# Tag Info

13

You can use changepoint analysis to identify regime change. You can also look at large angle differences in the eigenvectors between your most up-to-date/recent covariance matrix and the covariance matrix from the prior window. Another way to identify regime change is using a factor model. If the returns on a particular set of factors is X standard ...

13

Short of having a 'reasonable' predictive model for expected returns and the covariance matrix, there are a couple lines of attack. Shrinkage estimators (via Bayesian inference or Stein-class of estimators) Robust portfolio optimization Michaud's Resampled Efficient Frontier Imposing norm constraints on portfolio weights Naively, shrinkage methods ...

11

Perhaps you may want to consider article by D. Levine - Modeling Tail Behavior with Extreme Value Theory who gives practicale example on how EVT can be used to calculate probabilities on returns in tails with use of the Pickands-Balkema-de Haan Theorem and generalized Pareto distribution. It also contains some criterias and points on other methods that can ...

10

I highly recommend the Maximum Entropy Bootstrap for time series, implemented by the meboot package in R. In my work, I've stopped using both the block bootstrap and residuals bootstrap in favor of meboot, and I am pleased with the results. Hrishikesh Vinod, the researcher behind meboot, described it in his talk at UseR/2010 last year. The algorithm is ...

10

Both answers from Shane and Vishal Belsare make sense and detail different models. In my experience, I have never been satisfied by a unique model since the majority of papers out there can be split in two categories: Those that predict the mean component of the problem. Those that predict the variance component of the problem. The ideal (to read ...

10

One approach is Conditional Value at Risk (CVaR) a.k.a. Expected Shortfall (ES). It does, as you suggest, take into account the whole set of returns. However, instead of traditional VaR which asks "what is the worst 1% or 5% loss I can expect" in a given time frame, conditional VaR asks "assuming I sustain losses of at least 95% or 99% (and perhaps am ...

7

A block bootstrap makes sense to me. (If the term doesn't make sense to you, I explain it at the end.) In order to pick the block size, I would essentially do a grid search: pick the largest feasible block size pick a smallest reasonable block size pick how many block sizes you feel like testing I'd run the selected bootstraps and see if there was a ...

7

You raise a very important point, which unfortunately doesn't have a simple answer. Black-Litterman addresses the allocation problem by allowing you to provide a prior within a bayesian framework. It doesn't really tell you how to produce the prior itself. But more importantly, it doesn't address the fundamental problem: it's difficult to accurately ...

6

Nonlinear optimization algorithms are very susceptible to starting points, so some problems with same structure can become difficult to solve compared to others. A few suggestions: For a few instances where you are having difficulty in getting answers, try using another solver. You can try Excel, Matlab or R, all of which can be used for fitting. Try ...

6

Estimating $MA(q)$ models is significantly harder than $AR(p)$ models. Eviews, MATLAB and R can use multiple algorithms which are all based on some form of maximum likelihood estimation. You can look at the source of MATLAB and R or the excellent Eviews documentation. However, I strongly advise against rolling your own since efficient and well tested ...

6

What you refer to as the 99.5th percentile is known as the "Value-at-Risk." You are correct that you will need to make a distributional assumption, and there is a popular and well-researched approach to this problem, though I'm not certain it could be called "standard." I would recommend you use the "truncated Levy flight" distribution. James Xiong at ...

6

I personally use the simple Garch(1,1) for volatility filtering in the risk management area. In fact in most cases I don't even estimate the parameters, I stick 0.94 for mean reversion, 0.04 for the squared error and I get the constant by matching the series variance. My experience is that there is no point pretending to finetune parameters when vol is ...

5

The blog post http://www.portfolioprobe.com/2011/11/21/asynchrony-in-market-data/ explains a bit more about the problem and it also points to a paper that shows that a moving average model is the way to make the adjustment that Tal is seeking. The paper is presented in the context of a multivariate garch model. That is gratuitous, really -- the MA estimate ...

5

I think an extremely interesting strand of research on this topic is represented by extensions of vine copulas with time-varying parameters. For vine copulas in general have a look at this site from the Technische Universität München: Vine Copula Models One of their research projects, which is the most relevant in this context, is:Time varying vine copula ...

5

I would suggest a multivariate garch model as a possibility. We aren't exactly overrun with wonderful software for that, but with just bivariate data I would think that the in-sample correlation estimates would be reasonably robust over models and estimation. It would be good to try two or three ways of doing it to make sure I'm right about that. You may ...

