arXiv subjects

Jianfeng Zhang

Publications and source records attributed to Jianfeng Zhang.

At least 145 records · Page 8Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

The Wellposedness of FBSDEs (II)

This paper is a continuation of \cite{zhang}, in which we established the wellposedness result and a comparison theorem for a class of one dimensional Forward-Backward SDEs. In this paper we extend the wellposedness result to high dimensional FBSDEs, and weaken the key condition in \cite{zhang} significantly. Compared to the existing methods in the literature, our result has the following features: (i) arbitrary time duration; (ii) random coefficients; (iii) (possibly) degenerate forward diffusion; and (iv) no monotonicity condition.

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arXiv2016

Backward stochastic differential equations with Young drift

We prove via a direct fixpoint argument the well-posedness of backward stochastic differential equations containing an additional drift driven by a path of finite $p$-variation with $p \in [1,2)$. An application to the Feynman-Kac representation of semilinear rough partial differential equations is given.

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arXiv2016

Viscosity solutions of fully nonlinear parabolic path dependent PDEs: Part II

In our previous paper [Ekren, Touzi and Zhang (2015)], we introduced a notion of viscosity solutions for fully nonlinear path-dependent PDEs, extending the semilinear case of Ekren et al. [Ann. Probab. 42 (2014) 204-236], which satisfies a partial comparison result under standard Lipshitz-type assumptions. The main result of this paper provides a full, well-posedness result under an additional assumption, formulated on some partial differential equation, defined locally by freezing the path. Namely, assuming further that such path-frozen standard PDEs satisfy the comparison principle and the Perron approach for existence, we prove that the nonlinear path-dependent PDE has a unique viscosity solution. Uniqueness is implied by a comparison result.

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arXiv2016

Dynamic Approaches for Some Time Inconsistent Problems

In this paper we investigate possible approaches to study general time-inconsistent optimization problems without assuming the existence of optimal strategy. This leads immediately to the need to refine the concept of time-consistency as well as any method that is based on Pontryagin's Maximum Principle. The fundamental obstacle is the dilemma of having to invoke the {\it Dynamic Programming Principle} (DPP) in a time-inconsistent setting, which is contradictory in nature. The main contribution of this work is the introduction of the idea of the "dynamic utility" under which the original time inconsistent problem (under the fixed utility) becomes a time consistent one. As a benchmark model, we shall consider a stochastic controlled problem with multidimensional backward SDE dynamics, which covers many existing time-inconsistent problems in the literature as special cases, and we argue that the time inconsistency is essentially equivalent to the lack of {\it comparison principle}. We shall propose three approaches aiming at reviving the DPP in this setting: the duality approach, the dynamic utility approach, and the master equation approach. Unlike the game approach in many existing works in continuous time models, all our approaches produce the same value as the original static problem.

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arXiv2016

Pseudo Markovian Viscosity Solutions of Fully Nonlinear Degenerate PPDEs

In this paper we propose a new type of viscosity solutions for fully nonlinear path dependent PDEs. By restricting to certain pseudo Markovian structure, we remove the uniform non- degeneracy condition imposed in our earlier works [9, 10]. We establish the comparison principle under natural and mild conditions. Moreover, as applications we apply our results to two important classes of PPDEs: the stochastic HJB equations and the path dependent Isaacs equations, induced from the stochastic optimization with random coefficients and the path dependent zero sum game problem, respectively.

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arXiv2015

Comparison of viscosity solutions of fully nonlinear degenerate parabolic Path-dependent PDEs

We prove a comparison result for viscosity solutions of (possibly degenerate) parabolic fully nonlinear path-dependent PDEs. In contrast with the previous result in Ekren, Touzi & Zhang, our conditions are easier to check and allow for the degenerate case, thus including first order path-dependent PDEs. Our argument follows the regularization method as introduced by Jensen, Lions & Souganidis in the corresponding finite-dimensional PDE setting. The present argument significantly simplifies the comparison proof in Ekren, Touzi & Zhang, but requires an $L^p-$type of continuity (with respect to the path) for the viscosity semi-solutions and for the nonlinearity defining the equation.

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arXiv2015

Optimal stopping under adverse nonlinear expectation and related games

We study the existence of optimal actions in a zero-sum game $\inf_τ\sup_PE^P[X_τ]$ between a stopper and a controller choosing a probability measure. This includes the optimal stopping problem $\inf_τ\mathcal{E}(X_τ)$ for a class of sublinear expectations $\mathcal{E}(\cdot)$ such as the $G$-expectation. We show that the game has a value. Moreover, exploiting the theory of sublinear expectations, we define a nonlinear Snell envelope $Y$ and prove that the first hitting time $\inf\{t:Y_t=X_t\}$ is an optimal stopping time. The existence of a saddle point is shown under a compactness condition. Finally, the results are applied to the subhedging of American options under volatility uncertainty.

