just be to have a little nameless fun but they are extra probable to be sinister, like instituting phony friendships that lead to face-to-face meetings alongside who-knows-what aftermath, or to drift invitations to mature sites†(scam Busters Organization). They can make advertisements about a famous brand and take money from people and fool them and some may believe. Teens can be fooled quickly because some of them believe everything they see, especially when they put advertisement with pictures and colors that attract teenagers and adults the most. Social networking has many negative effects on teens and adults that lead to big problems. Social networks make people change their behavior. Nowadays, children use social networks more than anything else. Dr. Gallagher believes that â€Å"young teenagers and preteens are the most vulnerable to negative consequences of social media†(2011). Teens and adults change their behavior when they feel that social networking is more important than real life relations. Parents object on their children when they use social networks all day, which leads to put anger in teens and adults so they miss behave with their parents. Even parents may not know how to react and they start shouting on their children, it can also be one of the causes of changing behavior in adults and teenagers. Children turn to be abusers and they got that violent behavior with others. As Ryan (august 26,2011) has noted, â€Å"Teens who use social networking sites are three times as likely to drink alcohol, and five times more likely to smoke tobacco than teens who dont frequent the sites. † When other people post pictures like smoking and having drugs, that effect on children who use these networks and get excited to try this even if they never tried it before. This is a big issue and a reason that makes children change to the worst. They do not respect elders anymore as Socrates pointed out â€Å"  they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in place of exercise† (2011). Kids are producing up amid a marine of electronic media. It is vital for parents to ponder how this could encounter communal existence, progress, academics, and adjustment, and how parents can assist as a buffer from a little of the possible negative aftermath( Daiz, Y. , Evans, L. , Gallagher,R). Social networks change behavior to worst because teens like their new life and personality on these networks than the real one. People around teens and adults who use social networks can be affected. For example, children can ignore Parents as they find new friends online. These friends share the same age and think the same, so children in this age do not like their parents interfere in what they are doing. Here when children change their behavior and it becomes more violent and disrespectable for people around them. Using social networks more and more can make children lose interest in studies and that is a one face of changing behavior. According to a recent poll, 22% of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 times a day†(council on Communications and Media). These research shows that adults and teens who use social networks more than 10 times a day, they will not have a good focus on their studies. That can cause damage to their marks in school. It will lead to their parent anger and will affect on teens and make them feel upset, and also it can cause behavior changing. Som e people may argue that social networks are good to use and they have positive things like connecting with people. They connect people and also give some skills to teenagers in their growing age. They support their argument by saying that â€Å"Talking on a social networking site may also bring a teen’s personality to the forefront, while the focus on a disability lessens â€Å"(Holmquist. J 2007). Some one also might argue that becoming cozy alongside communal networking locations might additionally assistance teens change to a globe that is intentions extra and extra alongside convoluted technologies (2007). They also say â€Å"Middle and high school students are using social media to connect with one another on homework and group projects†(Schurgin. G, Clarke. K). One seeming benefit is that youth can increase their circle of friends and even converse extra frequently alongside spread relations (Holmquist. J 2007). They could maybe show that social networks can be good enough for children to use and make them more interesting to go in and see what they are is. All that may be true; however, we must consider the harm that all these social networks cause and realize how much greater the harm is than their positive effects. Networks can connect people together and strong the relations but not for adults and children, because they are still go to school and can see their friends and connect with them in real life. It is better to talk face to face rather than facing a computer screen without knowing their emotions. Also bulling is a big problem happens on social networks as â€Å"Some research has shown that youth with disabilities are at a greater risk of being bullied, and bullying can also occur on social networking sites†(Holmquist. J 2007). In conclusion, social networking has both sides of negative and positive effects that can be good or harmful for children. Parents should be aware of these social networking activities that their children do and put limits on using it. It will surly reduce the effects of social networks on them. Parents also can take help from some child study centers like NYU child study center that could be useful for them, they will have more idea about social networking and how they work. Parents can also join their children in using these networks by being friendly with them, so children will feel more confortable talking to their mother and father. Networks can be good and bad, it