Fair pricing of superannuation guaranteed benefits with downturn risk. Australians have more than $2.7 trillion in superannuation assets, meaning that Australia is the fourth largest holder of pension fund assets worldwide. Hence the impact of market fluctuations on financial well-being of retirees can be detrimental, especially during market downturns associated with economic crises. The finance industry addresses this issue by complementing variable annuities with riders designed to protect th ....Fair pricing of superannuation guaranteed benefits with downturn risk. Australians have more than $2.7 trillion in superannuation assets, meaning that Australia is the fourth largest holder of pension fund assets worldwide. Hence the impact of market fluctuations on financial well-being of retirees can be detrimental, especially during market downturns associated with economic crises. The finance industry addresses this issue by complementing variable annuities with riders designed to protect the income stream of retirees. This project aims to develop a novel approach to fair pricing and optimal withdrawals and surrender policies for superannuation guaranteed benefit products through a comprehensive analysis of complex optimisation problems in stochastic models of financial markets with downturn risk.Read moreRead less
Can green investors drive the transition to a low emissions economy? The project aims to develop a game-theoretical approach to model the impact of climate change on financial markets by studying the interactions between the government, companies and investors. Expected outcomes include novel solution concepts for stochastic games with heterogeneous beliefs, asymmetric information, and model uncertainty, as well as optimal investment and production strategies under climate driven economic transi ....Can green investors drive the transition to a low emissions economy? The project aims to develop a game-theoretical approach to model the impact of climate change on financial markets by studying the interactions between the government, companies and investors. Expected outcomes include novel solution concepts for stochastic games with heterogeneous beliefs, asymmetric information, and model uncertainty, as well as optimal investment and production strategies under climate driven economic transitions. Results will be used to validate and improve the recently launched Australian based climate transition index. The project should yield significant benefits for the financial industry and investors by providing novel insights into financial risks during the transition to a low emissions economy.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE200100896
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$427,008.00
Summary
How to beat model uncertainty with more information. Experience of the 2008 financial crisis exposed a weakness in our over-reliance on mathematical models. The main aim of this project is to develop mathematical tools to investigate the role of information in reducing model uncertainty. The project will undertake pressing research in robust finance, which is now one of the most active and dynamic topics in financial mathematics. It expects to quantify the value of information under uncertainty ....How to beat model uncertainty with more information. Experience of the 2008 financial crisis exposed a weakness in our over-reliance on mathematical models. The main aim of this project is to develop mathematical tools to investigate the role of information in reducing model uncertainty. The project will undertake pressing research in robust finance, which is now one of the most active and dynamic topics in financial mathematics. It expects to quantify the value of information under uncertainty in mathematical modelling. It will generate new knowledge in probability theory and stochastic processes providing a significant mathematical contribution in its own right.Read moreRead less
Computational methods for population-size-dependent branching processes. Branching processes are the primary mathematical tool used to model populations that evolve randomly in time. Most key results in the theory are derived under the simplifying assumption that individuals reproduce and die independently of each other. However, this assumption fails in most real-life situations, in particular when the environment has limited resources or when the habitat has a restricted capacity. This project ....Computational methods for population-size-dependent branching processes. Branching processes are the primary mathematical tool used to model populations that evolve randomly in time. Most key results in the theory are derived under the simplifying assumption that individuals reproduce and die independently of each other. However, this assumption fails in most real-life situations, in particular when the environment has limited resources or when the habitat has a restricted capacity. This project aims to develop novel and effective algorithmic techniques and statistical methods for a class of branching processes with dependences. We will use these results to study significant problems in the conservation of endangered island bird populations in Oceania, and to help inform their conservation management.Read moreRead less
New universality in stochastic systems. This project aims to uncover new analyses and effects in the complex behaviour of non-linear systems with random noise. Many systems originate near an unstable equilibrium. This project will develop a new mathematical theory that establishes a universality in the way the long term effect of noise expresses itself as random initial conditions in the dynamics. It will fill gaps in Mathematics and make refinements to existing fundamental scientific laws by in ....New universality in stochastic systems. This project aims to uncover new analyses and effects in the complex behaviour of non-linear systems with random noise. Many systems originate near an unstable equilibrium. This project will develop a new mathematical theory that establishes a universality in the way the long term effect of noise expresses itself as random initial conditions in the dynamics. It will fill gaps in Mathematics and make refinements to existing fundamental scientific laws by including random initial conditions as predicted by our theory. This will advance our understanding of complex systems subjected to noise and will provide significant benefits in the scientific discoveries in Biology, Ecology, Physics and other Sciences where such systems are frequently met.Read moreRead less
Large Markov decision processes and combinatorial optimisation. Markov decision processes continue to gain in popularity for modelling a wide range of applications ranging from analysis of supply chains and queueing networks to cognitive science and control of autonomous vehicles. Nonetheless, they tend to become numerically intractable as the size of the model grows fast. Recent works use machine learning techniques to overcome this crucial issue, but with no convergence guarantee. This project ....Large Markov decision processes and combinatorial optimisation. Markov decision processes continue to gain in popularity for modelling a wide range of applications ranging from analysis of supply chains and queueing networks to cognitive science and control of autonomous vehicles. Nonetheless, they tend to become numerically intractable as the size of the model grows fast. Recent works use machine learning techniques to overcome this crucial issue, but with no convergence guarantee. This project aims to provide theoretically sound frameworks for solving large Markov decision processes, and exploit them to solve important combinatorial optimisation problems. This timely project can promote Australia's position in the development of such novel frameworks for many scientific and industrial applications.Read moreRead less
Modern statistical methods for clustering community ecology data. This project will develop statistical methods and software for clustering community ecology data, and use them to analyse systematic survey and citizen science program data collected along the Great Barrier Reef. By doing so, the project will address the dearth of statistical classification techniques for high-dimensional, multi-response data with complex relationships. When the resultant clustering methods are used to construct b ....Modern statistical methods for clustering community ecology data. This project will develop statistical methods and software for clustering community ecology data, and use them to analyse systematic survey and citizen science program data collected along the Great Barrier Reef. By doing so, the project will address the dearth of statistical classification techniques for high-dimensional, multi-response data with complex relationships. When the resultant clustering methods are used to construct bioregions and characterise species’ environmental responses, they should significantly enhance evaluations of the impact of human activity and environmental change on coral diversity. Ultimately, these evaluations can underpin future decisions in the conservation and management of the Great Barrier Reef.Read moreRead less
Perturbations in Complex Systems and Games. This project aims to: advance the perturbation theory of dynamic and stochastic games; further develop approximations of infinite dimensional linear programs by their finite dimensional counterparts, and by finding asymptotic limits of spaces of occupational measures, by solution of successive layers of fundamental equations; explain and quantify the "exceptionality" of instances of systems that are genuinely difficult to solve; and, capitalise on the ....Perturbations in Complex Systems and Games. This project aims to: advance the perturbation theory of dynamic and stochastic games; further develop approximations of infinite dimensional linear programs by their finite dimensional counterparts, and by finding asymptotic limits of spaces of occupational measures, by solution of successive layers of fundamental equations; explain and quantify the "exceptionality" of instances of systems that are genuinely difficult to solve; and, capitalise on the outstanding performance of our Snakes-and-Ladders Heuristic (SLH) for the solution of the Hamiltonian cycle problem to identify its "fixed complexity orbits" and generalise this notion to other NP-complete problems.Read moreRead less