Most financial and investment decisions are based on considerations of possible future changes and require forecasts on the evolution of the financial world. Time series and processes are the natural tools for describing the dynamic behavior of financial data, leading to the required forecasts. This book presents a survey of the empirical properties of financial time series, their descriptions by means of mathematical processes, and some implications for important financial applications used in many areas like risk evaluation, option pricing or portfolio construction. The statistical tools used to extract information from raw data are introduced. Extensive multiscale empirical statistics provide a solid benchmark of stylized facts (heteroskedasticity, long memory, fat-tails, leverage...), in order to assess various mathematical structures that can capture the observed regularities. The author introduces a broad range of processes and evaluates them systematically against the benchmark, summarizing the successes and limitations of these models from an empirical point of view. The outcome is that only multiscale ARCH processes with long memory, discrete multiplicative structures and non-normal innovations are able to capture correctly the empirical properties. In particular, only a discrete time series framework allows to capture all the stylized facts in a process, whereas the stochastic calculus used in the continuum limit is too constraining. The present volume offers various applications and extensions for this class of processes including high-frequency volatility estimators, market risk evaluation, covariance estimation and multivariate extensions of the processes. The book discusses many practical implications and is addressed to practitioners and quants in the financial industry, as well as to academics, including graduate (Master or PhD level) students. The prerequisites are basic statistics and some elementary financial mathematics.

The theory of Markov decision processes focuses on controlled Markov chains in discrete time. The authors establish the theory for general state and action spaces and at the same time show its application by means of numerous examples, mostly taken from the fields of finance and operations research. By using a structural approach many technicalities (concerning measure theory) are avoided. They cover problems with finite and infinite horizons, as well as partially observable Markov decision processes, piecewise deterministic Markov decision processes and stopping problems. The book presents Markov decision processes in action and includes various state-of-the-art applications with a particular view towards finance. It is useful for upper-level undergraduates, Master's students and researchers in both applied probability and finance, and provides exercises (without solutions).

Financial engineering has been proven to be a useful tool for risk management, but using the theory in practice requires a thorough understanding of the risks and ethical standards involved. Stochastic Processes with Applications to Finance, Second Edition presents the mathematical theory of financial engineering using only basic mathematical tools

A much-needed introduction to the field of discrete-valued time series, with a focus on count-data time series Time series analysis is an essential tool in a wide array of fields, including business, economics, computer science, epidemiology, finance, manufacturing and meteorology, to name just a few. Despite growing interest in discrete-valued time series—especially those arising from counting specific objects or events at specified times—most books on time series give short shrift to that increasingly important subject area. This book seeks to rectify that state of affairs by providing a much needed introduction to discrete-valued time series, with particular focus on count-data time series. The main focus of this book is on modeling. Throughout numerous examples are provided illustrating models currently used in discrete-valued time series applications. Statistical process control, including various control charts (such as cumulative sum control charts), and performance evaluation are treated at length. Classic approaches like ARMA models and the Box-Jenkins program are also featured with the basics of these approaches summarized in an Appendix. In addition, data examples, with all relevant R code, are available on a companion website. Provides a balanced presentation of theory and practice, exploring both categorical and integer-valued series Covers common models for time series of counts as well as for categorical time series, and works out their most important stochastic properties Addresses statistical approaches for analyzing discrete-valued time series and illustrates their implementation with numerous data examples Covers classical approaches such as ARMA models, Box-Jenkins program and how to generate functions Includes dataset examples with all necessary R code provided on a companion website An Introduction to Discrete-Valued Time Series is a valuable working resource for researchers and practitioners in a broad range of fields, including statistics, data science, machine learning, and engineering. It will also be of interest to postgraduate students in statistics, mathematics and economics.

Model a Wide Range of Count Time Series Handbook of Discrete-Valued Time Series presents state-of-the-art methods for modeling time series of counts and incorporates frequentist and Bayesian approaches for discrete-valued spatio-temporal data and multivariate data. While the book focuses on time series of counts, some of the techniques discussed ca

The purpose of this book is to provide a rigorous yet accessible introduction to the modern financial theory of security markets. The main subjects are derivatives and portfolio management. The book is intended to be used as a text by advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students. It is also likely to be useful to practicing financial engineers, portfolio manager, and actuaries who wish to acquire a fundamental understanding of financial theory. The book makes heavy use of mathematics, but not at an advanced level. Various mathematical concepts are developed as needed, and computational examples are emphasized.

The De Gruyter Series in Probability and Stochastics is devoted to the publication of high-level monographs and specialized graduate texts in any branch of modern probability theory and stochastics, along with their numerous applications in other parts of mathematics, physics and informatics, in economics and finance, and in the life sciences. The aim of the series is to present recent research results in the form of authoritative and comprehensive works that will serve the probability and stochastics community as basis for further research. Editorial Board Itai Benjamini, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel Jean Bertoin, Universität Zürich, Switzerland Michel Ledoux, Université de Toulouse, France René L. Schilling, Technische Universität Dresden, Germany

This book consists of a series of new, peer-reviewed papers in stochastic processes, analysis, filtering and control, with particular emphasis on mathematical finance, actuarial science and engineering. Paper contributors include colleagues, collaborators and former students of Robert Elliott, many of whom are world-leading experts and have made fundamental and significant contributions to these areas.This book provides new important insights and results by eminent researchers in the considered areas, which will be of interest to researchers and practitioners. The topics considered will be diverse in applications, and will provide contemporary approaches to the problems considered. The areas considered are rapidly evolving. This volume will contribute to their development, and present the current state-of-the-art stochastic processes, analysis, filtering and control.Contributing authors include: H Albrecher, T Bielecki, F Dufour, M Jeanblanc, I Karatzas, H-H Kuo, A Melnikov, E Platen, G Yin, Q Zhang, C Chiarella, W Fleming, D Madan, R Mamon, J Yan, V Krishnamurthy.

The Handbook of Financial Time Series gives an up-to-date overview of the field and covers all relevant topics both from a statistical and an econometrical point of view. There are many fine contributions, and a preamble by Nobel Prize winner Robert F. Engle.

The field of financial econometrics has exploded over the last decade This book represents an integration of theory, methods, and examples using the S-PLUS statistical modeling language and the S+FinMetrics module to facilitate the practice of financial econometrics. This is the first book to show the power of S-PLUS for the analysis of time series data. It is written for researchers and practitioners in the finance industry, academic researchers in economics and finance, and advanced MBA and graduate students in economics and finance. Readers are assumed to have a basic knowledge of S-PLUS and a solid grounding in basic statistics and time series concepts. This Second Edition is updated to cover S+FinMetrics 2.0 and includes new chapters on copulas, nonlinear regime switching models, continuous-time financial models, generalized method of moments, semi-nonparametric conditional density models, and the efficient method of moments. Eric Zivot is an associate professor and Gary Waterman Distinguished Scholar in the Economics Department, and adjunct associate professor of finance in the Business School at the University of Washington. He regularly teaches courses on econometric theory, financial econometrics and time series econometrics, and is the recipient of the Henry T. Buechel Award for Outstanding Teaching. He is an associate editor of Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics and Econometrics. He has published papers in the leading econometrics journals, including Econometrica, Econometric Theory, the Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, Journal of Econometrics, and the Review of Economics and Statistics. Jiahui Wang is an employee of Ronin Capital LLC. He received a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Washington in 1997. He has published in leading econometrics journals such as Econometrica and Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, and is the Principal Investigator of National Science Foundation SBIR grants. In 2002 Dr. Wang was selected as one of the "2000 Outstanding Scholars of the 21st Century" by International Biographical Centre.