Let $\{D(s), s \geq 0 \}$ be a Lévy subordinator, that is, a non-decreasing process with stationary and independent increments and suppose that $D(0) = 0$. We study the first-hitting time of the process $D$, namely, the process $E(t) = \inf \{s: D(s) > t \}$, $t \geq 0$.
The process $E$ is, in general, non-Markovian with non-stationary and non-independent increments. We derive a partial differential equation for the Laplace transform of the $n$-time tail distribution function $P[E(t_1) > s_1,...,E(t_n) > s_n]$, and show that this PDE has a unique solution given natural boundary conditions. This PDE can be used to derive all $n$-time moments of the process $E$.
We present an exact sampling method for the first passage event of a Levy process. The idea is to embed the process into another one whose first passage event can be sampled exactly, and then recover the part belonging to the former from the latter. The method is based on several distributional properties that appear to be new. We obtain general procedures to sample the first passage event of a subordinator across a regular non-increasing boundary, and that of a process with infinite Levy measure, bounded variation, and suitable drift across a constant level or interval. We give examples of ap…
In this paper we analyze a Lévy process reflected at a general (possibly random) barrier. For this process we prove Central Limit Theorem for the first passage time. We also give the finite-time first passage probability asymptotics.
The existence of moments of first downward passage times of a spectrally negative Lévy process is governed by the general dynamics of the Lévy process, i.e. whether the Lévy process is drifting to $+\infty$, $-\infty$ or oscillates. Whenever the Lévy process drifts to $+\infty$, we prove that the $κ$-th moment of the first passage time (conditioned to be finite) exists if and only if the $(κ+1)$-th moment of the Lévy jump measure exists. This generalises a result shown earlier by Delbaen for Cramér-Lundberg risk processes \cite{Delbaen1990}. Whenever the Lévy process drifts to $-\infty$, we pr…
We show that exact sampling of the first passage event can be done for a Levy process with unbounded variation, if the process can be embedded in a subordinated standard Brownian motion. By sampling a series of first exit events of the Brownian motion and first passage events of the subordinator, the first passage event of interest can be obtained. The sampling of the first exit time and pre-exit location of the Brownian motion may be of independent interest.
We study a first passage time of a Lévy process over a positive constant level. In the spectrally negative case we give conditions for absolutely continuity of the distributions of the first passage times. The tail asymptotics of their densities are also clarified, where the asymptotics depend on tail behaviour of the corresponding Lévy measures. We apply our results to the mathematical finance, in particular, the credit default swap pricing.
In this paper, we identify Laplace transforms of occupation times of intervals until first passage times for spectrally negative Lévy processes. New analytical identities for scale functions are derived and therefore the results are explicitly stated in terms of the scale functions of the process. Applications to option pricing and insurance risk models are also presented.
For a Lévy process on the real line, we provide complete criteria for the finiteness of exponential moments of the first passage time into the interval $(r,\infty)$, the sojourn time in the interval $(-\infty,r]$, and the last exit time from $(-\infty,r]$. Moreover, whenever these quantities are finite, we derive their respective asymptotic behavior as $r \to \infty$.
We derive the exact asymptotics of $P(\sup_{u\leq t}X(u) > x)$ if $x$ and $t$ tend to infinity with $x/t$ constant, for a Lévy process $X$ that admits exponential moments. The proof is based on a renewal argument and a two-dimensional renewal theorem of Höglund (1990).
We consider the class of (possibly killed) spectrally positive Lévy process that have been time-changed by the inverse of an integral functional. Within this class we characterize the family of those processes which satisfy the following property: as functions of point of issue, the Laplace transforms of their first-passage times downwards are completely monotone. A wide (dense, in a sense) subfamily of this family admits closed form expressions for said Laplace transforms.
In this paper, we derive the joint Laplace transforms of occupation times until its last passage times as well as its positions. Motivated by Baurdoux [2], the last times before an independent exponential variable are studied. By applying dual arguments, explicit formulas are derived in terms of new analytical identities from Loeffen et al. [12].
