All Questions

511 views

A non parametric study of VaR with kernel density

I'm working in order to compare the calculation of the VaR between the methodology of copulas and kernel density, all this by using the software r. The process that I follow is: Obtain a sample (...
360 views

What are the major characteristics of natural gas volatility and options?

Seasonality is a big deal in the natural gas markets. My understanding is that they are broadly divided into summer and winter, with seasonality in both price and the volatility. What does this ...
290 views

penalizing negative skewness by linking $U(\mu)$ and $U(\Sigma)$

Consider $U_1(\mu,\Sigma)$ and $U_2(\mu,\Sigma)$, where $U_1(\mu, \cdot) = U_2(\mu, \cdot)$, $U_1(\cdot, \Sigma) = U_2(\cdot, \Sigma)$ such that \begin{equation*} arg\inf\limits_{\mu \in U_1(\mu, \...
278 views

Deriving the definition of stochastic integrals with respect to Ito processes from first principles

When I first encountered the definition of integrals with respect to Ito processes (Shreve's Stochastic Calculus for Finance Vol II), I didn't think twice. However, I wanted to see if the definition ...
777 views

How to price a Swing Option?

I'm working in the commodity market and I've to price Swing Options with MATLAB, preferably with finite element. Has anyone already priced these kind of derivatives? I'm thinking about using the ...
583 views

Alternative ways to understand time-varying comovement between two time-series?

I have been looking into ways to better understand how the dependencies/correlations/etc between two time series can vary over time. I first thought about using a Kalman/particle filter over a ...
508 views

22k views

Strategy of Renaissance Technologies Medallion fund: Holy Grail or next Madoff?

Renaissance Technologies Medallion fund is one of the most successful hedge funds - ever! Yet it is very secretive. Do you have information on the strategy used that is not yet mentioned in the ...
1k views

When to shut down a trend following strategy?

Suppose I have trend following strategy(on close to close data) that is not getting acceptable returns for some time. When should I start thinking about shutting it down?
4k views

When to use Monte Carlo simulation over analytical methods for options pricing?

I've been using Monte Carlo simulation (MC) for pricing vanilla options with non-lognormal underlyings returns. I'm tempted to start using MC as my primary option-valuating technique as I can get ...
1k views

How do I estimate the joint probability of stock B moving, if stock A moves?

I have two stocks, A and B, that are correlated in some way. If I know (hypothetically) that stock A has a 60% chance of rising tomorrow, and I know the joint probability between stocks A and B, how ...
1k views

4k views

Best way to store hourly/daily options data for research purposes

There are quite a few discussions here about storage, but I can't find quite what I'm looking for. I'm in need to design a database to store (mostly) option data (strikes, premiums bid / ask, etc.). ...
518 views

How to group timeseries showing similar curve

I am trying to classify similar looking curves of a timeseries and was wondering what is the best algorithm to research. Reading R, it looks like k-means clustering could be applied - but I don't know ...
3k views

How can I compare distributions using only mean and standard deviation?

I only have means and standard deviations of samples of two random variables. What technique can I use to determine how similar the distributions these describe are? Assume that the values are built ...
3k views

How does volatility affect the price of binary options?

In theory, how should volatility affect the price of a binary option? A typical out the money option has more extrinsic value and therefore volatility plays a much more noticeable factor. Now let's ...
5k views

R code for Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process

Can any one help me with some R code to run Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process?
20k views

What is the Swap Curve?

What is the so-called Swap Curve, and how does it relate to the Zero Curve (or spot yield curve)? Does it only refer to a curve of swap rates versus maturities found in the market? Or is it a swap ...
1k views

I am looking for academic articles which model the p&L of market makers. I have read the Ho-Stoll (1984) article. Is there any recent article on this subject?
449 views

Processes used in quant finance

What are the main stochastic processes (and their SDE) used in quant finance? For example to model currency prices, stock prices, etc.
9k views

Worked examples of applying Ito's lemma

In most textbooks Ito's lemma is derived (on different levels of technicality depending on the intended audience) and then only the classic examples of Geometric Brownian motion and the Black-Scholes ...
1k views

When hiring a quant, how can I protect my IP?

