The ten commandments for optimizing value-at-risk and daily capital charges

Credit risk is the most important type of risk in terms of monetary value. Another key risk measure is market risk, which is concerned with stocks and bonds, and related financial derivatives, as well as exchange rates and interest rates. This paper is concerned with market risk management and monitoring under the Basel II Accord, and presents Ten Commandments for optimizing Value-at-Risk (VaR) and daily capital charges, based on choosing wisely from: (1) conditional, stochastic and realized volatility; (2) symmetry, asymmetry and leverage; (3) dynamic correlations and dynamic covariances; (4) single index and portfolio models; (5) parametric, semiparametric and nonparametric models; (6) estimation, simulation and calibration of parameters; (7) assumptions, regularity conditions and statistical properties; (8) accuracy in calculating moments and forecasts; (9) optimizing threshold violations and economic benefits; and (10) optimizing private and public benefits of risk management. For practical purposes, it is found that the Basel II Accord would seem to encourage excessive risk taking at the expense of providing accurate measures and forecasts of risk and VaR

Discussion of “Principal Volatility Component Analysis” by Yu-Pin Hu and Ruey Tsay

__Abstract__ This note discusses some aspects of the paper by Hu and Tsay (2014), “Principal Volatility Component Analysis”. The key issues are considered, and are also related to existing conditional covariance and correlation models. Some caveats are given about multivariate models of time-varying conditional covariance and correlation models

The Fundamental Equation in Tourism Finance

The purpose of the paper is to present the fundamental equation in tourism finance that connects tourism research to empirical finance and financial econometrics. The energy industry, which includes, oil, gas and bio-energy fuels, together with the tourism industry, are two of the most important industries in the world today in terms of employment and generating income. The primary purpose in attracting domestic and international tourists to a country, region or city is to maximize tourism expenditure. The paper will concentrate on daily tourism expenditure, regardless of whether such data might be readily available. If such data are not available, a practical method is presented to calculate the appropriate data

Asymmetry and Leverage in Conditional Volatility Models

__Abstract__ The three most popular univariate conditional volatility models are the generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) model of Engle (1982) and Bollerslev (1986), the GJR (or threshold GARCH) model of Glosten, Jagannathan and Runkle (1992), and the exponential GARCH (or EGARCH) model of Nelson (1990, 1991). The underlying stochastic specification to obtain GARCH was demonstrated by Tsay (1987), and that of EGARCH was shown recently in McAleer and Hafner (2014). These models are important in estimating and forecasting volatility, as well as capturing asymmetry, which is the different effects on conditional volatility of positive and negative effects of equal magnitude, and leverage, which is the negative correlation between returns shocks and subsequent shocks to volatility. As there seems to be some confusion in the literature between asymmetry and leverage, as well as which asymmetric models are purported to be able to capture leverage, the purpose of the paper is two-fold, namely: (1) to derive the GJR model from a random coefficient autoregressive process, with appropriate regularity conditions; and (2) to show that leverage is not possible in these univariate conditional volatility models

VaR Forecast and Dynamic Conditional Correlations for Spot and Futures Returns on Stocks and Bonds

The paper investigates the interdependence and conditional correlations between futures contracts and their underlying assets, both for stock and bond markets, and the impact of the interdependence and conditional correlations on VaR forecasts. The paper finds evidence of volatility spill

Ten Things you should know about DCC

The purpose of the paper is to discuss ten things potential users should know about the limits of the Dynamic Conditional Correlation (DCC) representation for estimating and forecasting time-varying conditional correlations. The reasons given for caution about the use of DCC include the following: DCC represents the dynamic conditional covariances of the standardized residuals, and hence does not yield dynamic conditional correlations; DCC is stated rather than derived; DCC has no moments; DCC does not have testable regularity conditions; DCC yields inconsistent two step estimators; DCC has no asymptotic properties; DCC is not a special case of GARCC, which has testable regularity conditions and standard asymptotic properties; DCC is not dynamic empirically as the effect of news is typically extremely small; DCC cannot be distinguished empirically from diagonal BEKK in small systems; and DCC may be a useful filter or a diagnostic check, but it is not a model

Robust Ranking of Multivariate GARCH Models by Problem Dimension

During the last 15 years, several Multivariate GARCH (MGARCH) models have appeared in the literature. Recent research has begun to examine MGARCH specifications in terms of their out-of-sample forecasting performance. We provide an empirical comparison of alternative MGARCH models, namely BEKK, DCC, Corrected DCC (cDCC), CCC, OGARCH Exponentially Weighted Moving Average, and covariance shrinking, using historical data for 89 US equities. We contribute to the literature in several directions. First, we consider a wide range of models, including the recent cDCC and covariance shrinking models. Second, we use a range of tests and approaches for direct and indirect model comparison, including the Model Confidence Set. Third, we examine how the robust model rankings are influenced by the cross-sectional dimension of the problem

Threshold, news impact surfaces and dynamic asymmetric multivariate GARCH

DAMGARCH is a new model that extends the VARMA-GARCH model of Ling and McAleer (2003) by introducing multiple thresholds and time-dependent structure in the asymmetry of the conditional variances. Analytical expressions for the news impact surface implied by the new model are also presented. DAMGARCH models the shocks affecting the conditional variances on the basis of an underlying multivariate distribution. It is possible to model explicitly asset-specific shocks and common innovations by partitioning the multivariate density support. This paper presents the model structure, describes the implementation issues, and provides the conditions for the existence of a unique stationary solution, and for consistency and asymptotic normality of the quasi-maximum likelihood estimators. The paper also presents an empirical example to highlight the usefulness of the new model

A Multivariate Asymmetric Long Memory Conditional Volatility Model with X, Regularity and Asymptotics

The paper derives a Multivariate Asymmetric Long Memory conditional volatility model with Exogenous Variables (X), or the MALMX model, with dynamic conditional correlations, appropriate regularity conditions, and associated asymptotic theory. This enables checking of internal consistency and allows valid statistical inferences to be drawn based on empirical estimation. The underlying vector random coefficient autoregressive process, which has well established regularity conditions and associated asymptotic properties, is discussed, and a simple explanation is given as to why only the diagonal BEKK model, and not the Hadamard, triangular or full BEKK models, has regularity conditions and asymptotic properties. Various special cases, including the diagonal BEKK model of Baba et al. (1985) and Engle and Kroner (1995), VARMA- GARCH model of Ling and McAleer (2003), and VARMA-AGARCH model of McAleer et al. (2009), are discussed. There does not seem to have been a derivation of a univariate conditional volatility model with exogenous variables (X) that has dynamic conditional correlations, appropriate regularity conditions, and associated asymptotic theory. Therefore, the derivation of a multivariate conditional volatility model with exogenous variables (X) that has regularity conditions and asymptotic theory would seem to be a significant extension of the existing literature

Forecasting the Volatility of Nikkei 225 Futures

For forecasting volatility of futures returns, the paper proposes an indirect method based on the relationship between futures and the underlying asset for the returns and time-varying volatility. For volatility forecasting, the paper considers the stochastic volatility model with asymmetry and long memory, using high frequency data for the underlying asset. Empirical results for Nikkei 225 futures indicate that the adjusted R2 supports the appropriateness of the indirect method, and that the new method based on stochastic volatility models with the asymmetry and long memory outperforms the forecasting model based on the direct method using the pseudo long time series