For a spectrally negative Lévy process (snLp) $X$, killed according to a rate that is a function $ω$ of its position, we analyse the exit probability of the one-sided upwards-passage problem. When $ω$ is strictly positive, this problem is related to the determination of the Laplace transform of the first passage time upwards for $X$ that has been time-changed by the inverse of the additive functional $\int_0^\cdot ω(X_u)du$. In particular our findings thus shed extra light on related results concerning first passage times upwards (downwards) of spectrally negative positive self-similar Markov …
We review some of the theory relevant to passage times of one-dimensional Lévy processes out of bounded regions, highlighting results that are useful in physical phenomena modelled by heavy-tailed Lévy flights. The process is hypothesised to describe the motion of a particle on the line, starting at $0$, and exiting either a fixed interval $[-r, r]$, $r > 0$, or a time-dependent, expanding, set of intervals of the form $[-r t^κ, r t^κ]$, $r > 0$, $κ> 0$. Asymptotic behaviour of the exit time may be as $r \downarrow 0$ or as $r \to \infty$, but particular emphasis is placed herein on "small tim…
This article studies a linear scalar delay differential equation subject to small multiplicative power tail Lévy noise. We solve the first passage (the Kramers) problem with probabilistic methods and discover an asymptotic loss of memory in this non-Markovian system. Furthermore, the mean exit time increases as the power of the small noise amplitude, whereas the pre-factor accounts for memory effects. In particular, we discover a non-linear delay-induced exit acceleration due to a non-normal growth phenomenon. Our results are illustrated in the well-known linear delay oscillator driven by $α$-…
We investigate the behavior of Lévy processes with convolution equivalent Lévy measures, up to the time of first passage over a high level u. Such problems arise naturally in the context of insurance risk where u is the initial reserve. We obtain a precise asymptotic estimate on the probability of first passage occurring by time T. This result is then used to study the process conditioned on first passage by time T. The existence of a limiting process as $u\to\infty$ is demonstrated, which leads to precise estimates for the probability of other events relating to first passage, such as the ove…
We study the default risk in incomplete information. That means, we model the value of a firm by one Lévy process which is the sum of brownian motion with drift and compound Poisson process. This Lévy process can not be observed completely and we let an other process which representes the available information on the firm. We obtain an equation safisfied by the conditional density of the default time given the available information and closed form expression for the density.
This paper considers the class of Lévy processes that can be written as a Brownian motion time changed by an independent Lévy subordinator. Examples in this class include the variance gamma model, the normal inverse Gaussian model, and other processes popular in financial modeling. The question addressed is the precise relation between the standard first passage time and an alternative notion, which we call first passage of the second kind, as suggested by Hurd (2007) and others. We are able to prove that standard first passage time is the almost sure limit of iterations of first passage of th…
In this paper, we study the asymptotic behaviour of one-dimensional integrated Ornstein-Uhlenbeck processes driven by $α$-stable Lévy processes of small amplitude. We prove that the integrated Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process converges weakly to the underlying $α$-stable Lévy process in the Skorokhod $M_1$-topology which secures the weak convergence of first passage times. This result follows from a more general result about approximations of an arbitrary Lévy process by continuous integrated Ornstein-Uhlenbeck processes in the $M_1$-topology.
We study the asymptotic tail behaviour of the first-passage time over a moving boundary for asymptotically $α$-stable Lévy processes with $α<1$. Our main result states that if the left tail of the Lévy measure is regularly varying with index $- α$ and the moving boundary is equal to $1 - t^γ$ for some $γ<1/α$, then the probability that the process stays below the moving boundary has the same asymptotic polynomial order as in the case of a constant boundary. The same is true for the increasing boundary $1 + t^γ$ with $γ<1/α$ under the assumption of a regularly varying right tail with index $- α…
We study the exact asymptotics for the distribution of the first time $τ_x$ a Lévy process $X_t$ crosses a negative level $-x$. We prove that $\mathbf P(τ_x>t)\sim V(x)\mathbf P(X_t\ge 0)/t$ as $t\to\infty$ for a certain function $V(x)$. Using known results for the large deviations of random walks we obtain asymptotics for $\mathbf P(τ_x>t)$ explicitly in both light and heavy tailed cases. We also apply our results to find asymptotics for the distribution of the busy period in an M/G/1 queue.