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arXiv2015

On well-posedness of forward-backward SDEs-A unified approach

In this paper, we study the well-posedness of the Forward-Backward Stochastic Differential Equations (FBSDE) in a general non-Markovian framework. The main purpose is to find a unified scheme which combines all existing methodology in the literature, and to address some fundamental longstanding problems for non-Markovian FBSDEs. An important device is a decoupling random field that is regular (uniformly Lipschitz in its spatial variable). We show that the regulariy of such decoupling field is closely related to the bounded solution to an associated characteristic BSDE, a backward stochastic Riccati-type equation with superlinear growth in both components $Y$ and $Z$. We establish various sufficient conditions for the well-posedness of an ODE that dominates the characteristic BSDE, which leads to the existence of the desired regular decoupling random field, whence the solvability of the original FBSDE. A synthetic analysis of the solvability is given, as a "User's Guide," for a large class of FBSDEs that are not covered by the existing methods. Some of them have important implications in applications.

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arXiv2015

A monotone scheme for high-dimensional fully nonlinear PDEs

In this paper we propose a feasible numerical scheme for high-dimensional, fully nonlinear parabolic PDEs, which includes the quasi-linear PDE associated with a coupled FBSDE as a special case. Our paper is strongly motivated by the remarkable work Fahim, Touzi and Warin [Ann. Appl. Probab. 21 (2011) 1322-1364] and stays in the paradigm of monotone schemes initiated by Barles and Souganidis [Asymptot. Anal. 4 (1991) 271-283]. Our scheme weakens a critical constraint imposed by Fahim, Touzi and Warin (2011), especially when the generator of the PDE depends only on the diagonal terms of the Hessian matrix. Several numerical examples, up to dimension 12, are reported.

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arXiv2014

Pathwise Itô Calculus for Rough Paths and Rough PDEs with Path Dependent Coefficients

This paper introduces the path derivatives, in the spirit of Dupire's functional Itô calculus, for the controlled paths in the rough path theory with possibly non-geometric rough paths. The theory allows us to deal with rough integration and rough PDEs in the same manner as standard stochastic calculus. We next study rough PDEs with coefficients depending on the rough path itself, which corresponds to stochastic PDEs with random coefficients. Such coefficients is less regular in the time variable and is not covered in the existing literature. The results are useful for studying viscosity solutions of stochastic PDEs.

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arXiv2014

Comparison of Viscosity Solutions of Semi-linear Path-Dependent PDEs

This paper provides a probabilistic proof of the comparison result for viscosity solutions of path-dependent semilinear PDEs. We consider the notion of viscosity solutions introduced in \cite{EKTZ} which considers as test functions all those smooth processes which are tangent in mean. When restricted to the Markovian case, this definition induces a larger set of test functions, and reduces to the notion of stochastic viscosity solutions analyzed in \cite{BayraktarSirbu1,BayraktarSirbu2}. Our main result takes advantage of this enlargement of the test functions, and provides an easier proof of comparison. This is most remarkable in the context of the linear path-dependent heat equation. As a key ingredient for our methodology, we introduce a notion of punctual differentiation, similar to the corresponding concept in the standard viscosity solutions \cite{CaffarelliCabre}, and we prove that semimartingales are almost everywhere punctually differentiable. This smoothness result can be viewed as the counterpart of the Aleksandroff smoothness result for convex functions. A similar comparison result was established earlier in \cite{EKTZ}. The result of this paper is more general and, more importantly, the arguments that we develop do not rely on any representation of the solution.

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arXiv2014

Viscosity Solutions of Fully Nonlinear Parabolic Path Dependent PDEs: Part I

The main objective of this paper and the accompanying one \cite{ETZ2} is to provide a notion of viscosity solutions for fully nonlinear parabolic path-dependent PDEs. Our definition extends our previous work \cite{EKTZ}, focused on the semilinear case, and is crucially based on the nonlinear optimal stopping problem analyzed in \cite{ETZ0}. We prove that our notion of viscosity solutions is consistent with the corresponding notion of classical solutions, and satisfies a stability property and a partial comparison result. The latter is a key step for the wellposedness results established in \cite{ETZ2}. We also show that the value processes of path-dependent stochastic control problems are viscosity solutions of the corresponding path dependent dynamic programming equation.