I am a one-man operation, and would like to hire a quant for around 4 weeks or work. I am worried that the person I hire might copy my data or the indicators that I have him work on. What have ...
3k views

Why a self-financing replicating portfolio should always exist?

According to my understanding the derivation of the Black-Scholes PDE is based on the assumption that the price of the option should change in time in such a way that it should be possible to ...
551 views

What methods do I need to learn in order forecast asset price movements?

What are the standard models used to forecast asset price movements? For example, if I were to trade an option, what model would I use in conjunction with option pricing models to forecast the stock ...
778 views

Are e-mini markets manipulated?

Are the prices of e-minis such as S&P 500, Russell 2000, EUROSTOXX, etc. manipulated? That is, are there traders who trade large enough positions to make the price go in the direction they want, ...
2k views

How to solve for the implied stock lending rate given equity options prices?

When market makers price options on hard-to-borrow equities, they include the cost to borrow the underlying equity that their broker is going to charge them to sell the security short to hedge. I'm ...
7k views

Rationale for OIS discounting for collateralized derivatives?

Can someone explain to me the rationale for why the market may be moving towards OIS discounting for fully collateralized derivatives?
788 views

Reference request: Survey article on GPU in Finance

I would like to get and idea of how people use GPUs in finance. I can find some specific papers or books on the subject. GPUs in binomial model, finite difference, monte carlo,... But I couldn't ...
998 views

Is it ever possible that---because of illiquidity---exercising an out-of-the-money option is better than directly buying the stock?

Is there a case, where due to illiquidity, exercising out-of-the-money options could be better than directly buying the stock? When a stock is too illiquid, there are some costs because of this ...
232 views

Why are futures valueless?

I understand that futures exchanges are set up in such a way that traders don't pay cash in order to assume a long position on a futures contract; they simply "enter into" the contract, essentially ...
819 views

How to compute performance attribution between daily rebalanced strategies?

I have a daily rebalanced portfolio of several strategies. After one month, I now want to attribute the performance to the different strategies. There are several ways to do it. For instance one ...
3k views

Equity Risk Model Using PCA

I'm trying to build a simple risk model for stocks using PCA. I've noticed that when my dimensions are larger than the number of observations (for example 1000 stocks but only 250 days of returns), ...
1k views

How to conduct Monte Carlo simulations to test validity of Black Scholes for a specific option?

In reference to the original Black Scholes model, what approach is best to test the model in a rigorous way? Is there a standard approach that can accomplish this in a reasonable amount of time? ...
678 views

If stock A has a 60% chance of rising, and stocks A and B have 80% correlation, what is the chance of stock B rising?

As in the subject, I'm interested in a math puzzle of sorts: If stock A has a 60% chance of rising, and stocks A and B have an 80% correlation, what is the chance of stock B rising? Would it be ...
3k views

What is an effective way of backtesting VWAP execution?

From Optimal Trading Strategies : There are two main reasons why traders execute orders using a VWAP trading strategy. First, a VWAP strategy is the trading strategy that minimizes market ...
8k views

Are there any free c++ libraries that would have some of the functions that would be used in developing a trading strategy. For instance, calculating drawdown, Volatility Forecasting, MAE, MFE....etc. ...
6k views

What are the main limitations of Black Scholes?

Pls explain and discuss these limitations, and explain which models can I use to overcome these limitations. Alternatively, provide examples of how to modify the original Black Scholes to overcome ...
2k views

Is there a technique for using xts or zoo objects with options data (i.e., many entries per date) in R?

I am starting to work with options data from optionmetrics. I use data frames, but it seems like xts or zoo objects are the way to go for features and speed. I can't figure out the best work-around to ...