We study the asymptotic behaviour of the tail of the distribution of the first passage time of a Lévy process over a one-sided moving boundary. Our main result states that if the boundary behaves as $t^γ$ for large $t$ for some $γ<1/2$ then the probability that the process stays below the boundary behaves asymptotically as in the case of a constant boundary. We do not have to assume Spitzer's condition in contrast to all previously known results. Both positive ($+t^γ$) and negative ($-t^γ$) boundaries are considered. These results extend the findings of Greenwood and Novikov (1986) and are als…
Let $X$ be a real valued Lévy process that is in the domain of attraction of a stable law without centering with norming function $c.$ As an analogue of the random walk results in \cite{vw} and \cite{rad} we study the local behaviour of the distribution of the lifetime $ζ$ under the characteristic measure $\underline{n}$ of excursions away from 0 of the process $X$ reflected in its past infimum, and of the first passage time of $X$ below $0,$ $T_{0}=\inf \{t>0:X_{t}<0\},$ under $\mathbb{P}_{x}(\cdot),$ for $x>0,$ in two different regimes for $x,$ viz. $x=o(c(\cdot))$ and $x>D c(\cdot),$ for so…
Understanding the space-time features of how a Lévy process crosses a constant barrier for the first time, and indeed the last time, is a problem which is central to many models in applied probability such as queueing theory, financial and actuarial mathematics, optimal stopping problems, the theory of branching processes to name but a few. In \cite{KD} a new quintuple law was established for a general Lévy process at first passage below a fixed level. In this article we use the quintuple law to establish a family of related joint laws, which we call $n$-tuple laws, for Lévy processes, Lévy pr…
We consider the passage time problem for Lévy processes, emphasising heavy tailed cases. Results are obtained under quite mild assumptions, namely, drift to $-\infty$ a.s. of the process, possibly at a linear rate (the finite mean case), but possibly much faster (the infinite mean case), together with subexponential growth on the positive side. Local and functional versions of limit distributions are derived for the passage time itself, as well as for the position of the process just prior to passage, and the overshoot of a high level. A significant connection is made with extreme value theory…
In this note we apply the recently established Wiener-Hopf Monte Carlo (WHMC) simulation technique for Levy processes from Kuznetsov et al. [17] to path functionals, in particular first passage times, overshoots, undershoots and the last maximum before the passage time. Such functionals have many applications, for instance in finance (the pricing of exotic options in a Levy model) and insurance (ruin time, debt at ruin and related quantities for a Levy insurance risk process). The technique works for any Levy process whose running infimum and supremum evaluated at an independent exponential ti…
Let $\{D(s), s \geq 0\}$ be a non-decreasing Lévy process. The first-hitting time process $\{E(t) t \geq 0\}$ (which is sometimes referred to as an inverse subordinator) defined by $E(t) = \inf \{s: D(s) > t \}$ is a process which has arisen in many applications. Of particular interest is the mean first-hitting time $U(t)=\mathbb{E}E(t)$. This function characterizes all finite-dimensional distributions of the process $E$. The function $U$ can be calculated by inverting the Laplace transform of the function $\widetilde{U}(λ) = (λϕ(λ))^{-1}$, where $ϕ$ is the Lévy exponent of the subordinator $D…
We derive the explicit price of the perpetual American put option cancelled at the last passage time of the underlying above some fixed level. We assume the asset process is governed by a geometric spectrally negative Lévy process. We show that the optimal exercise time is the first epoch when asset price process drops below an optimal threshold. We perform numerical analysis as well considering classical Black-Scholes models and the model where logarithm of the asset price has additional exponential downward shocks. The proof is based on some martingale arguments and fluctuation theory of Lév…
First passage problems for spectrally negative Lévy processes with possible absorbtion or/and reflection at boundaries have been widely applied in mathematical finance, risk, queueing, and inventory/storage theory. Historically, such problems were tackled by taking Laplace transform of the associated Kolmogorov integro-differential equations involving the generator operator. In the last years there appeared an alternative approach based on the solution of two fundamental "two-sided exit" problems from an interval (TSE). A spectrally one-sided process will exit smoothly on one side on an interv…