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arXiv2014

An overview of Viscosity Solutions of Path-Dependent PDEs

This paper provides an overview of the recently developed notion of viscosity solutions of path-dependent partial di erential equations. We start by a quick review of the Crandall- Ishii notion of viscosity solutions, so as to motivate the relevance of our de nition in the path-dependent case. We focus on the wellposedness theory of such equations. In partic- ular, we provide a simple presentation of the current existence and uniqueness arguments in the semilinear case. We also review the stability property of this notion of solutions, in- cluding the adaptation of the Barles-Souganidis monotonic scheme approximation method. Our results rely crucially on the theory of optimal stopping under nonlinear expectation. In the dominated case, we provide a self-contained presentation of all required results. The fully nonlinear case is more involved and is addressed in [12].

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arXiv2014

Large Deviations for Non-Markovian Diffusions and a Path-Dependent Eikonal Equation

This paper provides a large deviation principle for Non-Markovian, Brownian motion driven stochastic differential equations with random coefficients. Similar to Gao and Liu \cite{GL}, this extends the corresponding results collected in Freidlin and Wentzell \cite{FreidlinWentzell}. However, we use a different line of argument, adapting the PDE method of Fleming \cite{Fleming} and Evans and Ishii \cite{EvansIshii} to the path-dependent case, by using backward stochastic differential techniques. Similar to the Markovian case, we obtain a characterization of the action function as the unique bounded solution of a path-dependent version of the Eikonal equation. Finally, we provide an application to the short maturity asymptotics of the implied volatility surface in financial mathematics.

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arXiv2014

Monotone Schemes for Fully Nonlinear Parabolic Path Dependent PDEs

In this paper we extend the results of the seminal work Barles and Souganidis \cite{BS} to path dependent case. Based on the viscosity theory of path dependent PDEs, developed by Ekren, Keller, Touzi and Zhang \cite{EKTZ} and Ekren, Touzi and Zhang \cite{ETZ0, ETZ1, ETZ2}, we show that a monotone scheme converges to the unique viscosity solution of the (fully nonlinear) parabolic path dependent PDE. An example of such monotone scheme is proposed. Moreover, in the case that the solution is smooth enough, we obtain the rate of convergence of our scheme.

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arXiv2014

Dynamic Equilibrium Limit Order Book Model and Optimal Execution Problem

In this paper we propose a dynamic model of Limit Order Book (LOB). The main feature of our model is that the shape of the LOB is determined endogenously by an expected utility function via a competitive equilibrium argument. Assuming zero resilience, the resulting equilibrium density of the LOB is random, nonlinear, and time inhomogeneous. Consequently, the liquidity cost can be defined dynamically in a natural way. We next study an optimal execution problem in our model. We verify that the value function satisfies the Dynamic Programming Principle, and is a viscosity solution to the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation which is in the form of an integro-partial-differential quasi-variational inequality. We also prove the existence and analyze the structure of the optimal strategy via a verification theorem argument, assuming that the PDE has a classical solution.

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arXiv2014

On viscosity solutions of path dependent PDEs

In this paper we propose a notion of viscosity solutions for path dependent semi-linear parabolic PDEs. This can also be viewed as viscosity solutions of non-Markovian backward SDEs, and thus extends the well-known nonlinear Feynman-Kac formula to non-Markovian case. We shall prove the existence, uniqueness, stability and comparison principle for the viscosity solutions. The key ingredient of our approach is a functional Itô calculus recently introduced by Dupire [Functional Itô calculus (2009) Preprint].

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arXiv2013

Pathwise Taylor Expansions for Random Fields on Multiple Dimensional Paths

In this paper we establish the pathwise Taylor expansions for random fields that are "regular" in the spirit of Dupire's path-derivatives \cite{Dupire}. Our result is motivated by but extends the recent result of Buckdahn-Bulla-Ma \cite{BBM}, when translated into the language of pathwise calculus. We show that with such a language the pathwise Taylor expansion can be naturally carried out to any order and for any dimension, and it coincides with the existing results when reduced to these special settings. More importantly, the expansion can be both "forward" and "backward" (i.e., the temporal increments can be both positive and negative), and the remainder is estimated in a pathwise manner. This result will be the main building block for our new notion of viscosity solution to forward path-dependent PDEs corresponding to (forward) stochastic PDEs in our accompanying paper \cite{BMZ}.

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