Copula-Type Estimators for Flexible Multivariate Density Modeling Using Mixtures

Copulas are popular as models for multivariate dependence because they allow the marginal densities and the joint dependence to be modeled separately. However, they usually require that the transformation from uniform marginals to the marginals of the joint dependence structure is known. This can only be done for a restricted set of copulas, for example, a normal copula. Our article introduces copula-type estimators for flexible multivariate density estimation which also allow the marginal densities to be modeled separately from the joint dependence, as in copula modeling, but overcomes the lack of flexibility of most popular copula estimators. An iterative scheme is proposed for estimating copula-type estimators and its usefulness is demonstrated through simulation and real examples. The joint dependence is modeled by mixture of normals and mixture of normal factor analyzer models, and mixture of t and mixture of t-factor analyzer models. We develop efficient variational Bayes algorithms for fitting these in which model selection is performed automatically. Based on these mixture models, we construct four classes of copula-type densities which are far more flexible than current popular copula densities, and outperform them in a simulated dataset and several real datasets. Supplementary material for this article is available online.     

On the invariant properties of notions of positive dependence and copulas under increasing transformations

Notions of positive dependence and copulas play important roles in modeling dependent risks. The invariant properties of notions of positive dependence and copulas under increasing transformations are often used in the studies of economics, finance, insurance and many other fields. In this paper, we examine the notions of the conditionally increasing (CI), the conditionally increasing in sequence (CIS), the positive dependence through the stochastic ordering (PDS), and the positive dependence through the upper orthant ordering (PDUO). We first use counterexamples to show that the statements in Theorem 3.10.19 of Müller and Stoyan (2002) about the invariant properties of CIS and CI under increasing transformations are not true. We then prove that the invariant properties of CIS and CI hold under strictly increasing transformations. Furthermore, we give rigorous proofs for the invariant properties of PDS and PDUO under increasing transformations. These invariant properties enable us to show that a continuous random vector is PDS (PDUO) if and only of its copula is PDS (PDUO). In addition, using the properties of generalized left-continuous and right-continuous inverse functions, we give a rigorous proof for the invariant property of copulas under increasing transformations on the components of any random vector. This result generalizes Proposition 4.7.4 of Denuit et al. (2005) and Proposition 5.6. of McNeil et al. (2005).     

Lévy-frailty copulas

A parametric family of n-dimensional extreme-value copulas of Marshall–Olkin type is introduced. Members of this class arise as survival copulas in Lévy-frailty models. The underlying probabilistic construction introduces dependence to initially independent exponential random variables by means of first-passage times of a Lévy subordinator. Jumps of the subordinator correspond to a singular component of the copula. Additionally, a characterization of completely monotone sequences via the introduced family of copulas is derived. An alternative characterization is given by Hausdorff’s moment problem in terms of random variables with compact support. The resulting correspondence between random variables, Lévy subordinators, and copulas is studied and illustrated with several examples. Finally, it is used to provide a general methodology for sampling the copula in many cases. The new class is shown to share some properties with Archimedean copulas regarding construction and analytical form. Finally, the parametric form allows us to compute different measures of dependence and the Pickands representation.     

Robust pair‐copula based forecasts of realized volatility

A useful application for copula functions is modeling the dynamics in the conditional moments of a time series. Using copulas, one can go beyond the traditional linear ARMA (p,q) modeling, which is solely based on the behavior of the autocorrelation function, and capture the entire dependence structure linking consecutive observations. This type of serial dependence is best represented by a canonical vine decomposition, and we illustrate this idea in the context of emerging stock markets, modeling linear and nonlinear temporal dependences of Brazilian series of realized volatilities. However, the analysis of intraday data collected from e‐markets poses some specific challenges. The large amount of real‐time information calls for heavy data manipulation, which may result in gross errors. Atypical points in high‐frequency intraday transaction prices may contaminate the series of daily realized volatilities, thus affecting classical statistical inference and leading to poor predictions. Therefore, in this paper, we propose to robustly estimate pair‐copula models using the weighted minimum distance and the weighted maximum likelihood estimates (WMLE). The excellent performance of these robust estimates for pair‐copula models are assessed through a comprehensive set of simulations, from which the WMLE emerged as the best option for members of the elliptical copula family. We evaluate and compare alternative volatility forecasts and show that the robustly estimated canonical vine‐based forecasts outperform the competitors. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Copula selection for graphical models in continuous Estimation of Distribution Algorithms

This paper presents the use of graphical models and copula functions in Estimation of Distribution Algorithms (EDAs) for solving multivariate optimization problems. It is shown in this work how the incorporation of copula functions and graphical models for modeling the dependencies among variables provides some theoretical advantages over traditional EDAs. By means of copula functions and two well known graphical models, this paper presents a novel approach for defining new EDAs. Either dependence is modeled by a copula function chosen from a predefined set of six functions that aim to cover a wide range of inter-relations. It is also shown how the use of mutual information in the learning of graphical models implies a natural way of employing copula entropies. The experimental results on separable and non-separable functions show that the two new EDAs, which adopt copula functions to model dependencies, perform better than their original version with Gaussian variables.     

