Why such high short borrow rates for the VIX ETNs?

blueraincap

blueraincap

The most liquid VXX borrow rate is 3%, others are 4%. Which are very high relative to their volume.

Yes, many people short volatility for the contango, but is the high rate a matter of simple supply & demand for shares or the issuer making it difficult to short? Or some defined relationship (more than demand) to the curve slope steepness?
 
I highly suspect you are right - they decay so fast no one wants to hold them long term, and many want to short them long term.

Which, if you don't want to pay the borrow fee, you could just sell VIX futures yourself, could you not? Different tax results I think, but at least you could get around the borrow fee.
 
SoyUnGanador said:
I highly suspect you are right - they decay so fast no one wants to hold them long term, and many want to short them long term.

Which, if you don't want to pay the borrow fee, you could just sell VIX futures yourself, could you not? Different tax results I think, but at least you could get around the borrow fee.
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Yes I can but I need more time to study the VIX and its products as well as those SPDJ strategies and then program it.
I just wanted to allocate a small portion to short VXX for starter and then surprised how high the fee is given it is so liquid.
 
blueraincap said:
The most liquid VXX borrow rate is 3%, others are 4%. Which are very high relative to their volume.

Yes, many people short volatility for the contango, but is the high rate a matter of simple supply & demand for shares or the issuer making it difficult to short? Or some defined relationship (more than demand) to the curve slope steepness?
More...

It doesn't matter why. you deal with it.
 
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Blueraincap. So, I did some testing on SVOL. It started trading on 5/13/21 it looks like. If you had invested in it then, your IRR return would have been 6.39%, and your max drawdown would have been 15.95%. That compares VERY favorably to SPY over that period, which had those numbers of 1.06% and 24.50%, respectively. So SVOL trounced it, although over a limited (and down) period.

Seems I need to study these things too!

The "Dynamic VIX Index" - is there a security that tracks in that you can buy that I can run tests on? Same thing for JPM vol index. The MS/VoINET Premium Fund it looks like is private, not publicly traded?

Thanks!
 
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