depends on how we want to use it and make it more interesting or make it more scary and harmful. References Mirror News ( 9 may,2011), Parents fear social networking sites are affecting their childrens school grades.. Retrieved from http://www. mirror. co. uk/ Celizic, M. (2009). Her teen committed suicide over ‘sexting’ . Retrieved from http://today. snbc. msn. com/id/29546030/ns/today-parenting_and_family/t/her-teen-committed-suicide-over-sexting/#. T8OOPbBo0Ug Goldman, R. (2010, March 29). Teens indicted after allegedly taunting girl who hanged herself. ABC News. Retrieved from http://abcnews. go. com Marquette,S. (2011), How kids fool their parents on social networks. NBC News. Retrieved from http://www. msnbc. msn. com/ McLoughlin, C. amp; Burgess, J. (2009). Texting, sex ting and social networking among Australian youth and the need for cyber safety education. Australian Association for Research in Education International Education Research Conference 2009 Canberra. Retrieved from AARE, website http://www. aare. edu. au/09pap/mcl091427. pdf Wolak, J. , Mitchell, K. J. , Finkelhor, D. (2007). Does online harassment constitute bullying? An exploration of online harassment by known peers and online-only contacts. Journal of Adolescent Health 41: S51-S58. Daiz, Y. , Evans, L. , Gallagher,R. Anti-Social Networking: how do texting and social media affect our children?. Retrieved from http://www. aboutourkids. org/ Holmquist, J. (n. d. ). Social Networking Sites: Consider the Benefits, Concerns for Your Teenager . Retrieved from University Of Minnesota website: http://ici. umn. edu/ Schurgin. G, Clarke. K, The impact of social media on children, adolescents, and families. Retrieved from http://pediatrics. aappublications. org/ Scam Busters Organization. (n. d. ). the 5 Most Common Social Networking Scams. Retrieved from http://www. scambusters. org/socialnetworking. html

Free Essays on Online Banking

Online Banking (Citibank) INTRODUCTION The use of computers and Internet in today’s society makes life much more convenient for everyone. This case proves the point that online banking as services are becoming more trusted with the increase in popularity. Also, consumers are finding financial services more suitable with Internet banking. Thus, as result, online banking is spreading like wildfire. As the number of consumers using the Internet expands, banks have to keep up with the demand and provide quality products and services online. Along with this, many users of online banking feel a sense of freedom that these new services offer them. Due to some of its benefits, financial services have never been as simple as they are with online banking. One key advantage, among others, is that consumers can access their accounts from any computer with the Internet around the world. However, like anything else, online banking has its disadvantages as well as advantages. LITERATURE REVIEW What is Online Banking? Online banking is just what it sounds like. You access a bank’s web site over the Internet and enter a user ID and password. This gives you access to your account information over a secure server. Service for online banking is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You no longer have to rush to the bank at lunchtime or stand in line-ups in the bank or at the ATM, just to find out information about the availability of your funds. While a number of the largest banks have gone to the Web and introduced free online banking to attract new customers and allow existing consumers to manage accounts online, not much else has changed, according to Bankrate.com’s fifth semiannual Checking Account Pricing Study (Buckham). Some online banking services are free while others have a fee. These banks determine rates and fees for online accounts based on where you live. That is why these banks ask customers wh... Free Essays on Online Banking Free Essays on Online Banking Online Banking (Citibank) INTRODUCTION The use of computers and Internet in today’s society makes life much more convenient for everyone. This case proves the point that online banking as services are becoming more trusted with the increase in popularity. Also, consumers are finding financial services more suitable with Internet banking. Thus, as result, online banking is spreading like wildfire. As the number of consumers using the Internet expands, banks have to keep up with the demand and provide quality products and services online. Along with this, many users of online banking feel a sense of freedom that these new services offer them. Due to some of its benefits, financial services have never been as simple as they are with online banking. One key advantage, among others, is that consumers can access their accounts from any computer with the Internet around the world. However, like anything else, online banking has its disadvantages as well as advantages. LITERATURE REVIEW What is Online Banking? Online banking is just what it sounds like. You access a bank’s web site over the Internet and enter a user ID and password. This gives you access to your account information over a secure server. Service for online banking is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You no longer have to rush to the bank at lunchtime or stand in line-ups in the bank or at the ATM, just to find out information about the availability of your funds. While a number of the largest banks have gone to the Web and introduced free online banking to attract new customers and allow existing consumers to manage accounts online, not much else has changed, according to Bankrate.com’s fifth semiannual Checking Account Pricing Study (Buckham). Some online banking services are free while others have a fee. These banks determine rates and fees for online accounts based on where you live. That is why these banks ask customers wh...