Multivariate extreme value copulas with factor and tree dependence structures

Parsimonious extreme value copula models with O(d) parameters for d observed variables of extrema are presented. These models utilize the dependence characteristics, including factor and tree structures, assumed on the underlying variables that give rise to the data of extremes. For factor structures, a class of parametric models is obtained by taking the extreme value limit of factor copulas with non-zero tail dependence. An alternative model suitable for both factor and tree structures imposes constraints on the parametric Hüsler-Reiss copula to get representations in terms of O(d) other parameters. Dependence properties are discussed. As the full density is often intractable, the method of composite (pairwise) likelihood is used for model inference. Procedures to improve the stability of bivariate density evaluation are also developed. The proposed models are applied to two data examples — one for annual extreme river flows and one for bimonthly extremes of daily stock returns.     

基于倾斜-t Copula的半参数马尔可夫链

在不指定时间序列结构的情况下,我们的分布模型是基于多变量离散时间的相应马尔可夫族和相关变量一维的边际分布.这样的模型可以同时处理时间序列之间的相互依赖和每个时间序列沿时间方向的依赖.具体的参数copula被指定为倾斜-t. 倾斜-t Copla能够处理不对称,偏斜和粗尾的数据分布.三个股票指数日均收益的实证研究表明,倾斜-t copula的马尔可夫模型要比以下模型更好:倾斜正态Copula马可夫, t-copula马可夫, 倾斜-t copula但无马尔可夫特性.     

Degradation modeling of 2 fatigue‐crack growth characteristics based on inverse Gaussian processes: A case study

Most modern products that are highly reliable are complex in their inner and outer structures. This situation indicates quality characterization by the interaction of multiple performance characteristics, which motivates the utilization of robust reliability models to obtain robust estimates. It is paramount to obtaining substantial information about a product's life cycle; therefore, when multiple performance characteristics are dependent, it is important to find models that address the joint distribution of performance degradation of such. In this paper, a reliability model for products with 2 fatigue‐crack growth characteristics related to 2 degradation processes is developed. The proposed model considers the dependence among degradation processes by using copula functions considering the marginal degradation processes as inverse Gaussian processes. The statistical inference is performed by using a Bayesian approach to estimate the parameters of the joint bivariate model. A time‐scale transformation is considered to assure monotone paths of the degradation trajectories. The comparison results of the reliability analysis, under both dependent and independent assumptions, are reported with the implementation of the proposed modeling in a case study, which consists of the crack propagation data of 2 terminals of an electronic device.     

Modeling multi-country mortality dependence and its application in pricing survivor index swaps—A dynamic copula approach

This paper introduces mortality dependence in multi-country mortality modeling using a dynamic copula approach. Specifically, we use time-varying copula models to capture the mortality dependence structure across countries, examining both symmetric and asymmetric dependence structures. In addition, to capture the phenomenon of a heavy tail for the multi-country mortality index, we consider not only the setting of Gaussian innovations but also non-Gaussian innovations under the Lee–Carter framework model. As tests of the goodness of fit of different dynamic copula models, the pattern of mortality dependence, and the distribution of the innovations, we used empirical mortality data from Finland, France, the Netherlands, and Sweden. To understand the effect of mortality dependence on longevity derivatives, we also built a valuation framework for pricing a survivor index swap, then investigated the fair swap rates of a survivor swap numerically. We demonstrate that failing to consider the dynamic copula mortality model and non-Gaussian innovations would lead to serious underestimations of the swap rates and loss reserves.     

Lower tail dependence for Archimedean copulas: Characterizations and pitfalls

Tail dependence copulas provide a natural perspective from which one can study the dependence in the tail of a multivariate distribution. For Archimedean copulas with continuously differentiable generators, regular variation of the generator near the origin is known to be closely connected to convergence of the lower tail dependence copulas to the Clayton copula. In this paper, these characterizations are refined and extended to the case of generators which are not necessarily continuously differentiable. Moreover, a counterexample is constructed showing that even if the generator of a strict Archimedean copula is continuously differentiable and slowly varying at the origin, then the lower tail dependence copulas still do not need to converge to the independent copula.     

