# Tag Info

## Hot answers tagged calibration

3

I highly recommend you to stick with the error function (RMSE) value minimization approach. I love MC techniques for this and related problem solving and thus do not recommend you to use anything else because of its simplicity and transparency. It comes down to using the right discretization function and to possibly implement variance reduction approaches. ...

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Doesn't the Heston model have some Fourier transform formulae for pricing vanillas? I think one could use those to calibrate to the vanillas. Can't provide references at this moment, on the road. Edit: check out http://www.visixion.com/dok/Visixion_Calibrating_Heston.pdf -- I haven't read this closely but it sounds familiar

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You can find the derivation of the Heston characteristic function (its Fourier Transform) in Gatheral (2006). Using the characteristic function, you can optimize the model on the prices. There are multiple approaches to optimize, among others pattern search (which is very slow) and stochastic optimization (randomly jump around and stop after n iterations), ...

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The Hull-White model can represents the risk free rate as a stochastic process, that is, in terms of expected return and volatility. The zero curve only gives you expected returns and you have to find a source to calibrate volatility, as FQuant told you. Common volatility sources used for this calibration are historical series of the zero curve or ...

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The one-factor Hull-White model is given by $$dr(t) = (\theta(t) - \alpha\; r(t))\,dt + \sigma\, dW(t)\,\!.$$ The zero curves are only sufficient for the calibration of the parameter $\theta(t)$, which is given in terms of them by $$\theta\mathrm{(t)=}\frac{\partial f(0,t)}{\partial T}+\alpha f(0,t)+\frac{\sigma^2}{2a}(1-e^{-2\alpha t}),$$ where ...

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Jim Gatherals Book deals with the models you mention and gives an intuitive understanding about calibration and issues that arise. Mostly basic stuff, but very useful if you're just starting out. Also very understandable without an extensive math background.

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Here's a decent study of calibration performance using fast fourier transforms versus other techniques. It concludes Gaussian quadrature works better than other techniques. http://www.frankfurt-school.de/dms/publications-cqf/CPQF_Arbeits6.pdf Edit: AZhu points out the link above is dead and that a working link is ...

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