type="main" xml:lang="en" <p>Estimates of daily volatility are investigated. Realized volatility can be computed from returns observed over time intervals of different sizes. For simple statistical reasons, volatility estimators based on high-frequency returns have been proposed, but such...</p>

In this paper we discuss the estimation of the diffusion coefficient in one-factor models for the short rate via non-parametric methods. We test the estimators proposed by Ait-Sahalia (1996), Stanton (1997) and Bandi and Phillips (2003) on Monte Carlo simulations of the Vasicek and CIR model. We...

In recent years, diffusion models for interest rates became very popular. In this paper, we perform a selection of a suitable diffusion model for the Italian short rate. Our data set is given by the yields on 3-month BOT (Buoni Ordinari del Tesoro), from 1981 to 2001, for a total of 470...