The calibration of option pricing models leads to the minimization of an error functional. We show that its usual specification as a root mean squared error implies fluctuating exotics prices and possibly wrong prices. We propose a simple and natural method to overcome these problems, illustrate...

This paper analyzes empirical market utility functions and pricing kernels derived from the DAX and DAX option data for three market regimes. A consistent parametric framework of stochastic volatility is used. All empirical market utility functions show a region of risk proclivity that is...

Option pricing models are calibrated to market data of plain vanillas by minimization of an error functional. From the economic viewpoint, there are several possibilities to measure the error between the market and the model. These different specifications of the error give rise to different...

We extend the definition of a convex risk measure to a conditional framework where additional information is available. We characterize these risk measures through the associated acceptance sets and prove a representation result in terms of conditional expectations. As an example we consider the...

Recently, Diebold and Li (2003) obtained good forecasting results for yield curves in a reparametrized Nelson-Siegel framework. We analyze similar modeling approaches for price curves of variance swaps that serve nowadays as hedging instruments for options on realized variance. We consider the...

Many of the concepts in theoretical and empirical finance developed over the past decades – including the classical portfolio theory, the Black- Scholes-Merton option pricing model or the RiskMetrics variance-covariance approach to VaR – rest upon the assumption that asset returns follow a...

In January 2005 the EU-wide CO2 emissions trading system (EU-ETS) has formally entered into operation. Within the new trading system, the right to emit a particular amount of CO2 becomes a tradable commodity - called EU Allowances (EUAs) - and affected companies, traders and investors will face...

In this paper we introduce the dynamic semiparametric factor model (DSFM) for electricity forward curves. The biggest advantage of our approach is that it not only leads to smooth, seasonal forward curves extracted from exchange traded futures and forward electricity contracts, but also to a...