Statistical Consequences of Fat Tails

Statistical Consequences of Fat Tails PDF

Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Publisher:

Published: 2020-06-30

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9781544508054

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The book investigates the misapplication of conventional statistical techniques to fat tailed distributions and looks for remedies, when possible. Switching from thin tailed to fat tailed distributions requires more than "changing the color of the dress." Traditional asymptotics deal mainly with either n=1 or n=∞, and the real world is in between, under the "laws of the medium numbers"-which vary widely across specific distributions. Both the law of large numbers and the generalized central limit mechanisms operate in highly idiosyncratic ways outside the standard Gaussian or Levy-Stable basins of convergence. A few examples: - The sample mean is rarely in line with the population mean, with effect on "naïve empiricism," but can be sometimes be estimated via parametric methods. - The "empirical distribution" is rarely empirical. - Parameter uncertainty has compounding effects on statistical metrics. - Dimension reduction (principal components) fails. - Inequality estimators (Gini or quantile contributions) are not additive and produce wrong results. - Many "biases" found in psychology become entirely rational under more sophisticated probability distributions. - Most of the failures of financial economics, econometrics, and behavioral economics can be attributed to using the wrong distributions. This book, the first volume of the Technical Incerto, weaves a narrative around published journal articles.

Dynamic Hedging

Dynamic Hedging PDF

Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 1997-01-14

Total Pages: 536

ISBN-13: 9780471152804

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Destined to become a market classic, Dynamic Hedging is the only practical reference in exotic options hedgingand arbitrage for professional traders and money managers Watch the professionals. From central banks to brokerages to multinationals, institutional investors are flocking to a new generation of exotic and complex options contracts and derivatives. But the promise of ever larger profits also creates the potential for catastrophic trading losses. Now more than ever, the key to trading derivatives lies in implementing preventive risk management techniques that plan for and avoid these appalling downturns. Unlike other books that offer risk management for corporate treasurers, Dynamic Hedging targets the real-world needs of professional traders and money managers. Written by a leading options trader and derivatives risk advisor to global banks and exchanges, this book provides a practical, real-world methodology for monitoring and managing all the risks associated with portfolio management. Nassim Nicholas Taleb is the founder of Empirica Capital LLC, a hedge fund operator, and a fellow at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences of New York University. He has held a variety of senior derivative trading positions in New York and London and worked as an independent floor trader in Chicago. Dr. Taleb was inducted in February 2001 in the Derivatives Strategy Hall of Fame. He received an MBA from the Wharton School and a Ph.D. from University Paris-Dauphine.

Incerto

Incerto PDF

Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Publisher: Random House Trade

Published: 2021-05-04

Total Pages: 1873

ISBN-13: 059324365X

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The landmark five-book series--all together in one boxed set The Incerto is an investigation of opacity, luck, uncertainty, probability, human error, risk, and decision making when we don't understand the world, expressed in the form of a personal essay with autobiographical sections, stories, parables, and philosophical, historical, and scientific discussions, in non-overlapping volumes that can be accessed in any order. The main thread is that while there is inordinate uncertainty about what is going on, there is great certainty as to what one should do about it. This boxed set includes: FOOLED BY RANDOMNESS THE BLACK SWAN THE BED OF PROCRUSTES ANTIFRAGILE SKIN IN THE GAME

The Fundamentals of Heavy Tails

The Fundamentals of Heavy Tails PDF

Author: Jayakrishnan Nair

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2022-06-09

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 1009062964

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Heavy tails –extreme events or values more common than expected –emerge everywhere: the economy, natural events, and social and information networks are just a few examples. Yet after decades of progress, they are still treated as mysterious, surprising, and even controversial, primarily because the necessary mathematical models and statistical methods are not widely known. This book, for the first time, provides a rigorous introduction to heavy-tailed distributions accessible to anyone who knows elementary probability. It tackles and tames the zoo of terminology for models and properties, demystifying topics such as the generalized central limit theorem and regular variation. It tracks the natural emergence of heavy-tailed distributions from a wide variety of general processes, building intuition. And it reveals the controversy surrounding heavy tails to be the result of flawed statistics, then equips readers to identify and estimate with confidence. Over 100 exercises complete this engaging package.

