Hedging the Possibility of Russia invading Ukraine

Annapurna

Hedging the Possibility of Russia invading Ukraine — LessWrong

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[ Question ]

Hedging the Possibility of Russia invading Ukraine

by Annapurna

23rd Dec 2021

1 min read

5 8

32

Assume that you know with a high degree of confidence that Russia will invade Ukraine in February 2022.

Also assume that you have an investment portfolio invested 100% in VTI (Vanguard Total Stock Market Index).

You think that if Russia invades Ukraine, this will affect your portfolio in a negative way.

Aside from doing a direct hedge (Buying buts on VTI), in what other ways would you attempt to hedge your portfolio?

Ukraine/Russia Conflict (2022)PoliticsWarWorld Modeling

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Hedging the Possibility of Russia invading Ukraine

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Annapurna

Jan 23, 2022

220

I found the perfect hedge:

I bet $5,000 to win $33,500 that the following Metaculus question resolves YES https://metaculus.com/questions/8898/russian-invasion-of-ukraine-before-2023/…

Bet is voided if resolution is ambiguous.

[-]Liron4y60

Nicely done

[-]Pee Doom3y10

Did you actually bet the money?

Annapurna

Dec 23, 2021

100

A few ways to hedge that were floating in my head:

Long natural gas futures

Long Brent oil futures

Buy VIX calls

Buy DXY calls

Buy VGK puts

quanticle

Dec 23, 2021

You think that if Russia invades Ukraine, this will affect your portfolio in a negative way.

But why would you think this?

[-]Dagon5y20

https://twitter.com/RALee85/status/1476642007426777092

is a reasonable summary of what Russian military leaders might be thinking. I'd say invasion with long-term troops is still unlikely, but some form of hot conflict seems to be brewing.

2quanticle5y

I should have clarified. My question was not about whether Russia would or would not invade Ukraine. My question was, conditional on Russia invading Ukraine, why do you think your portfolio of investments would be negatively affected? The US and Russian economies are not tightly coupled. Yes, the uncertainty from a military act could cause price spikes (especially in commodities that Russia exports), but historically these have dissipated in a matter of months. So why not sit tight and do nothing?

[-]Dagon5y100

Knowing ONLY what you've just said, the direct hedge seems pretty smart. If you know other things (like more precision about the invasion, or specific components of VTI that will rise or fall), you can certainly make better trades.

But if that were the case, you'd probably already be trading in those components rather than VTI in the first place - money you have in giant indexes is because you're not claiming to know more than "the market" on any specific topic.

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