We show how distributions can be reduced to low-dimensional scenario trees. Applied to intertemporal distributions, the scenarios and their probabilities become time-varying factors. From S&P 500 options, two or three time-varying scenarios suffice to forecast returns, implied variance or...

Most firms face some form of competition in product markets. The degree of competition a firm faces feeds back into its cash flows and affects the values of the securities it issues. Through its effects on stock prices, product market competition affects the prices of options on equity and...

We develop a general equilibrium model with intermediaries at the heart of international financial markets. Global intermediaries bargain with households and extract rents for providing access to foreign claims. The behavior of intermediaries, by tilting state prices, breaks monetary neutrality...

We solve the problems of mean-variance hedging (MVH) and mean-variance portfolio selection (MVPS) under restricted information. We work in a setting where the underlying price process S is a semimartingale, but not adapted to the filtration G which models the information available for...

This paper implements a novel model-free methodology to measure skewness risk premia in individual stocks. The methodology takes the form of a trading strategy, a skewness swap. The return on the strategy shows a significant positive skewness risk premium in individual stocks. The risk premium...

Polynomial processes have the property that expectations of polynomial functions (of degree n, say) of the future state of the process conditional on the current state are given by polynomials (of degree n) of the current state. Here we explore the application of polynomial processes in the...

We study the term structure of variance swaps, equity and variance risk premia. A model-free analysis reveals a significant price jump component in variance swap rates. A model-based analysis shows that investors' willingness to ensure against volatility risk increases after a market drop. This...

A new class of risk measures called cash sub-additive risk measures is introduced to assess the risk of future financial, nonfinancial and insurance positions. The debated cash additive axiom is relaxed into the cash sub-additive axiom to preserve the original difference between the numeraire of...

We propose a novel time-changed L évy LIBOR market model for the joint pricing of caps and swaptions. The time changes are split into three components. The first component allows us to match the volatility term structure, the second generates stochastic volatility, and the third one...