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The Risks Caused By Foreign Currency Derivatives On The World's Leading Nutrition, Health And Wellness Group

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Nestlé S.A. is a Swiss company and owns a prestigious position being the world’s leading nutrition, health and wellness group (Nestlé, 2016). According to its annual report (2015), this company is exposed to many risks caused by movements in foreign currency exchange rates, interest rate and market prices. The foreign exchange risk comes from transactions and translations of foreign operations in Swiss Francs (CHF). The interest rate risk faces the borrowings at fixed and variable rates. The market price risk comes from commodity price and equity price. The former risk arises from world commodity market for the supplies of coffee, cocoa beans, sugar and others. The later risk arises from the fluctuations of the prices of investments held. (Nestle annual reports, 2015). Thus, financial derivatives instruments are used by this multinational corporation in order to hedge these risks.

Moreover, because of the huge worldwide extension of the corporation, which operates in 194 countries, the use of foreign currency derivatives to minimize the earnings volatility would be the subject of later analysis. The report will focus on how Nestlé uses futures and option contracts to hedge its exposure to currency risk, centering our attention in Nestlé Home Currency, the Swiss Franc in relation to the US Dollar (USD/CHF). It will be examined an example of its hedging strategy and the information provided by a contact in the firm.

2. Currency risk: USD/CHF

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