In speech communication systems such as voice-controlled systems, hands-free mobile telephones and hearing aids, the received signals are degraded by room reverberation and background noise. This degradation can reduce the perceived quality and intelligibility of the speech, and decrease the performance of speech enhancement and source localization. These problems are difficult to solve due to the colored and nonstationary nature of the speech signals, and features of the Room Impulse Response (RIR) such as its long duration and non-minimum phase. In this dissertation, we focus on two topics of speech enhancement and speaker localization in noisy reverberant environments. A two-stage speech enhancement method is presented to suppress both early and late reverberation in noisy speech using only one microphone. It is shown that this method works well even in highly reverberant rooms. Experiments under different acoustic conditions confirm that the proposed blind method is superior in terms of reducing early and late reverberation effects and noise compared to other well known single-microphone techniques in the literature. Time Difference Of Arrival (TDOA)-based methods usually provide the most accurate source localization in adverse conditions. The key issue for these methods is to accurately estimate the TDOA using the smallest number of microphones. Two robust Time Delay Estimation (TDE) methods are proposed which use the information from only two microphones. One method is based on adaptive inverse filtering which provides superior performance even in highly reverberant and moderately noisy conditions. It also has negligible failure estimation which makes it a reliable method in realistic environments. This method has high computational complexity due to the estimation in the first stage for the first microphone. As a result, it can not be applied in time-varying environments and real-time applications. Our second method improves this problem by introducing two effective preprocessing stages for the conventional Cross Correlation (CC)-based methods. The results obtained in different noisy reverberant conditions including a real and time-varying environment demonstrate that the proposed methods are superior compared to the conventional TDE methods. / Graduate / 2015-04-23 / 0544 / 0984 / saeed.mosayyebpour@gmail.com

本研究探討VIX 期貨價格所隱含的資訊對於S&P 500 指數波動度預測的解釋力。過去許多文獻主要運用線性預測模型探討歷史波動度、隱含波動度和風險中立偏態對於波動度預測的資訊內涵。然而過去研究顯示，波動度具有長期記憶與非線性的特性，因此本文主要研究非線性預測模型對於波動度預測的有效性。本篇論文特別著重在不同市場狀態下(高波動與低波動)的實現波動度及隱含波動度異質自我迴歸模型(HAR-RV-IV model)。因此，本研究以考慮馬可夫狀態轉化下的異質自我迴歸模型(MRS-HAR model)進行實證分析。 本研究主要目的有以下三點: (1) 以VIX期貨價格所隱含的資訊提升S&P 500波動度預測的準確性。(2) 結合風險中立偏態與VIX期貨的資訊內涵，進一步提升S&P 500 波動度預測的準確性。(3) 考慮狀態轉換後的波動度預測模型是否優於過去文獻的線性迴歸模型。 本研究實證結果發現: (1) 相對於過去的實現波動度及隱含波動度，VIX 期貨可以提供對於預測未來波動度的額外資訊。 (2) 與其他模型比較，加入風險中立偏態和VIX 期貨萃取出的隱含波動度之波動度預測模型，只顯著提高預測未來一天波動度的準確性。 (3) 考慮狀態轉換後的波動度預測模型優於線性迴歸模型。 / This paper explores whether the information implied from VIX futures prices has incremental explanatory power for future volatility in the S&P 500 index. Most of prior studies adopt linear forecasting models to investigate the usefulness of historical volatility, implied volatility and risk-neutral skewness for volatility forecasting. However, previous literatures find out the long-memory and nonlinear property in volatility. Therefore, this study focuses on the nonlinear forecasting models to examine the effectiveness for volatility forecasting. In particular, we concentrate on Heterogeneous Autoregressive model of Realized Volatility and Implied Volatility (HAR-RV-IV) under different market conditions (i.e., high and low volatility state). This study has three main goals: First, to investigate whether the information extracted from VIX futures prices could improve the accuracy for future volatility forecasting. Second, combining the information content of risk-neutral skewness and VIX futures to enhance the predictive power for future volatility forecasting. Last, to explore whether the nonlinear models are superior to the linear models. This study finds that VIX futures prices contain additional information for future volatility, relative to past realized volatilities and implied volatility. Out-of-sample analysis confirms that VIX futures improves significantly the accuracy for future volatility forecasting. However, the improvement in the accuracy of volatility forecasts is significant only at daily forecast horizon after incorporating the information of risk-neutral skewness and VIX futures prices into the volatility forecasting model. Last, the volatility forecasting models are superior after taking the regime-switching into account.

