Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2002 / iii / Paper 32 / 3 / c / Solution

For European options with the same strike and maturity, the terminal payoff identity isThus long the call and short the put has the same terminal payoff as one stock less $X$ units of the maturity-$T$ zero-coupon bond. With no dividends, the stock strategy has no intervening payments. The law of one price gives put-call parity:Equivalently the two nonnegative terminal-payoff portfolios, call plus strike bond and put plus stock, agree in every state. The parity proof does not require lognormal stock prices or positive interest.

For American options the exercise times can differ, so equality of their maturity payoffs is not an identity between their full rights. Under the nonnegative-interest, non-dividend assumptions of part (a), $C_A=C_E$ while $P_A=P_E+{\Pi }_P$ with early-exercise premium ${\Pi }_P\ge 0$. Hencewhich generally differs from European parity. For a concrete limiting state, if the stock is zero and remains zero and interest is positive, then $C_A=C_E=0$, $P_A=X$ and $P_E=XB(t,T)<X$. European parity is not a general American-option equality. It holds in a particular case only when the relevant early-exercise premiums cancel, or both vanish.