A lot of economic problems can be formulated as constrained optimizations and equilibration of their solutions. Various mathematical theories have been supplying economists with indispensable machineries for these problems arising in economic theory. Conversely, mathematicians have been stimulated by various mathematical difficulties raised by economic theories. The series is designed to bring together those mathematicians who are seriously interested in getting new challenging stimuli from economic theories with those economists who are seeking effective mathematical tools for their research. The editorial board of this series comprises the following prominent economists and mathematicians: Managing Editors: S. Kusuoka (Univ. Tokyo), T. Maruyama (Keio Univ.). Editors: R. Anderson (U.C. Berkeley), C. Castaing (Univ. Montpellier), F.H. Clarke (Univ. Lyon I), G. Debreu (U.C. Berkeley), E. Dierker (Univ. Vienna), D. Duffie (Stanford Univ.), L.C. Evans (U.C. Berkeley), T. Fujimoto (Okayama Univ.), J.-M. Grandmont (CREST-CNRS), N. Hirano (Yokohama National Univ.), L. Hurwicz (Univ. of Minnesota), T. Ichiishi (Ohio State Univ.), A. Ioffe (Israel Institute of Technology), S. Iwamoto (Kyushu Univ.), K. Kamiya (Univ. Tokyo), K. Kawamata (Keio Univ.), N. Kikuchi (Keio Univ.), H. Matano (Univ. Tokyo), K. Nishimura (Kyoto Univ.), M.K. Richter (Univ. Minnesota), Y. Takahashi (Kyoto Univ.), M. Valadier (Univ. Montpellier II), A. Yamaguti (Kyoto Univ./Ryukoku Univ.), M. Yano (Keio Univ.).

Completely revised and greatly expanded, the new edition of this text takes readers who have been exposed to only basic courses in analysis through the modern general theory of random processes and stochastic integrals as used by systems theorists, electronic engineers and, more recently, those working in quantitative and mathematical finance. Building upon the original release of this title, this text will be of great interest to research mathematicians and graduate students working in those fields, as well as quants in the finance industry. New features of this edition include: End of chapter exercises; New chapters on basic measure theory and Backward SDEs; Reworked proofs, examples and explanatory material; Increased focus on motivating the mathematics; Extensive topical index. "Such a self-contained and complete exposition of stochastic calculus and applications fills an existing gap in the literature. The book can be recommended for first-year graduate studies. It will be useful for all who intend to work with stochastic calculus as well as with its applications."-Zentralblatt (from review of the First Edition)

An innovative new valuation framework with truly useful economic indicators The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers shows how the ubiquitous financial reports have become useless in capital market decisions and lays out an actionable alternative. Based on a comprehensive, large-sample empirical analysis, this book reports financial documents' continuous deterioration in relevance to investors' decisions. An enlightening discussion details the reasons why accounting is losing relevance in today's market, backed by numerous examples with real-world impact. Beyond simply identifying the problem, this report offers a solution the Value Creation Report and demonstrates its utility in key industries. New indicators focus on strategy and execution to identify and evaluate a company's true value-creating resources for a more up-to-date approach to critical investment decision-making. While entire industries have come to rely on financial reports for vital information, these documents are flawed and insufficient when it comes to the way investors and lenders work in the current economic climate. This book demonstrates an alternative, giving you a new framework for more informed decision making. * Discover a new, comprehensive system of economic indicators * Focus on strategic, value-creating resources in company valuation * Learn how traditional financial documents are quickly losing their utility * Find a path forward with actionable, up-to-date information Major corporate decisions, such as restructuring and M&A, are predicated on financial indicators of profitability and asset/liabilities values. These documents move mountains, so what happens if they're based on faulty indicators that fail to show the true value of the company? The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers shows you the reality and offers a new blueprint for more accurate valuation.

An expert's insider secrets to how successful CEOs and directors shape, lead, and oversee their organizations to achieve corporate goals

"Governance, Risk Management, and Compliance" shows senior executives and board members how to ensure that their companies incorporate the necessary processes, organization, and technology to accomplish strategic goals. Examining how and why some major companies failed while others continue to grow and prosper, author and internationally recognized expert Richard Steinberg reveals how to cultivate a culture, leadership process and infrastructure toward achieving business objectives and related growth, profit, and return goals.Explains critical factors that make compliance and ethics programs and risk management processes really workExplores the board's role in overseeing corporate strategy, risk management, CEO compensation, succession planning, crisis planning, performance measures, board composition, and shareholder communicationsHighlights for CEOs, senior management teams, and board members the pitfalls to avoid and what must go right for successOutlines the future of corporate governance and what's needed for continued effectivenessWritten by well-known corporate governance and risk management expert Richard Steinberg

"Governance, Risk Management, and Compliance" lays a sound foundation and provides critical insights for understanding the role of governance, risk management, and compliance and its successful implementation in today's business environment.

