Untangling hotel industry’s inefficiency: An SFA approach applied to a renowned Portuguese hotel chain

The present paper explores the technical efficiency of four hotels from Teixeira Duarte Group - a renowned Portuguese hotel chain. An efficiency ranking is established from these four hotel units located in Portugal using Stochastic Frontier Analysis. This methodology allows to discriminate between measurement error and systematic inefficiencies in the estimation process enabling to investigate the main inefficiency causes. Several suggestions concerning efficiency improvement are undertaken for each hotel studied.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Forecasting: theory and practice

Forecasting has always been in the forefront of decision making and planning. The uncertainty that surrounds the future is both exciting and challenging, with individuals and organisations seeking to minimise risks and maximise utilities. The lack of a free-lunch theorem implies the need for a diverse set of forecasting methods to tackle an array of applications. This unique article provides a non-systematic review of the theory and the practice of forecasting. We offer a wide range of theoretical, state-of-the-art models, methods, principles, and approaches to prepare, produce, organise, and evaluate forecasts. We then demonstrate how such theoretical concepts are applied in a variety of real-life contexts, including operations, economics, finance, energy, environment, and social good. We do not claim that this review is an exhaustive list of methods and applications. The list was compiled based on the expertise and interests of the authors. However, we wish that our encyclopedic presentation will offer a point of reference for the rich work that has been undertaken over the last decades, with some key insights for the future of the forecasting theory and practice

Computational methodology for modelling the dynamics of statistical arbitrage

Recent years have seen the emergence of a multi-disciplinary research area known as "Computational Finance". In many cases the data generating processes of financial and other economic time-series are at best imperfectly understood. By allowing restrictive assumptions about price dynamics to be relaxed, recent advances in computational modelling techniques offer the possibility to discover new "patterns" in market activity. This thesis describes an integrated "statistical arbitrage" framework for identifying, modelling and exploiting small but consistent regularities in asset price dynamics. The methodology developed in the thesis combines the flexibility of emerging techniques such as neural networks and genetic algorithms with the rigour and diagnostic techniques which are provided by established modelling tools from the fields of statistics, econometrics and time-series forecasting. The modelling methodology which is described in the thesis consists of three main parts. The first part is concerned with constructing combinations of time-series which contain a significant predictable component, and is a generalisation of the econometric concept of cointegration. The second part of the methodology is concerned with building predictive models of the mispricing dynamics and consists of low-bias estimation procedures which combine elements of neural and statistical modelling. The third part of the methodology controls the risks posed by model selection and performance instability through actively encouraging diversification across a "portfolio of models". A novel population-based algorithm for joint optimisation of a set of trading strategies is presented, which is inspired both by genetic and evolutionary algorithms and by modern portfolio theory. Throughout the thesis the performance and properties of the algorithms are validated by means of experimental evaluation on synthetic data sets with known characteristics. The effectiveness of the methodology is demonstrated by extensive empirical analysis of real data sets, in particular daily closing prices of FTSE 100 stocks and international equity indices

Statistics in Finance

[no abstract available

Proceedings of the 35th International Workshop on Statistical Modelling : July 20- 24, 2020 Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain

466 p.The InternationalWorkshop on Statistical Modelling (IWSM) is a reference workshop in promoting statistical modelling, applications of Statistics for researchers, academics and industrialist in a broad sense. Unfortunately, the global COVID-19 pandemic has not allowed holding the 35th edition of the IWSM in Bilbao in July 2020. Despite the situation and following the spirit of the Workshop and the Statistical Modelling Society, we are delighted to bring you the proceedings book of extended abstracts

Change-point Problem and Regression: An Annotated Bibliography

The problems of identifying changes at unknown times and of estimating the location of changes in stochastic processes are referred to as the change-point problem or, in the Eastern literature, as disorder . The change-point problem, first introduced in the quality control context, has since developed into a fundamental problem in the areas of statistical control theory, stationarity of a stochastic process, estimation of the current position of a time series, testing and estimation of change in the patterns of a regression model, and most recently in the comparison and matching of DNA sequences in microarray data analysis. Numerous methodological approaches have been implemented in examining change-point models. Maximum-likelihood estimation, Bayesian estimation, isotonic regression, piecewise regression, quasi-likelihood and non-parametric regression are among the methods which have been applied to resolving challenges in change-point problems. Grid-searching approaches have also been used to examine the change-point problem. Statistical analysis of change-point problems depends on the method of data collection. If the data collection is ongoing until some random time, then the appropriate statistical procedure is called sequential. If, however, a large finite set of data is collected with the purpose of determining if at least one change-point occurred, then this may be referred to as non-sequential. Not surprisingly, both the former and the latter have a rich literature with much of the earlier work focusing on sequential methods inspired by applications in quality control for industrial processes. In the regression literature, the change-point model is also referred to as two- or multiple-phase regression, switching regression, segmented regression, two-stage least squares (Shaban, 1980), or broken-line regression. The area of the change-point problem has been the subject of intensive research in the past half-century. The subject has evolved considerably and found applications in many different areas. It seems rather impossible to summarize all of the research carried out over the past 50 years on the change-point problem. We have therefore confined ourselves to those articles on change-point problems which pertain to regression. The important branch of sequential procedures in change-point problems has been left out entirely. We refer the readers to the seminal review papers by Lai (1995, 2001). The so called structural change models, which occupy a considerable portion of the research in the area of change-point, particularly among econometricians, have not been fully considered. We refer the reader to Perron (2005) for an updated review in this area. Articles on change-point in time series are considered only if the methodologies presented in the paper pertain to regression analysis

Multivariate financial econometrics: with applications to volatility modelling, option pricing and asset allocation

EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Proceedings of the 35th International Workshop on Statistical Modelling : July 20- 24, 2020 Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain

466 p.The InternationalWorkshop on Statistical Modelling (IWSM) is a reference workshop in promoting statistical modelling, applications of Statistics for researchers, academics and industrialist in a broad sense. Unfortunately, the global COVID-19 pandemic has not allowed holding the 35th edition of the IWSM in Bilbao in July 2020. Despite the situation and following the spirit of the Workshop and the Statistical Modelling Society, we are delighted to bring you the proceedings book of extended abstracts

Volatility and correlation: Modeling and forecasting using Support Vector Machines

Several Realized Volatility and Correlation estimators have been introduced. The estimators which are defined based on high frequency data converge to the true estimators faster than their counterparts even under Market Microstructure Noise. Also a strategy for multivariate volatility estimation has been introduced. The strategy which is an incorporation of Support Vector Machine with Multiresolution Analysis based on wavelets affords higher performance of estimation than the single estimation