Your $1,000,000 portfolio includes investments of $200,000 in cash (with duration of 0) and $800,000 in a stock fund with duration of 15. Your only liabilities are for your graduate school debt which has a present value of $400,000 and a duration of 6. The yield curve is flat at 4%.
(a) What is the value of your equity?
(b) What is the duration of your equity?
(c) If you wanted to immunize the value of your equity (set its duration = 0) by selling a percentage of the stock fund and investing in cash, how much in dollar value terms would you need to have in cash and how much would need to have in the stock fund to achieve this goal?
(d) Assume that you did not immunize your portfolio, using duration analysis, how much would you estimate the value of your equity to change if interest rates changed to 4.2%?