The classical Pontryagin maximum principle (addressed to deterministic finite dimensional control systems) is one of the three milestones in modern control theory. The corresponding theory is by now well-developed in the deterministic infinite dimensional setting and for the stochastic differential equations. However, very little is known about the same problem but for controlled stochastic (infinite dimensional) evolution equations when the diffusion term contains the control variables and the control domains are allowed to be non-convex. Indeed, it is one of the longstanding unsolved problems in stochastic control theory to establish the Pontryagin type maximum principle for this kind of general control systems: this book aims to give a solution to this problem. This book will be useful for both beginners and experts who are interested in optimal control theory for stochastic evolution equations.

This research monograph provides an introduction to tractable multidimensional diffusion models, where transition densities, Laplace transforms, Fourier transforms, fundamental solutions or functionals can be obtained in explicit form. The book also provides an introduction to the use of Lie symmetry group methods for diffusions, which allows to compute a wide range of functionals. Besides the well-known methodology on affine diffusions it presents a novel approach to affine processes with applications in finance. Numerical methods, including Monte Carlo and quadrature methods, are discussed together with supporting material on stochastic processes. Applications in finance, for instance, on credit risk and credit valuation adjustment are included in the book. The functionals of multidimensional diffusions analyzed in this book are significant for many areas of application beyond finance. The book is aimed at a wide readership, and develops an intuitive and rigorous understanding of the mathematics underlying the derivation of explicit formulas for functionals of multidimensional diffusions.

ECMI, the European Consortium for Mathematics in Industry, is the European brand associated with applied mathematics for industry and organizes highly successful biannual conferences. In this series, the ECMI 2010, the 16th European Conference on Mathematics for Industry, was held in the historic city hall of Wuppertal in Germany. It covered the mathematics of a wide range of applications and methods, from circuit and electromagnetic device simulation to model order reduction for chip design, uncertainties and stochastics, production, fluids, life and environmental sciences, and dedicated and versatile methods.

These proceedings of ECMI 2010 emphasize mathematics as an innovation enabler for industry and business, and as an absolutely essential pre-requiste for Europe on its way to becoming the leading knowledge-based economy in the world.

Stochastic instantaneous volatility models such as Heston, SABR or SV-LMM have mostly been developed to control the shape and joint dynamics of the implied volatility surface. In principle, they are well suited for pricing and hedging vanilla and exotic options, for relative value strategies or for risk management. In practice however, most SV models lack a closed form valuation for European options. This book presents the recently developed Asymptotic Chaos Expansions methodology (ACE) which addresses that issue. Indeed its generic algorithm provides, for any regular SV model, the pure asymptotes at any order for both the static and dynamic maps of the implied volatility surface. Furthermore, ACE is programmable and can complement other approximation methods. Hence it allows a systematic approach to designing, parameterising, calibrating and exploiting SV models, typically for Vega hedging or American Monte-Carlo.

"Asymptotic Chaos Expansions in Finance" illustrates the ACE approach for single underlyings (such as a stock price or FX rate), baskets (indexes, spreads) and term structure models (especially SV-HJM and SV-LMM). It also establishes fundamental links between the Wiener chaos of the instantaneous volatility and the small-time asymptotic structure of the stochastic implied volatility framework. It is addressed primarily to financial mathematics researchers and graduate students, interested in stochastic volatility, asymptotics or market models. Moreover, as it contains many self-contained approximation results, it will be useful to practitioners modelling the shape of the smile and its evolution.

Among the group of physics honors students huddled in 1957 on a Colorado mountain watching Sputnik bisect the heavens, one young scientist was destined, three short years later, to become a key player in America s own top-secret spy satellite program. One of our era s most prolific mathematicians, Karl Gustafson was given just two weeks to write the first US spy satellite s software. The project would fundamentally alter America s Cold War strategy, and this autobiographical account of a remarkable academic life spent in the top flight tells this fascinating inside story for the first time.

Gustafson takes you from his early pioneering work in computing, through fascinating encounters with Nobel laureates and Fields medalists, to his current observations on mathematics, science and life. He tells of brushes with death, being struck by lightning, and the beautiful women who have been a part of his journey."

A must-read for anyone who makes business decisions that have a major financial impact.