4th Nine Weeks Test #1 Flashcards Example for Free

4th Nine Weeks Test #1 What is the background/purpose for Paul Revere’s ride? -Purpose: Inform people about a historical event, and tell them why it’s important now -Background: Paul Revere rode through a bunch of Massachusetts cities to tell people that the British were coming to invade them. Describe the plot line for â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†, Exposition -Exposition: This story takes place during the deep night of April 18, 1775. It is in different places in Massachusetts such as the Charlestown shore, Medford, Lexington, and Concord. It’s about Paul Revere and his friend, who lived in the early American colonies. Describe the plot line for â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†, Rising Action -Rising Action: He talked to his friend in the evening about how ready the would be if the British came. Just as the moon rose, a British ship, The Somerset, appeared over the bay. The friend heard the ship. He ran to the Old North Church and hung up 2 lanterns, because the British came by sea. Paul Revere saw that his friend had hung up the lanterns, so he took off fearlessly to warn people. Paul Revere warned different cities (Medford/midnight, Lexington/one am, Concord/2 am Describe the plot line for â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†, Climax -Climax: The narrator described that even though the British came in strong, the farmers fought back hard. The farmers won and the British retreated. Describe the plot line for â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†, Falling Action -Falling Action: The narrator summarizes everything that happened Describe the plot line for â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†, Denoument -Denoument: The narrator, as well as summarizes everything that happened, says that the history of this event is very important to our nation. We will always remember what Paul Revere did. Describe the setting of â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†. Night of April 18, 1775 in Massachusetts Describe the characters of â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride†. Paul Revere, his friend, people of Charlestown, Medford, Lexington, Concord Contrast between the peaceful night and the violence of the approaching revolution. â€Å"Paul Revere’s Ride† Peaceful night for the farmers until Paul Revere came in and described that there would be a lot of violence coming-the British were looking to conquer and kill. What is the impact on the reader of the the narrative poem focus in on one person, Paul Revere, instead of a group of people who actually completed the night’s task? If it weren’t for Paul Revere, the people who completed the task wouldn’t have even known that the British were coming. He was one of the key parts of keeping America alive. What are the basics of Abraham Lincoln’s historical impact and assassination? Good president, but was beaten down a lot. Was with the North in the Civil War, and was against slavery. Was shot at the Ford Theatre, died the next day. Why were there so many details in the literature read about Abraham Lincoln? (assassination story) It was important to the whole story. It was vital to understanding all that happened and making sense of it all. Describe how there was a foreshadowing of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Abraham Lincoln had a dream about it Describe how the tone and effectiveness of â€Å"Oh Captain! My Captain!† by Walt Whitman would make somebody like it more. It was a poem, and it wasn’t as gory as the other story. It rhymed, and it helped me to understand a lot of what happened from the people’s perspective. Many American citizens had a connection with President Lincoln, and they were devastated when he died. He was leading the country in the right direction. Describe the extended metaphor in â€Å"Oh Captain! My Captain!†. They treated President Lincoln like the captain of the ship, and he was lying on the deck of the ship dead. What was Walt Whitman’s purpose for writing the poem, â€Å"Oh Captain! My Captain!† It gave a real sense of what it was like to lose the president. We read about it in different stories, but it’s different to see it from this perspective. What was something significant happening in the country during Mark Twain’s life? What was the event that set off Mark Twain’s job hunt and adventures? Describe Mark Twain’s personality/writing style. He’s a humorous writer, and a little quirky in a sense. He’s very philosophical, and tries to come up with morals for his stories. Why is Mark Twain let go from his jobs mentioned prior to his 2nd attempt at mining in his personal narrative? He never put any thought into them. Why did Mark Twain walk away from writing for good? He died. He never â€Å"walked away from writing†, except for two short times while writing Huckleberry Finn. What is a fable, and what is it’s purpose? Characters being animals that have personalities and traits like humans, has a moral lesson, generally written for children Mocking political figures, exaggeration to bring about change, points out flaws in a person, society, or idea. Gives inanimate objects human traits What is Twain suggesting about art critics through the words and actions of his animal characters? He’s suggesting that everybody is entitled to their own opinions. Art critics criticize paintings that other people think are beautiful. â€Å"You know something that I don’t know†, in a drama setting, specific irony happens, and it’s normally where the viewer knows what’s going to happen because it’s set up that way, and the people in the movie don’t. What was the significance of the cat’s description of a mirror in Mark Twain’s