DSGE models are customarily built in the presence of uncertainties of various levels, such as the specification of behavioural equations of economic agents, the actual values of model parameters, and so on. When the degree of complexity of the model structure and its parameterization increases,...

The assessment of models of financial market behaviour requires evaluation tools. When complexity hinders a direct estimation approach, e.g., for agent based microsimulation models or multifractal models, simulation based estimators might provide an alternative. In order to apply such...

This paper studies a Monte Carlo algorithm for computing distributions of state variables when the underlying model is a Markov process. It is shown that the $L_1$ error of the estimator always converges to zero with probability one, and often at a parametric rate. A related technique for...

In the literature, there are not satisfactory methods for measuring and presenting the performance of confidence regions. In this paper, techniques for measuring effectiveness of confidence regions and for the graphical display of simulation evidence concerning the coverage and effectiveness of...

In Japan, demands for Broadband Internet Access and Internet Telephony have increased dramatically in recent years. According to official sources, as of September 2005, there were 21.4 million users of Broadband Internet Access and 9.76 million IP telephones in use. In this study, we employ a...

This note describes ParallelKnoppix, a bootable CD that allows econometricians with average knowledge of computers to create and begin using a high performance computing cluster for parallel computing in very little time. The computers used may be heterogeneous machines, and clusters of up to...

I consider the problem of detecting and predicting regime switching behaviour in the context of Indian Stock Market data. First I discuss detection of volatility change points using the LRT and the Binary Segmentation procedure of Vostrikova (1981). The detected volatility changes are correlated...

The empirical evidence from financial markets suggests that the pattern of response of market volatility to shocks is highly dependent on the magnitude of shocks themselves. Markov-Switching GARCH (MS-GARCH) models are a valuable tool for modelling state dependence in the dynamics of the...

We develop a new approach to valuing and hedging basket options. We consider baskets of assets with potentially negative portfolio weights (spread options are a subclass of such basket options). The basket distribution is approximated using a generalized family of log-normal distributions. This...

It is widely accepted that the distribution of financial returns has heavy tails. In this context it is important to understand the frequency and importance of extreme events in financial markets. Extreme Value Theory is the appropriate framework for studying the tail behaviour of a...