Date of Award

2017

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science in Statistics

Department

Computer Science and Statistics

First Advisor

Gavino Puggioni

Abstract

Some financial time series exhibit short periods of explosive local trends followed by an abrupt decline. Such trends can be a result of speculative bubble phenomena. A bubble is formed when investors' future profits expectations influence the present market value of securities. Mixed causal-noncausal autoregressive processes (MAR) are able to better capture such behavior in comparison to standard causal ARIMA models. In the first part of this work we propose an alternative distribution (Voigt) to model the disturbances in the MAR processes. The Voigt, a convolution of Gaussian and Cauchy distributions, is used in atomic and molecular spectroscopy, and is more flexible than other heavy-tail distributions. The second part of this work extends the MAR models to Markov switching mixed causal-noncausal autoregressive processes (MSMAR) with Cauchy distributed errors to account for changes in regime at different times. Parameter estimation of both models MAR with Voigt errors and MSMAR is performed in a Bayesian framework via MCMC algorithms. The models are tested for performance with a simulation study and then applied to Bitcoin/USD exchange rate data.

Share

COinS
 
 

To view the content in your browser, please download Adobe Reader or, alternately,
you may Download the file to your hard drive.

NOTE: The latest versions of Adobe Reader do not support viewing PDF files within Firefox on Mac OS and if you are using a modern (Intel) Mac, there is no official plugin for viewing PDF files within the browser window.