We obtain a new fluctuation identity for a general Lévy process giving a quintuple law describing the time of first passage, the time of the last maximum before first passage, the overshoot, the undershoot and the undershoot of the last maximum. With the help of this identity, we revisit the results of Klüppelberg, Kyprianou and Maller [Ann. Appl. Probab. 14 (2004) 1766--1801] concerning asymptotic overshoot distribution of a particular class of Lévy processes with semi-heavy tails and refine some of their main conclusions. In particular, we explain how different types of first passage contrib…
Let be $(X_t, t\geq 0)$ be a Lévy process which is the sum of a Brownian motion with drift and a compound Poisson process. We consider the first passage time $τ_x$ at a fixed level $x>0$ by $(X_t, t\geq 0)$ and $K_x:= X_{τ_x}-x$ the overshoot and $L_x:= x-X_{τ_x^-}$ the undershoot. We first study the regularity of the density of the first passage time. Secondly, we calculate the joint law of $(τ_x, K_x, L_x).$
We consider the spectrally negative Levy processes and determine the joint laws for the quantities such as the first and last passage times over a fixed level, the overshoots and undershoots at first passage, the minimum, the maximum and the duration of negative values. We apply our results to insurance risk theory to find an explicit expression for the generalized expected discounted penalty function in terms of scale functions. Further, a new expression for the generalized Dickson's formula is provided.
We wish to characterise when a Lévy process $X_t$ crosses boundaries like $t^κ$, $κ>0$, in a one or two-sided sense, for small times $t$; thus, we enquire when $\limsup_{t\downarrow 0}|X_t|/t^κ$, $\limsup_{t\downarrow 0}X_t/t^κ$ and/or $\liminf_{t\downarrow 0}X_t/t^κ$ are almost surely (a.s.) finite or infinite. Necessary and sufficient conditions are given for these possibilities for all values of $κ>0$. Often (for many values of $κ$), when the limsups are finite a.s., they are in fact zero, as we show, but the limsups may in some circumstances take finite, nonzero, values, a.s. In general, t…
For the sum process $X=X^1+X^2$ of a bivariate Lévy process $(X^1,X^2)$ with possibly dependent components, we derive a quintuple law describing the first upwards passage event of $X$ over a fixed barrier, caused by a jump, by the joint distribution of five quantities: the time relative to the time of the previous maximum, the time of the previous maximum, the overshoot, the undershoot and the undershoot of the previous maximum. The dependence between the jumps of $X^1$ and $X^2$ is modeled by a Lévy copula. We calculate these quantities for some examples, where we pay particular attention to …
As well known, all functionals of a Markov process may be expressed in terms of the generator operator, modulo some analytic work. In the case of spectrally negative Markov processes however, it is conjectured that everything can be expressed in a more direct way using the $W$ scale function which intervenes in the two-sided first passage problem, modulo performing various integrals. This conjecture arises from work on Levy processes \cite{AKP,Pispot,APP,Iva,IP, ivanovs2013potential,AIZ,APY}, where the $W$ scale function has explicit Laplace transform, and is therefore easily computable; furth…
Consider the problem to explicitly calculate the law of the first passage time T(a) of a general Levy process Z above a positive level a. In this paper it is shown that the law of T(a) can be approximated arbitrarily closely by the laws of T^n(a), the corresponding first passages time for X^n, where (X^n)_n is a sequence of Levy processes whose positive jumps follow a phase-type distribution. Subsequently, explicit expressions are derived for the laws of T^n(a) and the upward ladder process of X^n. The derivation is based on an embedding of X^n into a class of Markov additive processes and on …
For spectrally negative Lévy processes, adapting an approach from \cite{BoLi:sub1} we identify joint Laplace transforms involving local times evaluated at either the first passage times, or independent exponential times, or inverse local times. The Laplace transforms are expressed in terms of the associated scale functions. Connections are made with the permanental process and the Markovian loop soup measure.