As the recent collapse on Wall Street shows, we are often ill-equipped to deal with uncertainty and risk. Yet every day we base our personal and business plans on uncertainties, whether they be next month's sales, next year's costs, or tomorrow's stock price. In "The Flaw of Averages," Sam Savage-known for his creative exposition of difficult subjects- describes common avoidable mistakes in assessing risk in the face of uncertainty. Along the way, he shows why plans based on average assumptions are wrong, on average, in areas as diverse as healthcare, accounting, the War on Terror, and climate change. In his chapter on Sex and the Central Limit Theorem, he bravely grasps the literary third rail of gender differences.

Instead of statistical jargon, Savage presents complex concepts in plain English. In addition, a tightly integrated web site contains numerous animations and simulations to further connect the seat of the reader's intellect to the seat of their pants.

The "Flaw of Averages" typically results when someone plugs a single number into a spreadsheet to represent an uncertain future quantity. Savage finishes the book with a discussion of the emerging field of Probability Management, which cures this problem though a new technology that can pack thousands of numbers into a single spreadsheet cell.

Praise for "The Flaw of Averages"

"Statistical uncertainties are pervasive in decisions we make every day in business, government, and our personal lives. Sam Savage's lively and engaging book gives any interested reader the insight and the tools to deal effectively with those uncertainties. I highly recommend "The Flaw of Averages.""
--William J. Perry, Former U.S. Secretary of Defense

"Enterprise analysis under uncertainty has long been an academic ideal. . . . In this profound and entertaining book, Professor Savage shows how to make all this practical, practicable, and comprehensible."
---Harry Markowitz, Nobel Laureate in Economics

An accessible guide that outlines the key elements of an effective financial plan

From Larry Swedroe, the author of the bestselling series of "The Only Guide" investment books, with Kevin Grogan and Tiya Lim comes a step-by-step handbook that shows you how to develop a winning personal investment strategy and reveals what it takes to make that strategy part of your overall financial plan. "The Only Guide You'll Ever Need for the Right Financial Plan" focuses on the "art" of investing and gives you the information you need to create a strategy that is tailor-made for your particular situation.

Designed for savvy investors and professional advisors, this book offers the vital information needed for developing and implementing an overall strategic financial plan. In this essential resource, Swedroe outlines the basics in asset allocation and other investment planning concepts.Addresses how you can design an investment policy statement and an individual asset allocation planExamines how to maintain your portfolio's risk profile in the most cost-effective and tax-efficient mannerOffers insights on integrating risk management and estate planning issues into your plan

"The Only Guide You'll Ever Need for the Right Financial Plan" offers a handy tool to help you make more informed and prudent decisions that will go a long way to ensure a secure financial future.

The concept of Wiener chaos generalizes to an infinite-dimensional setting the properties of orthogonal polynomials associated with probability distributions on the real line. It plays a crucial role in modern probability theory, with applications ranging from Malliavin calculus to stochastic differential equations and from probabilistic approximations to mathematical finance. This book is concerned with combinatorial structures arising from the study of chaotic random variables related to infinitely divisible random measures. The combinatorial structures involved are those of partitions of finite sets, over which Moebius functions and related inversion formulae are defined. This combinatorial standpoint (which is originally due to Rota and Wallstrom) provides an ideal framework for diagrams, which are graphical devices used to compute moments and cumulants of random variables. Several applications are described, in particular, recent limit theorems for chaotic random variables. An Appendix presents a computer implementation in MATHEMATICA for many of the formulae.

Become a more strategic and successful investor by identifying the biases impacting your decision making. In Behavioral Finance and Your Portfolio, acclaimed investment advisor and author Michael M. Pompian delivers an insightful and thorough guide to countering the negative effect of cognitive and behavioral biases on your financial decisions. You'll learn about the "Big Five" behavioral biases and how they're reducing your returns and leading to unwanted and unnecessary costs in your portfolio. Designed for investors who are serious about maximizing their gains, in this book you'll discover how to: Take control of your decision-making--even when challenging markets push greed and fear to intolerable levels Reflect on how to make investment decisions using data-backed and substantiated information instead of emotion and bias Counter deep-seated biases like loss aversion, hindsight and overconfidence with self-awareness and hard facts Identify your personal investment psychology profile, which you can use to inform your future financial decision making Behavioral Finance and Your Portfolio was created for individual investors, but will also earn a place in the libraries of financial advisors, planners and portfolio managers who are determined to counteract the less principled and data-driven aspects of their decision making.

Thomas A. Fetherston explores the financial markets in the 6th volume of Advances in Pacific Basin Financial Markets.

How could Finance benefit from AI? How can AI techniques provide an edge? Moving well beyond simply speeding up computation, this book tackles AI for Finance from a range of perspectives including business, technology, research, and students. Covering aspects like algorithms, big data, and machine learning, this book answers these and many other questions.

