Synthetic Financial Instruments
Synthetic financial instruments are artificially created investment vehicles or instruments intended to meet requirements not met by existing, conventional instruments. They are designed to reduce risk, increase diversification or offer a higher return. A synthetic floating rate instrument can be produced by combining a fixed-rate bond and an interest rate swap. Or an asset with the same risks and rewards as the underlying share can be created by the purchase of a call option and the simultaneous sale of a put option on the same share.
See also: Synthetic CDO, Synthetic Lease