The Calibration of Some Stochastic Volatility Models Used in Mathematical Finance

Stochastic volatility models are used in mathematical finance to describe the dynamics of asset prices. In these models, the asset price is modeled as a stochastic process depending on time implicitly defined by a stochastic differential Equation. The volatility of the asset price itself is modeled as a stochastic process depending on time whose dynamics is described by a stochastic differential Equation. The stochastic differential Equations for the asset price and for the volatility are coupled and together with the necessary initial conditions and correlation assumptions constitute the model. Note that the stochastic volatility is not observable in the financial markets. In order to use these models, for example, to evaluate prices of derivatives on the asset or to forecast asset prices, it is necessary to calibrate them. That is, it is necessary to estimate starting from a set of data the values of the initial volatility and of the unknown parameters that appear in the asset price/volatility dynamic Equations. These data usually are observations of the asset prices and/or of the prices of derivatives on the asset at some known times. We analyze some stochastic volatility models summarizing merits and weaknesses of each of them. We point out that these models are examples of stochastic state space models and present the main techniques used to calibrate them. A calibration problem for the Heston model is solved using the maximum likelihood method. Some numerical experiments about the calibration of the Heston model involving synthetic and real data are presented

Clinical Features, Cardiovascular Risk Profile, and Therapeutic Trajectories of Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Candidate for Oral Semaglutide Therapy in the Italian Specialist Care

Introduction: This study aimed to address therapeutic inertia in the management of type 2 diabetes (T2D) by investigating the potential of early treatment with oral semaglutide. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted between October 2021 and April 2022 among specialists treating individuals with T2D. A scientific committee designed a data collection form covering demographics, cardiovascular risk, glucose control metrics, ongoing therapies, and physician judgments on treatment appropriateness. Participants completed anonymous patient questionnaires reflecting routine clinical encounters. The preferred therapeutic regimen for each patient was also identified. Results: The analysis was conducted on 4449 patients initiating oral semaglutide. The population had a relatively short disease duration (42%  60% of patients, and more often than sitagliptin or empagliflozin. Conclusion: The study supports the potential of early implementation of oral semaglutide as a strategy to overcome therapeutic inertia and enhance T2D management

A Trading Execution Model Based on Mean Field Games and Optimal Control

We present a trading execution model that describes the behaviour of a big trader and of a multitude of retail traders operating on the shares of a risky asset. The retail traders are modeled as a population of “conservative” investors that: 1) behave in a similar way, 2) try to avoid abrupt changes in their trading strategies, 3) want to limit the risk due to the fact of having open positions on the asset shares, 4) in the long run want to have a given position on the asset shares. The big trader wants to maximize the revenue resulting from the action of buying or selling a (large) block of asset shares in a given time interval. The behaviour of the retail traders and of the big trader is modeled using respectively a mean field game model and an optimal control problem. These models are coupled by the asset share price dynamic equation. The trading execution strategy adopted by the retail traders is obtained solving the mean field game model. This strategy is used to formulate the optimal control problem that determines the behaviour of the big trader. The previous mathematical models are solved using the dynamic programming principle. In some special cases explicit solutions of the previous models are found. An extensive numerical study of the trading execution model proposed is presented. The interested reader is referred to the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance/w19 to find material including animations, an interactive application and an app that helps the understanding of the paper. A general reference to the work of the authors and of their coauthors in mathematical finance is the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance

The Use of Statistical Tests to Calibrate the Black-Scholes Asset Dynamics Model Applied to Pricing Options with Uncertain Volatility

A new method for calibrating the Black-Scholes asset price dynamics model is proposed. The data used to test the calibration problem included observations of asset prices over a finite set of (known) equispaced discrete time values. Statistical tests were used to estimate the statistical significance of the two parameters of the Black-Scholes model: the volatility and the drift. The effects of these estimates on the option pricing problem were investigated. In particular, the pricing of an option with uncertain volatility in the Black-Scholes framework was revisited, and a statistical significance was associated with the price intervals determined using the Black-Scholes-Barenblatt equations. Numerical experiments involving synthetic and real data were presented. The real data considered were the daily closing values of the S&P500 index and the associated European call and put option prices in the year 2005. The method proposed here for calibrating the Black-Scholes dynamics model could be extended to other science and engineering models that may be expressed in terms of stochastic dynamical systems