Probability Inequalities in Multivariate Distributions

Probability Inequalities in Multivariate Distributions PDF

Author: Y. L. Tong

Publisher: Academic Press

Published: 2014-07-10

Total Pages: 255

ISBN-13: 1483269213

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Probability Inequalities in Multivariate Distributions is a comprehensive treatment of probability inequalities in multivariate distributions, balancing the treatment between theory and applications. The book is concerned only with those inequalities that are of types T1-T5. The conditions for such inequalities range from very specific to very general. Comprised of eight chapters, this volume begins by presenting a classification of probability inequalities, followed by a discussion on inequalities for multivariate normal distribution as well as their dependence on correlation coefficients. The reader is then introduced to inequalities for other well-known distributions, including the multivariate distributions of t, chi-square, and F; inequalities for a class of symmetric unimodal distributions and for a certain class of random variables that are positively dependent by association or by mixture; and inequalities obtainable through the mathematical tool of majorization and weak majorization. The book also describes some distribution-free inequalities before concluding with an overview of their applications in simultaneous confidence regions, hypothesis testing, multiple decision problems, and reliability and life testing. This monograph is intended for mathematicians, statisticians, students, and those who are primarily interested in inequalities.

The Logic and Statistics of Fat Tails

The Logic and Statistics of Fat Tails PDF

Author: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Publisher: Penguin Press

Published: 2019-04-04

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 9780141988368

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The Logic and Statistics of Fat Tails is the definitive source on fat-tailed distribution and an essential technical read for students, accountants and those working in finance.

Monte Carlo Methods in Financial Engineering

Monte Carlo Methods in Financial Engineering PDF

Author: Paul Glasserman

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-03-09

Total Pages: 603

ISBN-13: 0387216170

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From the reviews: "Paul Glasserman has written an astonishingly good book that bridges financial engineering and the Monte Carlo method. The book will appeal to graduate students, researchers, and most of all, practicing financial engineers [...] So often, financial engineering texts are very theoretical. This book is not." --Glyn Holton, Contingency Analysis

An Introduction to the Theory of Point Processes

An Introduction to the Theory of Point Processes PDF

Author: D.J. Daley

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2006-04-10

Total Pages: 471

ISBN-13: 0387215646

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Point processes and random measures find wide applicability in telecommunications, earthquakes, image analysis, spatial point patterns, and stereology, to name but a few areas. The authors have made a major reshaping of their work in their first edition of 1988 and now present their Introduction to the Theory of Point Processes in two volumes with sub-titles Elementary Theory and Models and General Theory and Structure. Volume One contains the introductory chapters from the first edition, together with an informal treatment of some of the later material intended to make it more accessible to readers primarily interested in models and applications. The main new material in this volume relates to marked point processes and to processes evolving in time, where the conditional intensity methodology provides a basis for model building, inference, and prediction. There are abundant examples whose purpose is both didactic and to illustrate further applications of the ideas and models that are the main substance of the text.

Advances in Minimum Description Length

Advances in Minimum Description Length PDF

Author: Peter D. Grünwald

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 464

ISBN-13: 9780262072625

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A source book for state-of-the-art MDL, including an extensive tutorial and recent theoretical advances and practical applications in fields ranging from bioinformatics to psychology.

Randomness

Randomness PDF

Author: Deborah J. Bennett

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-07-01

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13: 9780674020771

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From the ancients' first readings of the innards of birds to your neighbor's last bout with the state lottery, humankind has put itself into the hands of chance. Today life itself may be at stake when probability comes into play--in the chance of a false negative in a medical test, in the reliability of DNA findings as legal evidence, or in the likelihood of passing on a deadly congenital disease--yet as few people as ever understand the odds. This book is aimed at the trouble with trying to learn about probability. A story of the misconceptions and difficulties civilization overcame in progressing toward probabilistic thinking, Randomness is also a skillful account of what makes the science of probability so daunting in our own day. To acquire a (correct) intuition of chance is not easy to begin with, and moving from an intuitive sense to a formal notion of probability presents further problems. Author Deborah Bennett traces the path this process takes in an individual trying to come to grips with concepts of uncertainty and fairness, and also charts the parallel path by which societies have developed ideas about chance. Why, from ancient to modern times, have people resorted to chance in making decisions? Is a decision made by random choice fair? What role has gambling played in our understanding of chance? Why do some individuals and societies refuse to accept randomness at all? If understanding randomness is so important to probabilistic thinking, why do the experts disagree about what it really is? And why are our intuitions about chance almost always dead wrong? Anyone who has puzzled over a probability conundrum is struck by the paradoxes and counterintuitive results that occur at a relatively simple level. Why this should be, and how it has been the case through the ages, for bumblers and brilliant mathematicians alike, is the entertaining and enlightening lesson of Randomness.