Diagonal Frog meets ADI: trading matrix exponentials for rational maps in the Fokker--Planck equation
A companion paper \cite{ItkinDF2026} introduced the Diagonal Frog (DF) positivity-preserving schemes for anisotropic Fokker--Planck equations, advancing each directional substep by a Krylov-computed matrix exponential, which dominates the cost. Replacing that exponential by a rational map $r(γL)$ reduces the substep to a banded solve, but the positivity argument no longer applies. We prove that for eventually exponentially positive generators the entrywise sign of $r(γL)$ at large steps is decided by a single number, the value $r(\infty)$ taken on infinitely stiff modes. Nonnegativity holds above a computable threshold when $0\le r(\infty)<1$, and at most on a bounded interval, empty or vanishingly narrow in all our tests, when $r(\infty)<0$. The criterion rejects the Crank--Nicolson (trapezoidal) method, where $r(\infty)=-1$, and selects the subdiagonal Padé$(0,2)$ method, which is second order, L-stable and provably positive above an explicit threshold. The resulting DF-ADI scheme costs $O(N)$ per step, keeps the implicit factorized mixed derivative unchanged, is second order in space and time, and conserves discrete mass exactly. In the strong cross-diffusion regime, however, the directional factors demand a step larger than the mixed derivative permits, so the composite second-order scheme is only empirically positive there, and the criterion serves to discriminate the well-behaved multiplicative factors from the stabilizing-correction schemes rather than to guarantee positivity. Against the Krylov exponential it runs ten to thirty-two times faster at matched accuracy in our tests with the gain growing with the mesh. We extend the construction to the backward Kolmogorov equation and to jump-diffusion models.