The joint distribution of the maximum loss and the maximum gain is obtained for a spectrally negative Levy process until the passage time of a given level. Their marginal distributions up to an independent exponential time are also provided. The existing formulas for Brownian motion with drift are recovered using the particular scale functions.Keywords Maximum drawdown Maximum drawup Spectrally negative Reflected process Fluctuation theory
The Segerdahl process (Segerdahl (1955)), characterized by exponential claims and affine drift, has drawn a considerable amount of interest -- see, for example, (Tichy (1984); Avram and Usabel (2008), due to its economic interest (it is the simplest risk process which takes into account the effect of interest rates). It is also the simplest non-Levy, non-diffusion example of a spectrally negative Markov risk model. Note that for both spectrally negative Levy and diffusion processes, first passage theories which are based on identifying two basic monotone harmonic functions/martingales have bee…
The purpose of this article is to provide, with the help of a fluctuation identity, a generic link between a number of known identities for the first passage time and overshoot above/below a fixed level of a Levy process and the solution of Gerber and Shiu [Astin Bull. 24 (1994) 195-220], Boyarchenko and Levendorskii [Working paper series EERS 98/02 (1998), Unpublished manuscript (1999), SIAM J. Control Optim. 40 (2002) 1663-1696], Chan [Original unpublished manuscript (2000)], Avram, Chan and Usabel [Stochastic Process. Appl. 100 (2002) 75-107], Mordecki [Finance Stoch. 6 (2002) 473-493], Asm…
A Lévy process is said to creep through a curve if, at its first passage time across this curve, the process reaches it with positive probability. We first study this property for bivariate subordinators. Given the graph $\{(t,f(t)):t\ge0\}$ of any continuous, non increasing function $f$ such that $f(0)>0$, we give an expression of the probability that a bivariate subordinator $(Y,Z)$ issued from 0 creeps through this graph in terms of its renewal function and the drifts of the components $Y$ and $Z$. We apply this result to the creeping probability of any real Lévy process through the graph o…
The first passage time process of a Lévy subordinator with heavy-tailed Lévy measure has long-range dependent paths. The random fluctuations that appear under two natural schemes of summation and time scaling of such stochastic processes are shown to converge weakly. The limit process is fractional Brownian motion in one case and a non-Gaussian and non-stable process in the other case. The latter appears to be of independent interest as a random process that arises under the influence of coexisting Gaussian and stable domains of attraction and is known from other applications to provide a brid…
Let $\mathbb{X}=(\mathbb{X}_t)_{t\geq 0}$ be the subdiffusive process defined, for any $t\geq 0$, by $ \mathbb{X}_t = X_{\ell_t}$ where $X=(X_t)_{t\geq 0}$ is a Lévy process and $\ell_t=\inf \{s>0;\: \mathcal{K}_s>t \}$ with $\mathcal{K}=(\mathcal{K}_t)_{t\geq 0}$ a subordinator independent of $X$. We start by developing a composite Wiener-Hopf factorization to characterize the law of the pair $(\mathbb{T}_a^{(\mathcal{b})}, (\mathbb{X} - \mathcal{b})_{\mathbb{T}_a^{(\mathcal{b})}})$ where \begin{equation*} \mathbb{T}_a^{(\mathcal{b})} = \inf \{t>0;\: \mathbb{X}_t > a+ \mathcal{b}_t \} \end{eq…
Last passage times arise in a number of areas of applied probability, including risk theory and degradation models. Such times are obviously not stopping times since they depend on the whole path of the underlying process. We consider the problem of finding a stopping time that minimises the $L^1$-distance to the last time a spectrally negative Lévy process $X$ is below zero. Examples of related problems in a finite horizon setting for processes with continuous paths are Du Toit et al. (2008) and Glover and Hulley (2014), where the last zero is predicted for a Brownian motion with drift, and f…
