Paper 1, Section II, K

Stochastic Financial Models
Part II, 2014

Suppose that Sˉt(St0,,Std)T\bar{S}_{t} \equiv\left(S_{t}^{0}, \ldots, S_{t}^{d}\right)^{T} denotes the vector of prices of d+1d+1 assets at times t=0,1,t=0,1, \ldots, and that θˉt(θt0,,θtd)T\bar{\theta}_{t} \equiv\left(\theta_{t}^{0}, \ldots, \theta_{t}^{d}\right)^{T} denotes the vector of the numbers of the d+1d+1 different assets held by an investor from time t1t-1 to time tt. Assuming that asset 0 is a bank account paying zero interest, that is, St0=1S_{t}^{0}=1 for all t0t \geqslant 0, explain what is meant by the statement that the portfolio process (θˉt)t0\left(\bar{\theta}_{t}\right)_{t \geqslant 0} is self-financing. If the portfolio process is self-financing, prove that for any t>0t>0

θˉtSˉtθˉ0Sˉ0=j=1tθjΔSj\bar{\theta}_{t} \cdot \bar{S}_{t}-\bar{\theta}_{0} \cdot \bar{S}_{0}=\sum_{j=1}^{t} \theta_{j} \cdot \Delta S_{j}

where Sj(Sj1,,Sjd)T,ΔSj=SjSj1S_{j} \equiv\left(S_{j}^{1}, \ldots, S_{j}^{d}\right)^{T}, \Delta S_{j}=S_{j}-S_{j-1}, and θj(θj1,,θjd)T\theta_{j} \equiv\left(\theta_{j}^{1}, \ldots, \theta_{j}^{d}\right)^{T}.

Suppose now that the ΔSt\Delta S_{t} are independent with common N(0,V)N(0, V) distribution. Let

F(z)=infE[t1(1β)βt{(θˉtSˉtθˉ0Sˉ0)2+j=1tΔθj2}θ0=z]F(z)=\inf E\left[\sum_{t \geqslant 1}(1-\beta) \beta^{t}\left\{\left(\bar{\theta}_{t} \cdot \bar{S}_{t}-\bar{\theta}_{0} \cdot \bar{S}_{0}\right)^{2}+\sum_{j=1}^{t}\left|\Delta \theta_{j}\right|^{2}\right\} \mid \theta_{0}=z\right]

where β(0,1)\beta \in(0,1) and the infimum is taken over all self-financing portfolio processes (θˉt)t0\left(\bar{\theta}_{t}\right)_{t \geqslant 0} with θ00=0\theta_{0}^{0}=0. Explain why FF should satisfy the equation

F(z)=βinfy[yVy+yz2+F(y)]F(z)=\beta \inf _{y}\left[y \cdot V y+|y-z|^{2}+F(y)\right]

If QQ is a positive-definite symmetric matrix satisfying the equation

Q=β(V+I+Q)1(V+Q)Q=\beta(V+I+Q)^{-1}(V+Q)

show that ()(*) has a solution of the form F(z)=zQzF(z)=z \cdot Q z.