Smoothly truncated stable distributions,GARCH-models,and option pricing

Although asset return distributions are known to be conditionally leptokurtic, this fact has rarely been addressed in the recent GARCH model literature. For this reason, we introduce the class of smoothly truncated stable distributions (STS distributions) and derive a generalized GARCH option pricing framework based on non-Gaussian innovations. Our empirical results show that (1) the model’s performance in the objective as well as the risk-neutral world is substantially improved by allowing for non-Gaussian innovations and (2) the model’s best option pricing performance is achieved with a new estimation approach where all model parameters are obtained from time-series information whereas the market price of risk and the spot variance are inverted from market prices of options. The paper subsumes a previous one under the title “A New Class of Probability Distributions and Its Application to Finance”. The authors gratefully acknowledge comments made by seminar participants at University of California, Santa Barbara, University of Washington, Seattle, Hochschule für Banken, Frankfurt, Cornell University, Princeton University, American University, Washington DC, and the Risk Management and Financial Engineering Conference held in Gainesville, FL in April 2005. All views and opinions expressed in this article are strictly those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of Sal. Oppenheim.