We demonstrate that the lowest possible price change (tick-size) has a large impact on the structure of financial return distributions. It induces a microstructure as well as possibly altering the tail behavior. On small return intervals, the tick-size can distort the calculation of...

We present a method to compensate statistical errors in the calculation of correlations on asynchronous time series. The method is based on the assumption of an underlying time series. We set up a model and apply it to financial data to examine the decrease of calculated correlations towards...

We analyze the statistical dependence structure of the S&P 500 constituents in the 4-year period from 2007 to 2010 using intraday data from the New York Stock Exchange’s TAQ database. Instead of using a given parametric copula with a predetermined shape, we study the empirical pairwise copula...

We set up a structural model to study credit risk for a portfolio containing several or many credit contracts. The model is based on a jump-diffusion process for the risk factors, i.e. for the company assets. We also include correlations between the companies. We discuss that models of this type...

The measurement of correlations between financial time series is of vital importance for risk management. In this paper we address an estimation error that stems from the non-stationarity of the time series. We put forward a method to rid the time series of local trends and variable volatility,...

We consider random vectors drawn from a multivariate normal distribution and compute the sample statistics in the presence of stochastic correlations. For this purpose, we construct an ensemble of random correlation matrices and average the normal distribution over this ensemble. The resulting...

The current research on credit risk is primarily focused on modelling default probabilities. Recovery rates are often treated as an afterthought; they are modelled independently, in many cases they are even assumed to be constant. This despite their pronounced effect on the tail of the loss...