The study of heavy-tailed distributions allows researchers to represent phenomena that occasionally exhibit very large deviations from the mean. The dynamics underlying these phenomena is an interesting theoretical subject, but the study of their statistical properties is in itself a very useful endeavor from the point of view of managing assets and controlling risk. In this book, the authors are primarily concerned with the statistical properties of heavy-tailed distributions and with the processes that exhibit jumps. A detailed overview with a Matlab implementation of heavy-tailed models applied in asset management and risk managements is presented. The book is not intended as a theoretical treatise on probability or statistics, but as a tool to understand the main concepts regarding heavy-tailed random variables and processes as applied to real-world applications in finance. Accordingly, the authors review approaches and methodologies whose realization will be useful for developing new methods for forecasting of financial variables where extreme events are not treated as anomalies, but as intrinsic parts of the economic process.

Fractional Calculus and Fractional Processes with Applications to Financial Economics presents the theory and application of fractional calculus and fractional processes to financial data. Fractional calculus dates back to 1695 when Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first suggested the possibility of fractional derivatives. Research on fractional calculus started in full earnest in the second half of the twentieth century. The fractional paradigm applies not only to calculus, but also to stochastic processes, used in many applications in financial economics such as modelling volatility, interest rates, and modelling high-frequency data. The key features of fractional processes that make them interesting are long-range memory, path-dependence, non-Markovian properties, self-similarity, fractal paths, and anomalous diffusion behaviour. In this book, the authors discuss how fractional calculus and fractional processes are used in financial modelling and finance economic theory. It provides a practical guide that can be useful for students, researchers, and quantitative asset and risk managers interested in applying fractional calculus and fractional processes to asset pricing, financial time-series analysis, stochastic volatility modelling, and portfolio optimization.