fable? The significance was that it showed the reader that maybe the cat didn’t know as much as he thought he knew. Each animal is eager to test the mirror after hearing about other’s experiences in Mark Twain’s fable. What does this reveal about human nature? Everybody wants to be right and prove the other wrong. What is the moral of Mark Twain’s fable? You can find in a text whatever you bring, if you will stand between it and the mirror of your imagination. You may not see your ears, but they will be there. realism and mark twain A Presidential Candidate Mark Twain Mark Twain "Advice to Little Girls" and "Invalid's Story" Mark Twain Gilded Age Notable People and famous quotes Samuel Clemens - Mark Twain Vocab Quiz - Mark Twain, Story of an Hour, Poems, and Wagner Matinee english// mark twain The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: Chapters 4-7 Mark Twain Biography company About StudyMoose Contact Careers Help Center Donate a Paper Legal Terms & Conditions Privacy Policy Complaints We will write a custom sample essay on 4th Nine Weeks Test #1 specifically

International Economics Eurozone Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

International Economics Eurozone - Essay Example 29). For instance, Germany is considered to have a comparative advantage in the production of cars in the sense that its cars are considered to be of the highest quality in the market. This creates the opportunity for the substitution of products that have the same factor intensity. The other condition for the occurrence of intra-industry trade is that the production processes of particular products should have fixed costs. This is to ensure that an increase in the production processes is advantageous in the sense that there will be a decrease in the unit costs of the product. This condition is beneficial to both producers and consumers. Producers will be able to reduce the cost of production as they engage in mass production. They will enjoy economies of scale in times of low costs of production. Consumers on the other hand will pay less as more cars are being produced because low costs will be transferred to them. For instance, the more units Mercedes produces, the lower the unit c ost of production. Possible welfare gains of intra industry trade There are two conditions that determine the occurrence of intra-industry trade and they include comparative advantage and economies of scale. ... German citizens are able to get jobs hence improve their living standards. An economy also records an increase in the number of exports and this translates to higher revenue collection. The revenue collected is used in funding projects across the economy and the country is able to improve on its social infrastructure such as hospitals and schools. Increase in imports also reflects that the economy is recording growth in its GDP which eventually translates to higher per capita income. Citizens will be able to meet their basic wants because of the improvement in their income. Economies of scale also have the advantage of improving the social welfare of citizens in the sense that the growth of the industry will stimulate infrastructure development that will be utilized by both producers and the residents (Helpman & Krugman, 2009, p. 100). The other possible welfare gain of intra-industry trade is the provision of quality services because there is specialization in the production process es. Comparative advantages lead to the specialization of industries and this improves the productivity of such industries. Countries are able to access a wider market that makes it easy for consumers have access to quality services and goods that are of high quality from specialized countries. Criteria used to define an optimum currency area. The general definition of an optimum currency area is that it relates to a geographical area where the use of a common currency would create the greatest economic benefit. The theory is closely related to Robert Mundell whose works have made numerous contributions to issues of currency. There are a number of criteria used in defining an optimum currency

Nursing Assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Nursing Assignment - Essay Example This paer approves that traditional psoriasis treatment regimens may be augmented with stress-reduction strategies. Hypnosis may improve or resolve numerous dermatoses, including psoriasis. In addition, hypnosis can facilitate aversive therapy and enhance desensitization and other cognitive-behavioural methods. Hypnosis may be a useful therapeutic modality for patients with psoriasis, and merits further testing in a larger patient population. Treatment of depressive symptoms may prove to be a helpful adjunct in the management of pruritis and sleep difficulties in psoriasis. The tricyclic antidepressants imipramine and clomipramine are considered the first-line treatment options for panic disorder. Most CBT treatments can be completed in a few weeks or months. This essay makes a conclusio that the degree of psychosocial distress experienced varies widely in individuals. The effective management of psoriasis includes considering the psychological and social impact of the disease on each individual as well as the physical symptoms. Patients affected with psoriasis also tend to suffer from low self-esteem and poor body image. They suffer guilt, embarrassment, and the fear of being thought dirty and infectious to others. When compared to other skin diseases, the level of stigmatization is greater in patients with psoriasis. Numerous studies have demonstrated the beneficial effects of psychological counselling and treatment in psoriasis. This can include hypnosis, cognitive-behaviour therapy and relaxation techniques.

Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal Essay Example for Free

Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal Essay Franklin Delano Roosevelt is indisputably the greatest President of the United States of America in the 20th century. Ascending to the highest office despite his crippling poliomyelitis condition, he epitomized transformation never before seen in American soil (Cashman 1989). Identifying himself with the multitudes forgotten at the base of the base of the economic pyramid, he inspired and led the New Deal; a complex and comprehensive legislation program designed to raise all Americans from the Great Depression and serve as a remedy to the inequalities inherent in the American social structure. Under the same deal, the United States military and domestic strategies were directed to the World War II, the victories thereof brought the United States to the pinnacle of global economic and unchallenged military superiority. The United States, his country over which he presided, in unmatched adoration elected him four times: a feat unmatched in the history of the American presidency. For the twelve years in White House, he was the personification of the response of all Americans to the Great Depression. As the World War II drew on he never failed the American populace. For the twelve years, unparalleled crisis tormented the United States and not a single citizen was spared. Never, in the history of the Presidency had a president identified with each and every citizen, bearing even greater responsibility as he pushed his metal capacities to the limit to save Americans from the bites of the Great Depression. Sitting on a wheel chair in the Oval office he witnessed and participated in greater changes not only in his country but the world over. His administration remains a major watershed in the history of the United States. In 1933 when he took the oath of office, America was no more than a land of small town values with small government and completely isolated from global affairs. This was the America he was handed at the inauguration; an America still presided over by the Protestant and the Anglo-Saxon elites, an America of economic laissez-faire, of Prohibition, and a country of the Model T Ford (Heale 1999). Twelve years later, a different America had emerged. An America characterized by pervasive government bureaucracy, metropolitan values, assertive ethnic minorities, a nuclear power and an America whose political power was centred in Washington. More than any other president before him he directed the fundamental transformation of America’s political society. His influence was so powerful that subsequent occupants of the White House had to operate in his shadow. When FDR assumed office, the economic situation was so devastating that the country was almost on its knees. The gross national product plummeted from $103.1 billion to $ 58 billion (in current dollars) between 1929 and 1932. In the same period the level of industrial production had almost halved. The unemployment rate was at 25%, thousands of farmers and businesses went bankrupt, and millions and millions of investors lost life savings. The New Deal brought into life by FDR could not have been more welcome. The Deal broke novel federal regulatory ground. For the fast time in the political and economic history of the United States, the federal government assumed the responsibility of stimulating investments. The federal government strove to correct the abuses in the national economic machinery. By amassing far more reaching goals, the government became responsible for the relief of distress among workers, homeowners, businesses, farmers, consumers and investors (Steiner 2005). Urgent action had to be taken. The election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1932 marked the terminus of the roaring twenties corporate regime paving the way for the New Deal regime, a regime that would reshape the balance of power in Washington and the way of life of American for almost half of the 20th century. The hope that he brought to the nation was so palpable. With the New Deal FDR â€Å"made his greatest single contribution to the politics of the 1930s: the instillation of hope and courage in the people† (Derber 2004, 60). Just a day after the inauguration, the president summoned an extraordinary session of Congress and with the first sitting fresh energies was directed towards the challenge of the time: the Great Depression. The term â€Å"Hundred Days† became descriptive of the special sessions of the 73rd Congress that launched the New Deal to fight the Great Depression. Between March 9 1933 and June 16, 1933, more major legislations were passed by Congress than at any other time in the history of the United States. The major legislations passed during these one hundred days include; the Emergency Banking Act, the Civilian Conservation Act, the Economy Act, the Reforestation Relief