In this paper we establish local estimates for the first passage time of a subordinator under the assumption that it belongs to the Feller class, either at zero or infinity, having as a particular case the subordinators which are in the domain of attraction of a stable distribution, either at zero or infinity. To derive these results we first obtain uniform local estimates for the one dimensional distribution of such a subordinator, which sharpen those obtained by Jain and Pruitt in 1987. In the particular case of a subordinator in the domain of attraction of a stable distribution the results …
For a given Markov process $X$ and survival function $\overline{H}$ on $\mathbb{R}^+$, the inverse first-passage time problem (IFPT) is to find a barrier function $b:\mathbb{R}^+\to[-\infty,+\infty]$ such that the survival function of the first-passage time $τ_b=\inf \{t\ge0:X(t)<b(t)\}$ is given by $\overline{H}$. In this paper, we consider a version of the IFPT problem where the barrier is fixed at zero and the problem is to find an initial distribution $μ$ and a time-change $I$ such that for the time-changed process $X\circ I$ the IFPT problem is solved by a constant barrier at the level ze…
Let $X$ be a real Lévy process and let $\Xpos $ be the process conditioned to stay positive. We assume that $ 0 $ is regular for $(-\infty, 0)$ and $(0, +\infty) $ with respect to $X$. Using elementary excursion theory arguments, we provide a simple probabilistic description of the reversed paths of $X$ and $\Xpos $ at their first hitting time of $ (x, +\infty)$ and last passage time of $ (-\infty, x ] $, on a fixed time interval $[0, t]$, for a positive level $x$. From these reversion formulas, we derive an extension to general Lévy processes of Williams' decomposition theorems, Bismut's deco…
We consider a wide class of increasing Lévy processes perturbed by an independent Brownian motion as a degradation model. Such family contains almost all classical degradation models considered in the literature. Classically failure time associated to such model is defined as the hitting time or the first-passage time of a fixed level. Since sample paths are not in general increasing, we consider also the last-passage time as the failure time following a recent work by Barker and Newby. We address here the problem of determining the distribution of the first-passage time and of the last-passag…
It is shown that the celebrated result of Sparre Andersen for random walks and Lévy processes has intriguing consequences when the last time of the process in $(-\infty,0]$, say $σ$, is added to the picture. In the case of no positive jumps this leads to six random times, all of which have the same distribution - the uniform distribution on $[0,σ]$. Surprisingly, this result does not appear in the literature, even though it is based on some classical observations concerning exchangeable increments.
We study sample-path large deviations for Lévy processes and random walks with heavy-tailed jump-size distributions that are of Weibull type. Our main results include an extended form of an LDP (large deviations principle) in the $J_1$ topology, and a full LDP in the $M_1'$ topology. The rate function can be represented as the solution to a quasi-variational problem. The sharpness and applicability of these results are illustrated by a counterexample proving the nonexistence of a full LDP in the $J_1$ topology, and by an application to a first passage problem.
Let X_t be a subordinate Brownian motion, and suppose that the Levy measure of the underlying subordinator has completely monotone density. Under very mild conditions, we find integral formulae for the tail distribution P(τ_x > t) of first passage times τ_x through a barrier at x > 0, and its derivatives in t. As a corollary, we examine the asymptotic behaviour of P(τ_x > t) and its t-derivatives, either as t goes to infinity or x goes to 0.