Estimating copula densities, using model selection techniques

Recently a new way of modeling dependence has been introduced considering a sequence of parametric copula models, covering more and more dependency aspects and thus giving a closer approximation to the true copula density. The method uses contamination families based on Legendre polynomials. It has been shown that in general after a few steps accurate approximations are obtained. In this paper selection of the adequate number of steps is considered, and estimation of the unknown parameters within the chosen contamination family is established, thus obtaining an estimator of the unknown copula density. There should be a balance between the complexity of the model and the number of parameters to be estimated. High complexity gives a low model error, but a large stochastic or estimation error, while a very simple model gives a small stochastic error, but a large model error. Techniques from model selection are applied, thus letting the data tell us which aspects are important enough to capture into the model. Natural and simple estimators of the involved Fourier coefficients complete the procedure. Theoretical results show that the expected quadratic error is reduced by the selection rule to the same order of magnitude as in a classical parametric problem. The method is applied on a real data set, illustrating that the new method describes the data set very well: the error involved in the classical Gaussian copula density is reduced with no fewer than 50%.     

Recognizing and visualizing copulas: An approach using local Gaussian approximation

In this paper we examine the relationship between a newly developed local dependence measure, the local Gaussian correlation, and standard copula theory. We are able to describe characteristics of the dependence structure in different copula models in terms of the local Gaussian correlation. Further, we construct a goodness-of-fit test for bivariate copula models. An essential ingredient of this test is the use of a canonical local Gaussian correlation and Gaussian pseudo-observations which make the test independent of the margins, so that it is a genuine test of the copula structure. A Monte Carlo study reveals that the test performs very well compared to a commonly used alternative test. We also propose two types of diagnostic plots which can be used to investigate the cause of a rejected null. Finally, our methods are applied to a “classical” insurance data set.     

Bivariate nonparametric estimation of the Pickands dependence function using Bernstein copula with kernel regression approach

In this study, a new nonparametric approach using Bernstein copula approximation is proposed to estimate Pickands dependence function. New data points obtained with Bernstein copula approximation serve to estimate the unknown Pickands dependence function. Kernel regression method is then used to derive an intrinsic estimator satisfying the convexity. Some extreme-value copula models are used to measure the performance of the estimator by a comprehensive simulation study. Also, a real-data example is illustrated. The proposed Pickands estimator provides a flexible way to have a better fit and has a better performance than the conventional estimators.     

Distribution modeling for reliability analysis: Impact of multiple dependences and probability model selection

Reliability analysis requires modeling of joint probability distribution of uncertain parameters, which can be a challenge since the random variables representing the parameter uncertainties may be correlated. For convenience, a Gaussian data dependence is commonly assumed for correlated random variables. This paper first investigates the effect of multidimensional non-Gaussian data dependences underlying the multivariate probability distribution on reliability results. Using different bivariate copulas in a vine structure, various data dependences can be modeled. The associated copula parameters are identified from available statistical information by moment matching techniques. After the development of the vine copula model for representing the multivariate probability distribution, the reliability involving correlated random variables is evaluated based on the Rosenblatt transformation. The impact of data dependence is significant because a large deviation in failure probability is observed, which emphasizes the need for accurate dependence characterization. A practical method for dependence modeling based on limited data is thus provided. The result demonstrates that the non-Gaussian data dependences can be real in practice, and the reliability can be biased if the Gaussian dependence is used inappropriately. Moreover, the effect of conditioning order on reliability should not be overlooked except that the vine structure contains only one type of copula.     

COPAR—multivariate time series modeling using the copula autoregressive model

The analysis of multivariate time series is a common problem in areas like finance and economics. The classical tools for this purpose are vector autoregressive models. These however are limited to the modeling of linear and symmetric dependence. We propose a novel copula‐based model that allows for the non‐linear and non‐symmetric modeling of serial as well as between‐series dependencies. The model exploits the flexibility of vine copulas, which are built up by bivariate copulas only. We describe statistical inference techniques for the new model and discuss how it can be used for testing Granger causality. Finally, we use the model to investigate inflation effects on industrial production, stock returns and interest rates. In addition, the out‐of‐sample predictive ability is compared with relevant benchmark models. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Portfolio value-at-risk estimation in energy futures markets with time-varying copula-GARCH model