Act, the Economy Act, the Federal Emergency Relief Act, the Securities Act, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Agricultural Adjustment Act, the Home Owners’ Refinancing Act, the National Employment System Act, the Banking Act, the Emergency Railroad Transportation Act, the Farm Act and the National Industrial Recovery Act. The one hundred days as the most dramatic duration in the United States’ public policy history (Olson 2001). In the early months of 1933, the Great Depression continued biting along its relentless path. Unemployment mounted, industrial production foundered, mortgage foreclosures became commonplace and the banking sector failed and not even the state authorities could afford to meet their relief obligations (Cashman 1989). Coupled to this inaction, the country had to wait for four months before any positive executive action could come into play. From the presidential date of November 8 to the inauguration date on March 4, this quadrennial problem in American politics persisted and its ramifications with regard to the Great Depression were not friendly either. To remedy the situation, the Twentieth Amendment did away with the Congress meeting on January 3 and brought forward the presidential inauguration to January 20 from March 4. However, the ratification of this Amendment did not take place until February 1933. To try and heal the stultifying loss of confidence occasioned by the four months of unnecessary wait, Herbert Hoover attempted a smooth transition by pursuing dialogue with FDR, trying to extract assurances that FDR would comply with his positions on taxes and tariffs, the budget and the currency even if such a move was only focussed on maintaining public confidence but FDR would not promise commitment (Cashman 1989). In February 1933, a series of bank failures led to the complete collapse Herbert Hoover’s intended dialogue. Historically, the weakness of the American banking system had led to so many bank failures, but in 1932-1933, the condition was reminiscent of an acute crisis. In October 1932, the crisis deepened further. In anticipation of the collapse of a crucial banking chain in Nevada, the governor ordered a bank holiday. On the midnight of February 14 1932, William A. Comstock, the Governor of Michigan issued a proclamation leading to the closure of five hundred and fifty banks for eight days. The Michigan bank holiday precipitated the panic that spread to other states and subsequent declarations of bank holidays (Cashman 1989). As banks closed for holidays, the gold reserves flowed from the Federal Reserve System and the New Yolk banks to keep banks across the country afloat and to satisfy the demands of the panic stricken foreign investors. In slightly more than two months, Americas gold reserves had fallen from more that $ 1.3 billion to just $ 400 million. By 1933, 18,569 banks had a total deposit of about $ 6 billion in cash against the demand of $ 41 billion by depositors. Two days before the inauguration of FDR, $ 500 was withdrawn from banks across the country making the situation worse (Cashman 1989). It is therefore no surprising that all Americans were united in the demand of a decisive executive action even if such an imperative could only be met by a modified dictatorship.

Windows Me :: essays research papers

An Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) version of Windows ME is a special release product made available for computer Manufacturers. OEMs can customize these versions of Windows ME specifically for their hardware and software. The Setup procedures and requirements outlined in this document may be different if you have an OEM version of Windows ME. For more information, read the documentation that came with your computer or contact your computer manufacturer. ========================================= IF WINDOWS ME DOES NOT START IN SAFE MODE ========================================= Any of the following conditions can cause Windows ME not to start in Safe Mode: - Your computer is infected with a virus. Run up-to-date anti- virus software to check for a virus and clean your computer if necessary. - Your computer's CMOS settings are not correct. Check your computer's CMOS settings to make sure they are correct. Note that you may need to contact the computer manufacturer to verify these settings. - There is a hardware failure. Note that you may need to contact the computer manufacturer for more information about your hardware. - There is an error on your computer's hard disk. See "Using ScanDisk to check your hard disk." - There is an error in the Windows registry. See "Using the Windows Registry Checker." Using ScanDisk to Check Your Hard Disk -------------------------------------- If you suspect there may be file corruption or other problems with your hard disk(s), run ScanDisk to check for and repair errors. To check all your hard disks for errors: 1. At the command prompt, type: