wrote on 8/17/2018 2:41 PM:
I was never much good at forecasting financial markets. So several months
before delivery of my ASW 24 in late 1991, I began worrying that the exchange
rate (D-mark) would move against me. So I bought a DM call option. I forget the
amount but the contract almost covered what I owed Schleicher. It was slightly
out of the money with a short-term expiration date so it seemed like cheap
insurance. If the exchange rate remained the same or the DM weakened, I would
lose only the small amount invested. But when the day arrived, the DM had
appreciated a bit and my option was now slightly in the money. So I had a
modest gain to offset the higher amount of US$ I would have to pay for my DMs.
I was about to close out my position when I discovered that the type of option
I had bought (European style?) allowed me to exercise through my brokerage
account and actually take delivery of the underlying currency in any bank
account I wished, in this case Schleicher's bank. Wow! I avoided various wire
transfer fees plus currency conversion costs and got the "big bank" exchange
rate. OK, the savings weren't huge: IIRC, on the order of $500 in total. But I
was pretty pleased with myself. That was my last new glider.

For first new glider I bought (ASW20C), I researched currency markets, trying to
figure out what to do. The dealer, John Murray, told me "If I was any good at
understanding currency markets, I'd be buying gliders instead of selling them". By
the time I figured out the perfect strategy, the Mark had fallen to long-time low,
and I got the glider cheap when I converted my dollars to Marks.

When I bought my second new glider (ASH26E), I used the same approach, but the
Mark kept going up and up and ... So, lost ground on that one, but it's been a
terrific glider for 25 seasons, and my wife loves it ("it always gets home").

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"
https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1
- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Dec 2014a" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm

http://soaringsafety.org/prevention/...anes-2014A.pdf