This paper combines copula functions with GARCH-type models to construct the conditional joint distribution, which is used to estimate Value-at-Risk (VaR) of an equally weighted portfolio comprising crude oil futures and natural gas futures in energy market. Both constant and time-varying copulas are applied to fit the dependence structure of the two assets returns. The findings show that the constant Student t copula is a good compromise for effectively fitting the dependence structure between crude oil futures and natural gas futures. Moreover, the skewed Student t distribution has a better fit than Normal and Student t distribution to the marginal distribution of each asset. Asymmetries and excess kurtosis are found in marginal distributions as well as in dependence. We estimate VaR of the underlying portfolio to be 95% and 99%, by using the Monte Carlo simulation. Then using backtesting, we compare the out-of-sample forecasting performances of VaR estimated by different models.     

Tail dependence functions and vine copulas

Tail dependence and conditional tail dependence functions describe, respectively, the tail probabilities and conditional tail probabilities of a copula at various relative scales. The properties as well as the interplay of these two functions are established based upon their homogeneous structures. The extremal dependence of a copula, as described by its extreme value copulas, is shown to be completely determined by its tail dependence functions. For a vine copula built from a set of bivariate copulas, its tail dependence function can be expressed recursively by the tail dependence and conditional tail dependence functions of lower-dimensional margins. The effect of tail dependence of bivariate linking copulas on that of a vine copula is also investigated.     

Tensor Approximation of Generalized Correlated Diffusions and Functional Copula Operators

In this paper we develop a class of applied probabilistic continuous time but discretized state space decompositions of the characterization of a multivariate generalized diffusion process. This decomposition is novel and, in particular, it allows one to construct families of mimicking classes of processes for such continuous state and continuous time diffusions in the form of a discrete state space but continuous time Markov chain representation. Furthermore, we present this novel decomposition and study its discretization properties from several perspectives. This class of decomposition both brings insight into understanding locally in the state space the induced dependence structures from the generalized diffusion process as well as admitting computationally efficient representations in order to evaluate functionals of generalized multivariate diffusion processes, which is based on a simple rank one tensor approximation of the exact representation. In particular, we investigate aspects of semimartingale decompositions, approximation and the martingale representation for multidimensional correlated Markov processes. A new interpretation of the dependence among processes is given using the martingale approach. We show that it is possible to represent, in both continuous and discrete space, that a multidimensional correlated generalized diffusion is a linear combination of processes originated from the decomposition of the starting multidimensional semimartingale. This result not only reconciles with the existing theory of diffusion approximations and decompositions, but defines the general representation of infinitesimal generators for both multidimensional generalized diffusions and, as we will demonstrate, also for the specification of copula density dependence structures. This new result provides immediate representation of the approximate weak solution for correlated stochastic differential equations. Finally, we demonstrate desirable convergence results for the proposed multidimensional semimartingales decomposition approximations.     

基于极值统计和高维动态C藤Copula的股市行业集成风险计算

股市诸多行业风险之间存在着波动相依性,集成计量多维风险对投资决策意义重大。藤Copula是Copula函数高维化拓展的一个方向,其动态化是新的研究前沿。将极值理论的GPD模型和高维动态C藤Copula方法结合起来研究沪深300指数中地产、基建、银行和运输四个行业风险,能够有效描述尾部极值形态,突出关键变量的作用。再运用动态Pair-Copula分解,刻画高维行业风险变量间的动态关系,以仿真出动态集成风险变量VaR序列。VaR计算结果通过了回溯检验和稳定性测试,表明高维动态C藤Copula模型可以作为风险集成计量的一种新的有效方法。     

Market risk forecasting for high dimensional portfolios via factor copulas with GAS dynamics

In this paper we propose forecasting market risk measures, such as Value at Risk (VaR) and Expected Shortfall (ES), for large dimensional portfolios via copula modeling. For that we compare several high dimensional copula models, from naive ones to complex factor copulas, which are able to simultaneously tackle the curse of dimensionality and introduce a high level of complexity into the model. We explore both static and dynamic copula fitting. In the dynamic case we allow different levels of flexibility for the dependence parameters which are driven by a GAS (Generalized Autoregressive Scores) model, in the spirit of Oh and Patton (2015). Our empirical results, for assets negotiated at Brazilian BOVESPA stock market from January, 2008 to December, 2014, suggest that, compared to the other copula models, the GAS dynamic factor copula approach has a superior performance in terms of AIC (Akaike Information Criterion) and a non-inferior performance with respect to VaR and ES forecasting.