In the setting of a Lévy insurance risk process, we present some results regarding the Parisian ruin problem which concerns the occurrence of an excursion below zero of duration bigger than a given threshold $r$. First, we give the joint Laplace transform of ruin-time and ruin-position (possibly killed at the first-passage time above a fixed level $b$), which generalises known results concerning Parisian ruin. This identity can be used to compute the expected discounted penalty function via Laplace inversion. Second, we obtain the $q$-potential measure of the process killed at Parisian ruin. T…
By killing a stable Lévy process when it leaves the positive half-line, or by conditioning it to stay positive, or by conditioning it to hit 0 continuously, we obtain three different positive self-similar Markov processes which illustrate the three classes described by Lamperti \cite{La}. For each of these processes, we compute explicitly the infinitesimal generator from which we deduce the characteristics of the underlying Lévy process in the Lamperti representation. The proof of this result bears on the behaviour at time 0 of stable Lévy processes before their first passage time across level…
For a spectrally negative Lévy process $X$, we study the following distribution: $$ \mathbb{E}_x \left[ \mathrm{e}^{- q \int_0^t \mathbf{1}_{(a,b)} (X_s) \mathrm{d}s } ; X_t \in \mathrm{d}y \right], $$ where $-\infty \leq a < b < \infty$, and where $q,t>0$ and $x \in \mathbb{R}$. More precisely, we identify the Laplace transform with respect to $t$ of this measure in terms of the scale functions of the underlying process. Our results are then used to price step options and the particular case of an exponential spectrally negative Lévy jump-diffusion model is discussed.
For drifted Brownian motion $X(t)= x - μt + B_t \ (μ>0)$ starting from $x>0,$ we study the joint distribution of the first-passage time below zero, $τ(x),$ and the first-passage area, $A(x),$ swept out by $X$ till the time $τ(x).$ In particular, we establish differential equations with boundary conditions for the joint moments $E[τ(x)^m A(x)^n],$ and we present an algorithm to find recursively them, for any $m$ and $n.$ Finally, the expected value of the time average of $X$ till the time $τ(x)$ is obtained.
We develop a new Monte Carlo variance reduction method to estimate the expectation of two commonly encountered path-dependent functionals: first-passage times and occupation times of sets. The method is based on a recursive approximation of the first-passage time probability and expected occupation time of sets of a Levy bridge process that relies in part on a randomisation of the time parameter. We establish this recursion for general Levy processes and derive its explicit form for mixed-exponential jump-diffusions, a dense subclass (in the sense of weak approximation) of Levy processes, whic…
We recall four open problems concerning constructing high-order matrix-exponential approximations for the infimum of a spectrally negative Levy process (with applications to first-passage/ruin probabilities, the waiting time distribution in the M/G/1 queue, pricing of barrier options, etc). On the way, we provide a new approximation, for the perturbed Cramer-Lundberg model, and recall a remarkable family of (not minimal order) approximations of Johnson and Taaffe, which fit an arbitrarily high number of moments, greatly generalizing the currently used approximations of Renyi, De Vylder and Whi…
We consider exit problems for general Lévy processes, where the first passage over a threshold is detected either immediately or at an epoch of an independent homogeneous Poisson process. It is shown that the two corresponding one-sided problems are related through a surprisingly simple identity. Moreover, we identify a simple link between two-sided exit problems with one continuous and one Poisson exit. Finally, Poisson exit of a reflected process is connected to the continuous exit of a process reflected at Poisson epochs, and a link between some Parisian type exit problems is established. W…
This paper is concerned with the behaviour of a Lévy process when it crosses over a positive level, $u$, starting from 0, both as $u$ becomes large and as $u$ becomes small. Our main focus is on the time, $τ_u$, it takes the process to transit above the level, and in particular, on the {\it stability} of this passage time; thus, essentially, whether or not $τ_u$ behaves linearly as $u\dto 0$ or $u\to\infty$. We also consider conditional stability of $τ_u$ when the process drifts to $-\infty$, a.s. This provides information relevant to quantities associated with the ruin of an insurance risk pr…
The work concerns nonlinear filtering problems of stochastic differential equations with correlated Lévy noises. First, we establish the Kushner-Stratonovich and Zakai equations through martingale representation theorems and the Kallianpur-Striebel formula. Second, we show the pathwise uniqueness and uniqueness in joint law of weak solutions for the Zakai equation. Finally, we investigate the uniqueness in joint law of weak solutions to the Kushner-Stratonovich equation.