The use of statistical tests to calibrate the normal SABR model

We investigate the idea of solving calibration problems for stochastic dynamical systems using statistical tests. We consider a specific stochastic dynamical system: the normal SABR model. The SABR model has been introduced in mathematical finance in 2002 by Hagan, Kumar, Lesniewski and Woodward. The model is a system of two stochastic differential equations whose independent variable is time and whose dependent variables are the forward prices/rates and the associated stochastic volatility. The normal SABR model is a special case of the SABR model. The calibration problem for the normal SABR model is an inverse problem that consists in determining the values of the parameters of the model from a set of data. We consider as set of data two different sets of forward prices/rates and we study the resulting calibration problems. Ad hoc statistical tests are developed to solve these calibration problems. Estimates with statistical significance of the parameters of the model are obtained. Let be a constant, we consider multiple independent trajectories of the normal SABR model associated to given initial conditions assigned at time . In the first calibration problem studied the set of the forward prices/rates observed at time in this set of trajectories is used as data sample of a statistical test. The statistical test used to solve this calibration problem is based on some new formulae for the moments of the forward prices/rates variable of the normal SABR model. The second calibration problem studied uses as data sample the observations of the forward prices/rates made on a discrete set of given time values along a single trajectory of the normal SABR model. The statistical test used to solve this second calibration problem is based on the numerical evaluation of some high-dimensional integrals. The results obtained in the study of the normal SABR model are easily extended from mathematical finance to other contexts in science and engineering where stochastic models involving stochastic volatility or stochastic state space models are used

A Trading Execution Model Based on Mean Field Games and Optimal Control

We present a trading execution model that describes the behaviour of a big trader and of a multitude of retail traders operating on the shares of a risky asset. The retail traders are modeled as a population of \u201cconservative\u201d investors that: 1) behave in a similar way, 2) try to avoid abrupt changes in their trading strategies, 3) want to limit the risk due to the fact of having open positions on the asset shares, 4) in the long run want to have a given position on the asset shares. The big trader wants to maximize the revenue resulting from the action of buying or selling a (large) block of asset shares in a given time interval. The behaviour of the retail traders and of the big trader is modeled using respectively a mean field game model and an optimal control problem. These models are coupled by the asset share price dynamic equation. The trading execution strategy adopted by the retail traders is obtained solving the mean field game model. This strategy is used to formulate the optimal control problem that determines the behaviour of the big trader. The previous mathematical models are solved using the dynamic programming principle. In some special cases explicit solutions of the previous models are found. An extensive numerical study of the trading execution model proposed is presented. The interested reader is referred to the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance/w19 to find material including animations, an interactive application and an app that helps the understanding of the paper. A general reference to the work of the authors and of their coauthors in mathematical finance is the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance

Some Explicit Formulae for the Hull and White Stochastic Volatility Model

An explicit formula for the transition probability density function of the Hull and White stochastic volatility model in presence of nonzero correlation between the stochastic differentials of the Wiener processes on the right hand side of the model equations is presented. This formula gives the transition probability density function as a two dimensional integral of an explicitly known integrand. Previously an explicit formula for this probability density function was known only in the case of zero correlation. In the case of nonzero correlation from the formula for the transition probability density function we deduce formulae (expressed by integrals) for the price of European call and put options and closed form formulae (that do not involve integrals) for the moments of the asset price logarithm. These formulae are based on recent results on the Whittaker functions [1] and generalize similar formulae for the SABR and multiscale SABR models [2]. Using the option pricing formulae derived and the least squares method a calibration problem for the Hull and White model is formulated and solved numerically. The calibration problem uses as data a set of option prices. Experiments with real data are presented. The real data studied are those belonging to a time series of the USA S&P 500 index and of the prices of its European call and put options. The quality of the model and of the calibration procedure is established comparing the forecast option prices obtained using the calibrated model with the option prices actually observed in the financial market. The website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance/w17 contains some auxiliary material including animations and interactive applications that helps the understanding of this paper. More general references to the work of the authors and of their coauthors in mathematical finance are available in the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance

Filtering and maximum likelihood methods inthe calibration of some stochastic volatility models of mathematical finance

Lecture Notes in Decision Science

The Analysis of Real Data Using a Multiscale Stochastic Volatility Model

In this paper we use filtering and maximum likelihood methods to solve a calibration problem for a multiscale stochastic volatility model. The multiscale stochastic volatility model considered has been introduced in Fatone et al. (2009), generalises the Heston model and describes the dynamics of the asset price using as auxiliary variables two stochastic variances on two different time scales. The aim of this paper is to estimate the parameters of this multiscale model (including the risk premium parameters when necessary) and its two initial stochastic variances from the knowledge, at discrete times, of the asset price and, eventually, of the prices of call and/or put European options on the asset. This problem is translated into a maximum likelihood problem with the likelihood function defined through the solution of a filtering problem. Furthermore we develop a tracking procedure that is able to track the asset price and the values of its two stochastic variances for time values where there are no data available. Numerical examples of the solution of the calibration problem and of the performance of the tracking procedure using high frequency synthetic data and daily real data are presented. The real data studied are two time series of electric power price data taken from the US electricity market and the 2005 data relative to the US S&P 500 index and to the prices of a call and a put European option on the US S&P 500 index. The calibration procedure is applied to these data and the results of the calibration are used in the tracking procedure to forecast the asset and option prices. The forecasts of the asset prices and of the option prices are compared with the prices actually observed. This comparison shows that the forecasts are of very high quality even when we consider ‘spiky’ electric power price data. The website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance/w9 contains some auxiliary material including animations that help with the understanding of this paper. A more general reference to the work of the authors and of their coauthors in mathematical finance is the website: http://www.econ.univpm.it/recchioni/finance

Closed Form Moment Formulae for the Lognormal SABR Model and Applications to Calibration Problems

We study two calibration problems for the lognormal SABR model using the moment method and some new formulae for the moments of the logarithm of the forward prices/rates variable. The lognormal SABR model is a special case of the SABR model [1]. The acronym “SABR” means “Stochastic-αβρ” and comes from the original names of the model parameters (i.e., α,β,ρ) [1]. The SABR model is a system of two stochastic differential equations widely used in mathematical finance whose independent variable is time and whose dependent variables are the forward prices/rates and the associated stochastic volatility. The lognormal SABR model corresponds to the choice β = 1 and depends on three quantities: the parameters α,ρ and the initial stochastic volatility. In fact the initial stochastic volatility cannot be observed and can be regarded as a parameter. A calibration problem is an inverse problem that consists in determineing the values of these three parameters starting from a set of data. We consider two different sets of data, that is: i) the set of the forward prices/rates observed at a given time on multiple independent trajectories of the lognormal SABR model, ii) the set of the forward prices/rates observed on a discrete set of known time values along a single trajectory of the lognormal SABR model. The calibration problems corresponding to these two sets of data are formulated as constrained nonlinear least-squares problems and are solved numerically. The formulation of these nonlinear least-squares problems is based on some new formulae for the moments of the logarithm of the forward prices/rates. Note that in the financial markets the first set of data considered is hardly available while the second set of data is of common use and corresponds simply to the time series of the observed forward prices/rates. As a consequence the first calibration problem although realistic in several contexts of science and engineering is of limited interest in finance while the second calibration problem is of practical use in finance (and elsewhere). The formulation of these calibration problems and the methods used to solve them are tested on synthetic and on real data. The real data studied are the data belonging to a time series of exchange rates between currencies (euro/U.S. dollar exchange rates)