Implied Markov transition matrices under structural price models

Abstract

This paper proposes an approach to compute the implied transition matrices from observations of market data on financial derivatives, when the price of the underlying originates from a structural model and the payoffs are received over a period of time. The structural price model involves a price formation mechanism which computes the price based on a set of Markovian inputs and constrained optimization processes. The developed inference method relies on a linear description of the derivative values in terms of occupation measures of the payoff duration. We establish closed-form expressions between occupation measures and state transitions, which then enable us to characterize implied state transition probabilities consistent with the market data on the derivative values. We develop methods to solve the optimization problem with the resulting nonlinear occupation measure equation. Numerical illustrations of the approach are presented for financial derivatives on network capacities. By applying the method to an electric network, we investigate the relation between financial transmission correct contract values and a range of implied probabilities of congestion in the network.