Market clichés assert that markets take escalators up and elevators down. The observation suggests differentiating models for up and down moves. Non-diffusive models allow for this and we model the move as the difference of two independent mean reverting increasing processes driven by gamma...

Return distributions in the class of pure jump limit laws are observed to reflect numerous asymmetries between the upward and downward motions of asset prices. The return distributions are modeled by self decomposable parametric laws with all parameters continuously responding to each other....

Options paying the product of put and/or call option payouts at different strikes on two underlying assets are observed to synthesize joint densities and replicate differentiable functions of two underlying asset prices. The pricing of such options is undertaken from three perspectives. The...

It is argued that the growth in the breadth of option strikes traded after the financial crisis of 2008 poses difficulties for the use of Fourier inversion methodologies in volatility surface calibration. Continuous time Markov chain approximations are proposed as an alternative. They are shown...

The Sato process model for option prices is expanded to accomodate credit considerations by incorporating a single jump to default occuring at an independent random time with a Weibull distribution. Explicit formulas for bid and ask prices are derived. Liquidity considerations are captured by...

Distortions introduced by limited liability towards higher volatility and kurtosis, increased liability skewness, reduced asset skewness and an incentive to decorrelate assets from liabilities are demonstrated in the context of a stylized model. The concept of acceptable risks operationalized by...

Single period risks acceptable to the market at zero cost are modeled by a convex set of random variables leading to bid and ask prices that are trade size dependent. The theory of nonlinear expectations is employed to construct dynamically consistent sequences of bid and ask unit size prices...

Observing first that the daily option surface may be summarized by the level of the spot price and the four parameters of the Sato process based on the variance gamma process, a time series is constructed for this five dimensional set of factors driving the surface of S&P 500 index option...

An argument for adjusting Black Scholes implied call deltas downwards for a gamma exposure in a left skewed market is presented. It is shown that when the objective for the hedge is the conservation of capital ignoring the gamma for the delat position is expensive. The gamma adjustment factor in...

The theory of two price markets of Cherny and Madan (2010) yields closed forms for bid and ask prices. Defining profits as the difference between the mid quote and the risk neutral expectation and capital as difference between the ask and the bid price one obtains precise expressions for these...