1. How exactly does a hostage situation influence the put options on gold?
2. Did Ryder set up the other two accomplices to get caught near the end?
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The movie has a plot hole?!?
EVERY FRIGGIN' MOVIE HAS A FRIGGIN' PLOT HOLE!!!!! (¬_¬)
For point 1, I was wondering the same when I heard that bit.
Gold was going up (as it does in times of trouble, being a safe haven asset - see gold prices around 2008). A put is the right to sell an asset at a fixed price (set when the contract is struck). In this case, puts aren't going to make you much.
But I don't think they said gold, they were looking at equities at the time and I assume were referring to that. The equity markets were plummeting. This would result from the lack of confidence, causing people to sell off. This has been observed in real life and there are conspiracy theories that market manipulation was at least a by product if not the goal of 9/11. So if the market falls, you exercise the put and sell the asset for more than it's currently worth.
So they had the right idea, but just looked in the wrong place (although found him...by checking old flight records?!). Ryder probably actually took calls on gold. Although I really don't think he could have turned $2m in to $307m with calls on gold by a hijack - even if premiums were low he'd need gold to more than double (did anyone catch what the prices did do?)
For point 2, I took the view that he didn't, but also didn't care and would be happy for their capture to be a distraction for his escape.