Estimation of volatility of financial time series plays a crucial role in pricing derivatives. Volatility is often estimated from historical data; however, it is well known that volatility varies in time. We propose a method to choose a suitable length of historical data to estimate contemporary...

Three approaches toward the determination of fixed swap rates are presented in this article: a swap as a portfolio of bonds with a fixed and floating coupon, a swap as a portfolio of forwards, and a swap as the difference between the cap and the floor (zero-collar). Later in the paper, credit...