scandisk /all 2. Press ENTER. To perform a full surface scan of your hard disk(s) for maximum protection against data loss: 1. At the command prompt, type: scandisk /all /surface 2. Press ENTER. Using Windows Registry Checker ------------------------------ If you are still unable to start Windows ME in Safe Mode, run the Windows Registry Checker (Scanreg.exe) tool, as there may be a problem with the system registry. To start the Windows Registry Checker: 1. At the command prompt, type: scanreg /restore 2. Press ENTER. Scanreg may not be available if Windows ME has not been successfully installed on your computer. ========================================================= IF SETUP STOPS AND WINDOWS ME WILL NOT START IN SAFE MODE ========================================================= The following section explains what you can do to recover from a failed Windows Setup. For more information about other Setup problems, see the Setup.txt file in the Win9X folder of your Windows ME CD. If you encounter any of these error messages while running Setup: - Invalid system disk - Incorrect MS-DOS version - Missing or corrupted Command.com it is likely that your computer's startup drive needs updated

Designer’s Portfolio Essay

1. A brief summary of the play Two tramps named Estragon and Vladimir meet on the road, beside a sick looking tree. They are happy because they didn’t see each other for a long time. Estragon has a sore foot and is having troubles taking his boot off. The two men remember that they are supposed to wait for a man named Godot. In the play it shows that they do not remember the man named Godot really well, but they think he is going to give them an answer. But they cannot remember the questions. While they are waiting, estragon falls asleep. Vladimir suddenly fells lonely, so he wakes Estragon up. Tired of going nothing, they begin to talk about the tree and the wait. And they talk about their condition- homeless and lack of money. After a while, a master with his slave appears whose names are Pozzo and Lucky. Pozzo sits on a stool, relaxes a little and enjoys some chicken and wine. He is really rude to his servant. Eventually Lucky dozes off to sleep, but is weakened by jerks on the rope from his master. The master then tell the tramps that Lucky is pitiful and old, and he would like to get rid of him soon. On hearing all of these words, Lucky cries. Estragon tries to comfort him, but Lucky gives him a hard kick in the leg in return. Later, the master and slave leave the tramps, and they continue their wait of Godot. A litter later, a young boy brings in a message that Godot might seem them the nest day, at the same time and the same place. Meanwhile, night falls and the tramps decide to leave and come back the next day. Instead, they remain. The act ends. The next act begins in exactly the same set as the first one: the two tramps meet on the road beside a sick looking tree. Nothing has changed except that the bare tree has five or six leaves. Vladimir is singing a song about a dog that has been beaten. Estragon reveals that he has been beaten as well. They keep waiting for Godot, though Estragon seems to have forgotten the events of the day before. Vladimir tries to remind him about something happened yesterday. But Estragon’s only memory is about the bone that he was given to chew. Bored with waiting, Vladimir spots Lucky’s hat, and the tramps begin to play with it. But they still feel bored, they discuss suicide again, call each other names, and wait for Godot. After some time, Pozzo and Lucky appear again. Buut this time, Pozzo is blind and being led by lucky. They are still bound up by a rope. Pozzo falls to the ground and cannot get up. In the process of helping him, Estragon and Vladimir also fall to the ground. Finally they are able to get up. The suns sets and the moon rises. The same boy shows up with the same message that Godot will not come today but the day after. He leaves the two men again contemplate suicide. Later, they decide to come back tomorrow with a rope, and if Godot does not arrive, they will hang themselves. They decide to move on, but as in the previous act, they stay where they are and the act ends. The setting and the overall mood in the play. In this play, the setting actually is really simple. A country and a sick looking tree. No visible horizon exists. The setting is constant. The time frame is most likely two days. The only visible reference to the passage of time occurs at the end of Act II when the sun sets and the moon rises. After reading the play, we can feel that there is no horizon, no sign of civilization. For a moment, this play might be considered comic. But as the story unfolds and a mood of despair appears on the stage. Characters are beaten, cursed, and wondered-all without any sign of relief. But as we know that the tramps do not see the man that they are waiting for, it shows the eternal hopelessness of life. Based on the reasons, actually this play can be considered as a tragedy. 