The role of asymmetric information in allocation of resources, together with the associated information-revelation process, has long been a central focus of economic research. While the bulk of the literature addresses these is sues within the framework of principal-agent relationship, which essentially reduces the problem to the sole principal's (the sole Stackelberg leader's) optimization problem subject to the agents' (the Stackelberg followers') re sponses, there are recent attempts to extend analysis to other economic setups characterized by different relationships among decision-makers. A notable strand of such attempts is the core analysis of incomplete in formation. Here, there is no Stackelberg-type relationship, and more impor tantly the players can talk to each other for coordinated choice of strategies. See, e.g., Wilson (1978) for a pioneering work; Yannelis (1991) for formula tion of feasibility of a strategy as its measurability; Ichiishi and Idzik (1996) for introduction of Bayesian incentive-compatibility to this strand; Ichiishi, Idzik and Zhao (1994) for information revelation (that is, endogenous deter mination of updated information structures); Ichiishi and Radner (1997) and Ichiishi and Sertel (1998) for studies of a specific model of Chandler's firm in multidivisional form for sharper results; and Vohra (1999) for a recent work. It is a common postulate in these works that every player takes part in design of a mechanism and also in execution of the signed contract."

A lot of economic problems can formulated as constrained optimizations and equilibration of their solutions. Various mathematical theories have been supplying economists with indispensable machineries for these problems arising in economic theory. Conversely, mathematicians have been stimulated by various mathematical difficulties raised by economic theories. The series is designed to bring together those mathematicians who were seriously interested in getting new challenging stimuli from economic theories with those economists who are seeking for effective mathematical tools for their researchers. Members of the editorial board of this series consists of following prominent economists and mathematicians: Managing Editors: S. Kusuoka (Univ. Tokyo), T. Maruyama (Keio Univ.) Editors: R. Anderson (U.C.Berkeley), C. Castaing (Univ. Montpellier), F. H. Clarke (Univ. Lyon I), G. Debreu (U.C. Berkeleyer), E. Dierker (Univ. Vienna), D. Duffie (Stanford Univ.), L.C. Evans (U.C. Berkeley), T. Fujimoto (Okayama Univ.), J. -M. Grandmont (CREST-CNRS), N. Hirano (Yokohama National Univ.), L. Hurwicz (Univ. of Minnesota), T. Ichiishi (Ohio State Univ.), A. Ioffe (Israel Institute of Technology), S. Iwamoto (Kyushu Univ.), K. Kamiya (Univ. Tokyo), K. Kawamata (Keio Univ.), N. Kikuchi (Keio Univ.), H. Matano (Univ. Tokyo), K. Nishimura (Kyoto Univ.), M. K. Richter (Univ. Minnesota), Y. Takahashi (Kyoto Univ.), M. Valadier (Univ. Montpellier II), M. Yano (Keio Univ).

Discover an insightful new text covering advanced problems in real property valuation In Advanced Issues in Property Valuation, real estate valuation experts and authors Hans Lind and Bo Nordlund provide a deep understanding of the concepts, theories, methods and controversies in property valuation. The book introduces readers to controversies and discussions in real estate valuation, including the relevance of market value for valuation for lending purposes, how uncertainty in property valuations should be interpreted, and the relationship between market value and fair value in financial reporting. Readers will also benefit from the inclusion of: A thorough introduction to the concepts, theories, methods and problems in real estate property valuation An exploration of the relevance of market value for valuation for lending purposes A practical discussion of how uncertainty in property valuations should be interpreted A concise treatment of the relationship between market value and fair value in financial reporting An examination of how concerns about sustainability and other structural changes can affect property valuation Perfect for graduate level students in courses involving valuation or real estate, Advanced Issues in Property Valuation is also an excellent resource for real estate practitioners who wish to update and deepen their knowledge about property valuation.

In "Coherent Stress Testing: A Bayesian Approach," industry expert Riccardo Rebonato presents a groundbreaking new approach to this important but often undervalued part of the risk management toolkit.

Based on the author's extensive work, research and presentations in the area, the book fills a gap in quantitative risk management by introducing a new and very intuitively appealing approach to stress testing based on expert judgement and Bayesian networks. It constitutes a radical departure from the traditional statistical methodologies based on Economic Capital or Extreme-Value-Theory approaches.

