We introduce a multivariate estimator of financial volatility that is based on the theory of Markov chains. The Markov chain framework takes advantage of the discreteness of high-frequency returns. We study the finite sample properties of the estimation in a simulation study and apply it to...

We introduce a novel estimator of the quadratic variation that is based on the theory of Markov chains. The estimator is motivated by some general results concerning filtering contaminated semimartingales. Specifically, we show that filtering can in principle remove the effects of market...