2. A serious of quotations that comments directly on the aspects of the design. 1) â€Å"The play opens on a totally surreal note, with a tramp trying to pull off his boot on a lonely road under a leafless tree.† ( From- Sam I Am – Beckett’s private purgatories† by Benjamin Kunkel in The New Yorker) 2) â€Å"But yesterday evening it was all black and bare. And now it’s covered with leaves.† (From- the play â€Å"Waiting for Godot† Act II, line 1, by Samuel Beckett) 3) â€Å"A country road. A tree. Evening. Estragon, sitting on a low mound, is trying to take off his boot. He pulls at it with both hands, panting.† (By Samuel Beckett at the beginning of Act I) 4) â€Å"A terrible cry, close at hand. Estragon drops the carrot. They remain motionless, and then together make a sudden rush towards the wings. Estragon stops halfway, runs back, picks up the carrot, stuffs it in his pocket, runs to rejoin Vladimir who is waiting for him, stops again, runs back, picks up his boot, runs to rejoin Vladimir. Huddled together, shoulders hunched, cringing away from the menace, they (By Samuel Beckett, Act I, line 359) 5) â€Å"Next day. Same time. Same place. Estragon’s boots front center, heels together, toes splayed.† ( By Samuel Beckett, the beginning of Act II) 6) â€Å"Lucky’s hat at same place. The tree has four or five leaves. Enter Vladimir agitatedly. He halts and looks long at the tree, then suddenly begins to move feverishly about the stage. He halts before the boots, picks one up, examines it, sniffs it, manifests disgust, puts it back carefully. Comes and goes. Halts extreme right and gazes into distance off, shading his eyes with his hand. Comes and goes. Halts extreme left, as before. Comes and goes. Halts suddenly and begins to sing loudly.† (By Samuel Beckett, Act II, line 5) 3. Props in the play 1) a sick looking tree 2) a pair of boots 3) a stool 4) a hat 5) a rope 4. A color scheme for the play —— Main colors used in the play 1. Grey In the play, we know that the tramps are waiting for Godot, but he never shows up. Grey in some point can represent their feelings. They keep waiting, but they cannot see the people they are waiting to see. They might be in great sorrow. It seems hopeless for them to see Godot. 2. Brown It is the color appeared in many settings in the play. Say, for instant, the road, the tree. —– Other colors used in the play 1. Dark blue and black These two colors represent day and night. From the two colors, we can have a clearly view in the changing of time. And for black, it also can represent the fact that the act of waiting is never over, and there is little hope that people can get. 2. Dark green It is the color of the leaves in the tree appeared in Act II. 3. Sienna It is the color of a stool that Pozzo used. 5. A visual collage for the play Explanations: 1. Wood The tree and the stool appeared in the play are both belonging to wood. 2. Wool The blanket that the two tramps used is made of thin wool. 3. Canvas The two tramps’ clothes are made from the canvas. In other ways, it shows the characteristics of tramps- homeless and lack of money, have to travel to many places, cannot settle down. 4. Hemp The rope that used in this play is made of hemp. 6. Photographs for the play 1. A circle When I finish reading this play, a circle suddenly appeared in my mind. As we know in the play, the act is never over, and yet it mysteriously starts again each day. But no one knows when the waiting is end. The action, in the same way, describes a circle. Each day is the return to the beginning. Nothing is completed because nothing can be completed. 2. A long road that you can never see the end The road belongs to the setting part of the play. The reason that I think the road is associated with the play is because it represent one of the themes of the play. In the play, we know that it talks about two tramps are waiting for man named Godot, but he never comes. No one knows whether he will come or not. All they can do is keeping waiting. Think deeper about the waiting; I think the play want to show us the two men are waiting for hope. Godot is symbolic. Back to the road, we can see from the picture the characteristic of the road is long and you can never see the end. It reflects on the play about waiting for hope. All they can do is waiting, but no one knows whether there is hope or the future is hopeless. The future is unknown. 3. A bright moon The concept of the passage of time leads to an irony. Each minute spent waiting brings death one step closer to the character s and makes the arrival of Godot lees likely. The moon in some point, actually represent the changing of time. When the moon comes up, it means one day is finished. And another is coming. But there is no sign of hope appeared for the two tramps. When you see them standing in the moon, a really sad and hopeless feeling will naturally comes out from my mind.