Applied Stochastic Methods

Generally, books on mathematical statistics are restricted to the case of independent identically distributed random variables. In this book however, both this case AND the case of dependent variables, i.e. statistics for discrete and continuous time processes, are studied. This second case is very important for today's practitioners. Mathematical Statistics and Stochastic Processes is based on decision theory and asymptotic statistics and contains up-to-date information on the relevant topics of theory of probability, estimation, confidence intervals, non-parametric statistics and robustness, second-order processes in discrete and continuous time and diffusion processes, statistics for discrete and continuous time processes, statistical prediction, and complements in probability. This book is aimed at students studying courses on probability with an emphasis on measure theory and for all practitioners who apply and use statistics and probability on a daily basis.

Quantitative finance has become these last years a extraordinary field of research and interest as well from an academic point of view as for practical applications. At the same time, pension issue is clearly a major economical and financial topic for the next decades in the context of the well-known longevity risk. Surprisingly few books are devoted to application of modern stochastic calculus to pension analysis. The aim of this book is to fill this gap and to show how recent methods of stochastic finance can be useful for to the risk management of pension funds. Methods of optimal control will be especially developed and applied to fundamental problems such as the optimal asset allocation of the fund or the cost spreading of a pension scheme. In these various problems, financial as well as demographic risks will be addressed and modelled.