4

You could try measuring autocorrelation at varying lags, as described here, and then choose your optimal block size according to the results of this test, i.e. if there is significant autocorrelation up to and including lag 5, your block size should be no larger than 5.

4

Very interesting question. I am not an expert on the subject, however, I was able to find a collection of papers on the subject that should get you started. Here is a good and very informative paper that walks you through several tick by tick volatility estimators that seek to reduce the volatility imposed by market micro-structure: Efficient estimation of ...

4

The use of kernels to estimate volatility using intraday data is "nothing more" than combining: intraday volatility estimation kernel smoothing Thus you have to take care about the "usual pits" of these two approaches. Intraday volatility estimation. I hope you know the "signature plot" effect. Of course if you use the proper estimation method, it ...

3

One approach would be Engle (2002) dynamic conditional correlations. Taking your $Y_t$ and $X_t$, I will make the simplifying assumption that the mean equation of these is: $$\boxed{Y_t = \mu_y + \varepsilon_{y,t}}$$ $$\boxed{X_t = \mu_x + \varepsilon_{x,t}}$$ with $\varepsilon_{y,t} = z_{y,t} \sigma_{y,t} \sim N(0,\sigma_{y,t})$, $\varepsilon_{x,t} = ... 3 The answer to the original question is simple: the Chopra-Ziemba paper is highly flawed and unreliable. Note that the framework is in-sample and based on a utility function. It has nothing to do with out-of-sample behavior of the mean vs. the covariance in an optimization. Estimation error grows linearly in the mean but quadratically in the covariance. At ... 3 The pdfs of Student-t distributions have asymptotically Paretian tails, and the tail shape parameter (aka the maximal moment exponent) is equal to the distribution's degrees of freedom parameter. Assuming you have enough observations, you could estimate the Pareto parameter using the so-called Hill method (named after Bruce Hill, 1975). A word of caution: ... 3 There are many techniques, but I would begin with Stambaugh Analyzing Investments Whose Histories Differ in Lengths. The full information maximum likelihood approach he describes basically involves regressing the short history series against the long history series to obtain the covariance with the longer history securities and adding back the covariance of ... 3 Since you're asking on a quant finance forum, the mathematical approach would be Decide on a model that the stock price follows, and Compute the expected value of the price, conditional on the most recent price. A famous model, made ubiquitous by Black, Scholes and Merton, is a geometric Brownian motion. Under this model, the stock price$S_T$at time ... 3$\alpha=0$does not imply constant volatility. Consider just a simple Garch(1,1):$\sigma^2_t = \omega + \alpha \eta_t^2 + \beta \sigma^2_{t-1}$Note that:$\sigma^2_t = \omega + (\alpha + \beta) \eta_t^2 - \beta (\eta_t^2- \sigma^2_{t-1})$Now add$\eta_{t+1}^2$to both sides:$\eta_{t+1}^2 = \omega + (\alpha + \beta) \eta_t^2 - \beta (\eta_t^2- ...

2

Here's an answer from a purely statistical point of view: http://www.duke.edu/~rnau/regnotes.htm#constant And another from Cross Validated: http://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/7948/when-is-it-ok-to-remove-the-intercept-in-lm The lean in both cases is to include the intercept unless there is a strong theoretical reason. A more satisfying answer would ...

2

Time-series regression is not a great method for determining betas on individual securities. Rather, the most common method used by the commercial risk model providers is called "predicted beta" or "fundamental beta." The leader in this area is Barra. The way they define the predicted beta, it appears that they include the constant in the regression.

2

I like the function b.star in the np package for R to select the block size and pass it to tsboot although I don't have the math background to determine whether this is the best method.

2

Unless it is due to random chance, there seems to be a bias in your estimation method for $\kappa$, and this bias appears to depend on the size of the sample. This may be revealing a deeper underlying problem with your technique that will ultimately make it clearer what the tradeoff is between accuracy and sample size. I do not believe it should be the ...

2

I would recommend to use simple standard deviation (among the 2 options you offered). You are performing time series analysis of historical data points, you are not forecasting. Thus, why exposing yourself to a much more computationally intensive method? May I also point you to a related (not duplicate) thread: Why are GARCH models used to forecast ...

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