Analytical approximations of local‐Heston volatility model and error analysis

This paper studies the expansion of an option price (with bounded Lipschitz payoff) in a stochastic volatility model including a local volatility component. The stochastic volatility is a square root process, which is widely used for modeling the behavior of the variance process (Heston model). The local volatility part is of general form, requiring only appropriate growth and boundedness assumptions. We rigorously establish tight error estimates of our expansions, using Malliavin calculus. The error analysis, which requires a careful treatment because of the lack of weak differentiability of the model, is interesting on its own. Moreover, in the particular case of call–put options, we also provide expansions of the Black–Scholes implied volatility that allow to obtain very simple formulas that are fast to compute compared to the Monte Carlo approach and maintain a very competitive accuracy.     

New development: China renews reform of central–local fiscal relations and provides for basic national public services

China’s reform on central–local fiscal reform has slowed down in recent years. The appointment of a new finance minister experienced in local government affairs is expected to renew the reform affirmed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) congress in late 2017. China has unprecedentedly identified a comprehensive list of 81 national basic public services as entitlements. Eighteen of them are subject to national and local standards, and co-financed by central and local governments. A new cost-sharing method for 10 of these services classifies sub-national jurisdictions into five tiers, in which the central government’s share declines from 80% to 10%. These measures, effective in 2019, aim at creating a ‘harmonious and moderately prosperous society’.     

Non-linear Gaussian sovereign CDS pricing models

Prior literature indicates that quadratic models and the Black–Karasinski model are very promising for CDS pricing. This paper extends these models and the Black [J. Finance 1995, 50, 1371–1376] model for pricing sovereign CDS’s. For all 10 sovereigns in the sample quadratic models best fit CDS spreads in-sample, and a four factor quadratic model can account for the joint effects on CDS spreads of default risk, default loss risk and liquidity risk with no restriction to factors correlation. Liquidity risk appears to affect sovereign CDS spreads. However, quadratic models tend to over-fit some CDS maturities at the expense of other maturities, while the BK model is particularly immune from this tendency. The Black model seems preferable because its out-of-sample performance in the time series dimension is the best.     

Impact of state-dependent oil price on US stock returns using local projections

In this paper, we investigate the impact of oil prices on both aggregate and industry US real stock returns over the period 1973–2017. The empirical analysis contributes to the related literature introducing a state-dependent oil price (high and low) and the local projections approach. Our main finding is that, depending on the nature of the shock and industry, the negative effects of oil price shocks become exacerbated -and the positive effects get moderated- if oil prices are already high.     

The mechanism of credit risk contagion among internet P2P lending platforms based on a SEIR model with time-lag

The credit risk contagion of Internet peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms is an important part of Internet financial risk management and supervision. This study analyzes the contagion path of credit risk in Internet P2P lending. Based on complex network theory and the theory of infectious disease dynamics, the characteristics of Internet P2P lending development are combined to construct a SEIR model of credit risk transmission among Internet P2P lending platforms with time lag, and the robustness of the model is analyzed and proven. The influence of platform correlations, the susceptible immune rate, the platform elimination rate, contagion latency, the saturation coefficient, and the susceptibility input rate on credit risk contagion behavior among Internet P2P lending platforms is analyzed, using the equilibrium point and threshold value. The impact of each variable is analyzed by simulation. Corresponding countermeasures and suggestions are proposed to prevent and control credit risk contagion among these platforms.     

时间压力对网络冲动性购买的影响研究：交易效用和感知风险的调节

以往关于时间压力对冲动性购买影响的研究结论具有两面性，即促进或抑制。文章引入交易效用和感知风险两个调节变量，通过两个实验探讨了时间压力对网络冲动性购买倾向影响的边界条件。首先，当交易效用较高时，时间压力的增加会导致其网络冲动性购买倾向的提高；而当交易效用较低时，时间压力的增加会导致其网络冲动性购买倾向的降低（实验一）。其次，当人们感知风险较低时，时间压力的增加会导致其网络冲动性购买倾向的提高；而当人们感知风险较高时，时间压力的增加会导致其网络冲动性购买倾向的降低（实验二）。研究结论可以帮助电商企业进一步了解消费者的冲动性购买行为，充分利用时间压力的影响，制定更灵活有效的促销策略。     

Local opinions on trophy hunting in Kyrgyzstan

As traditional international trophy hunting destinations are becoming less accessible due to hunting restrictions and regulations, new destinations are entering the scene, such as the Republic of Kyrgyzstan, located in Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan has grown to be one of the top destinations for international trophy hunting of argali Ovis ammon and ibex Capra sibirica, both of which are in danger of extinction. Empirically, the article draws on a case study from the largest region in Kyrgyzstan, At-Bashy, and 395 questionnaires with local inhabitants from 5 villages, and 1 interview with an international trophy hunting tour operator. In this article, the impacts of trophy hunting as a tourism practice in a rural context is discussed in terms of its sustainability and through the opinions of the local inhabitants. In sum, the negative impacts of trophy hunting in At-Bashy seem to overrule the positive ones, and in its current form it is not sustainable. The local inhabitants report about a decrease in argali and ibex during the last years; they receive basically no economic benefits from hunting tourism; and not surprisingly, 70% of the population rejects the further development of the industry in its current shape.     

Time Inhomogeneous Multiple Volatility Modeling

Price variations at speculative markets exhibit positive autocorrelationand cross correlation. Due to large parameter spaces necessaryfor joint modeling of variances and covariances, multivariateparametric volatility models become easily intractable in practice.We propose an adaptive procedure that identifies periods ofsecond-order homogeneity for each moment in time. To overcomethe high dimensionality of the problem we transform the multivariateseries into a set of univariate processes. We discuss thoroughlythe implementation of the adaptive technique. Theoretical andMonte Carlo results are given. We provide two applications ofthe new method. For a bivariate exchange rate series we comparethe multivariate GARCH approach with our method and find thelatter to be more in line with the underlying assumption ofindependently distributed innovations. Analyzing a 23-dimensionalvector of asset returns we underscore the case for adaptivemodeling in high-dimensional systems.     

考虑供给与需求波动性的安全库存定量研究

本文以商业企业和MTS模式下生产企业的安全库存为研究对象,将供给与需求的变动程度作为两个动态指标研究四种不同战略与运营环境下的安全库存模型,并进一步分析了降低安全库存所需的管理杠杆.