We investigate the effect of including variance derivatives as calibration and hedging instruments for pricing and hedging exotic structures. This is studied empirically using market data for SPX and VIX derivatives applied in a stochastic volatility jump diffusion model

After a market downturn, especially in an uncertain economic environment such as the current state, there can be a relatively long period with a sideways market, where indexes, stocks, etc., move in channels with support and resistance levels. We discuss option pricing in such scenarios, in both...

Stocks with high idiosyncratic volatility perform poorly relative to low idiosyncratic volatility stocks. We offer a novel explanation of this anomaly based on real options, which is consistent with earlier findings on idiosyncratic volatility (the positive contemporaneous relation between...

We explore the use of an option selling overlay to improve portfolio rebalancing. Within a multi-asset class portfolio, portfolio weights deviate from targets as asset values fluctuate. Investors typically use a rebalancing process to bring portfolio weights back to their desired strategic...

This paper presents a tractable model of non-linear dynamics of market returns using a Langevin approach.Due to non-linearity of an interaction potential, the model admits regimes of both small and large return fluctuations. Langevin dynamics are mapped onto an equivalent quantum mechanical (QM)...

This paper presents a new transform-based approach for path-independent lattice construction for pricing American options under low-dimensional stochastic volatility models. We derive multidimensional transforms which allow us to construct efficient path-independent lattices for virtually all...

We investigate the pricing of risk-neutral skewness in the stock options market by creating skewness assets comprised of two option positions (one long and one short) and a position in the underlying stock. The assets are created such that exposure to changes in the price of the underlying stock...

This paper evaluates the underperformance of individual equity options relative to their replicating portfolios. Considering a high-dimensional set of variables, we use a machine learning approach to identify the characteristics of options and their underlying stocks that provide incremental...

Classical quantitative finance models such as the Geometric Brownian Motion or its later extensions such as local or stochastic volatility models do not make sense when seen from a physics-based perspective, as they are all equivalent to a negative mass oscillator with a noise. This paper...

When the pricing kernel is U-shaped, then expected returns of claims with payout on the upside are negative for strikes beyond a threshold, determined by the slope of the U-shaped kernel in its increasing region, and have negative partial derivative with respect to strike in the increasing...