The book is split into four parts. Part I looks at stress testing and at its role in modern risk management. It discusses the distinctions between risk and uncertainty, the different types of probability that are used in risk management today and for which tasks they are best used. Stress testing is positioned as a bridge between the statistical areas where VaR can be effective and the domain of total Keynesian uncertainty. Part II lays down the quantitative foundations for the concepts described in the rest of the book. Part III takes readers through the application of the tools discussed in part II, and introduces two different systematic approaches to obtaining a coherent stress testing output that can satisfy the needs of industry users and regulators. In part IV the author addresses more practical questions such as embedding the suggestions of the book into a viable governance structure.

In this fully updated book, options trading innovator George Fontanills arms you with the knowledge and skills youneed to unleash the phenomenal power of your computer to become a successful online options trader. Following a concise review of the basics of online trading--including hardware and software requirements and essential online resources--Fontanills cuts to the chase with step-by-step coverage of proven managed risk option trading strategies. Specifically designed for online traders, these tested off-floor techniques provide you with a sure-fire method for consistently building up your trading account. Drawing upon his years as a leading international options educator, Fontanills makes it easy for you to master online options trading by walking you through a series of hypothetical trades that demonstrate how to compute the maximum risk, maximum profit, breakevens, and exit alternatives for each strategy. "Trade Options Online" also includes a comprehensive guide to fundamental and technical analysis methodologies, a detailed list of the best financial resources, websites analyzed from the point of view of an online options trader, and a review of the most popular online brokerages. "Trade Options Online" is your complete guide to earning a living and making a killing as an online options trader.

For successful innovation in business the responsible managers need a consistent view of the individual processes as well as an assessment of key projects in all phases of the development. Generating new ideas, fast examination of its feasibility requires skilled methods for evaluation of these ideas, plans and especially costs and revenues. Business models, calculation methods and some assessments of certain options are presented by the authors. The ability to identify risks and appropriate responses to misperceptions are important milestones in the innovation process. From analysis of problems to the introduction of market-ready solutions, legal requirements, business demands and risk management systems are discussed. Concepts promoting uniform, binding rules for ratings in the innovation process are treated. The identification of target pricing, target costing and litigation, the evaluation of the solution to calculate risk aspects as tasks in financial management and innovation controlling are part of the content. The authors demonstrate that any innovation in different industries requires a strategic and financial project management. Monetary assessment of the individual processes, a detailed patent portfolio and accounts management for innovation processes are of enormous importance. The book is completed by applications of the Berlin Balanced Scorecard Concept with practical examples from the innovation projects in pharmaceutical and technical business.

The interaction between mathematicians and statisticians reveals to be an effective approach to the analysis of insurance and financial problems, in particular in an operative perspective. The Maf2006 conference, held at the University of Salerno in 2006, had precisely this purpose and the collection published here gathers some of the papers presented at the conference and successively worked out to this aim. They cover a wide variety of subjects in insurance and financial fields.

IT Governance is finally getting the Board's and top management's attention. The value that IT needs to return and the associated risks that need to be managed, have become so important in many industries that enterprise survival depends on it. Information integrity is a significant part of the IT Governance challenge. Among other things, this conference will explore how Information Integrity contributes to the overall control and governance frameworks that enterprises need to put in place for IT to deliver business value and for corporate officers to be comfortable about the IT risks the enterprise faces. The goals for this international working conference are to find answers to the following questions: * what precisely do business managers need in order to have confidence in the integrity of their information systems and their data; * what is the status quo of research and development in this area; * where are the gaps between business needs on the one hand and research I development on the other; what needs to be done to bridge these gaps. The contributions have been divided in the following sections: * Refereed papers. These are papers that have been selected through a blind refereeing process by an international programme committee. * Invited papers. Well known experts present practice and research papers upon invitation by the programme committee. * Tutorial. Two papers describe the background, status quo and future development of CobiT as well as a case of an implementation of Co biT.

This sixth volume in the series Integrity and Internal Control in Information Systems is a state-of-the-art collection of papers in the area of integrity within information systems and the relationship between integrity in information systems and the overall internal control systems that are established in organizations to support corporate governance codes. Integrity and Internal Control in Information Systems VI represents a continuation of the dialogue between information security specialists, internal control specialists and the business community. The objectives of this dialogue are: To present methods and techniques that will help business achieve the desired level of integrity in information systems and data; To present the results of research that may in future be used to increase the level of integrity or help management maintain the desired level of integrity; To investigate the shortcomings in the technologies presently in use, shortcomings that require attention in order to protect the integrity of systems in general.The book contains a collection of papers from the Sixth International Working Conference on Integrity and Internal Control in Information Systems (IICIS), sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) and held in Lausanne, Switzerland in November 2003. It will be essential reading for academics and practitioners in computer science, information technology, business informatics, accountancy and IT-auditing.