Submitted by Regio Martins (regio@fgvmail.br) on 2011-03-16T22:17:36Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Thesis.pdf: 1258015 bytes, checksum: 511b0226f85ea587ab4fb0f330be47c6 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Andrea Virginio Machado(andrea.machado@fgv.br) on 2011-03-18T12:45:47Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Thesis.pdf: 1258015 bytes, checksum: 511b0226f85ea587ab4fb0f330be47c6 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2011-03-31T18:04:05Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Thesis.pdf: 1258015 bytes, checksum: 511b0226f85ea587ab4fb0f330be47c6 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-08-30 / In this thesis, we investigate some aspects of the interplay between economic regulation and the risk of the regulated firm. In the first chapter, the main goal is to understand the implications a mainstream regulatory model (Laffont and Tirole, 1993) have on the systematic risk of the firm. We generalize the model in order to incorporate aggregate risk, and find that the optimal regulatory contract must be severely constrained in order to reproduce real-world systematic risk levels. We also consider the optimal profit-sharing mechanism, with an endogenous sharing rate, to explore the relationship between contract power and beta. We find results compatible with the available evidence that high-powered regimes impose more risk to the firm. In the second chapter, a joint work with Daniel Lima from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), we start from the observation that regulated firms are subject to some regulatory practices that potentially affect the symmetry of the distribution of their future profits. If these practices are anticipated by investors in the stock market, the pattern of asymmetry in the empirical distribution of stock returns may differ among regulated and non-regulated companies. We review some recently proposed asymmetry measures that are robust to the empirical regularities of return data and use them to investigate whether there are meaningful differences in the distribution of asymmetry between these two groups of companies. In the third and last chapter, three different approaches to the capital asset pricing model of Kraus and Litzenberger (1976) are tested with recent Brazilian data and estimated using the generalized method of moments (GMM) as a unifying procedure. We find that ex-post stock returns generally exhibit statistically significant coskewness with the market portfolio, and hence are sensitive to squared market returns. However, while the theoretical ground for the preference for skewness is well established and fairly intuitive, we did not find supporting evidence that investors require a premium for supporting this risk factor in Brazil. / Essa tese investiga alguns aspectos da relação entre regulação econômica e risco da empresa regulada. No primeiro capítulo, o objetivo é entender as implicações do modelo tradicional de regulação por incentivos (Laffont e Tirole, 1993) sobre o risco sistemático da firma. Generalizamos o modelo de forma a incorporar risco agregado ao lucro da atividade, e descobrimos que o contrato ótimo deve ser severamente restringido para que reproduza betas (CAPM) próximos aos observados em setores regulados. Usamos um caso particular do modelo, de regulação por repartição de lucro (profit-sharing regulation), para avaliar a relação entre a potência do contrato e o nível de risco não diversificável. Encontramos resultados compatíveis com a evidência disponível, de que regimes com alta potência impõem mais risco sobre a firma. No segundo capítulo, escrito em co-autoria com Daniel Lima da Universidade da Califórnia em San Diego (UCSD), partimos da constatação de que empresas reguladas podem estar sujeitas a práticas regulatórias que potencialmente afetam a simetria da distribuição de seus lucros futuros. Se essas práticas forem antecipadas pelos investidores no mercado secundário de ações, poderemos identificar diferenças no padrão da assimetria da distribuição empírica de retornos das empresas reguladas com relação às não-reguladas. Nesse capítulo revisamos alguns métodos de mensuração de assimetria propostos recentemente na literatura, que são robustos à características comuns em séries de retornos financeiros (caudas pesadas e correlação serial), e investigamos se existem diferenças significativas na distribuição de assimetria entre empresas reguladas e não-reguladas. No terceiro e último capítulo, três diferentes abordagens empíricas do modelo de apreçamento de ativos de Kraus e Litzenberger (1976) são testadas com dados do mercado brasileiro de ações. Descobrimos que a distribuição empírica de retornos costuma exibir co-assimetria significativa com relação à carteira de mercado, e que portanto os retornos das ações são sensíveis à volatilidade (retornos quadráticos) do mercado. No entanto, apesar da base teórica para a preferência por retornos assimétricos esteja bem estabelecida e seja bastante intuitiva, não encontramos evidência que suporte a hipótese de que os investidores requeiram um prêmio para aceitar esse tipo de risco no mercado local.

Neste trabalho, desenvolvemos três tópicos relacionados a modelos de regressão da família exponencial. No primeiro tópico, obtivemos a matriz de covariância assintótica de ordem $n^$, onde $n$ é o tamanho da amostra, dos estimadores de máxima verossimilhança corrigidos pelo viés de ordem $n^$ em modelos lineares generalizados, considerando o parâmetro de precisão conhecido. No segundo tópico calculamos o coeficiente de assimetria assintótico de ordem n^{-1/2} para a distribuição dos estimadores de máxima verossimilhança dos parâmetros que modelam a média e dos parâmetros de precisão e dispersão em modelos não-lineares da família exponencial, considerando o parâmetro de dispersão desconhecido, porém o mesmo para todas as observações. Finalmente, obtivemos fatores de correção tipo-Bartlett para o teste escore em modelos não-lineares da família exponencial, considerando covariáveis para modelar o parâmetro de dispersão. Avaliamos os resultados obtidos nos três tópicos desenvolvidos por meio de estudos de simulação de Monte Carlo / In this work, we develop three topics related to the exponential family nonlinear regression. First, we obtain the asymptotic covariance matrix of order $n^$, where $n$ is the sample size, for the maximum likelihood estimators corrected by the bias of order $n^$ in generalized linear models, considering the precision parameter known. Second, we calculate an asymptotic formula of order $n^{-1/2}$ for the skewness of the distribution of the maximum likelihood estimators of the mean parameters and of the precision and dispersion parameters in exponential family nonlinear models considering that the dispersion parameter is the same although unknown for all observations. Finally, we obtain Bartlett-type correction factors for the score test in exponential family nonlinear models assuming that the precision parameter is modelled by covariates. Monte Carlo simulation studies are developed to evaluate the results obtained in the three topics.

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This thesis deals with several statistical and probabilistic aspects of symmetry and asymmetry, both in a univariate and multivariate context, and is divided into three distinct parts. The first part, composed of Chapters 1, 2 and 3 of the thesis, solves two conjectures associated with multivariate skew-symmetric distributions. Since the introduction in 1985 by Adelchi Azzalini of the most famous representative of that class of distributions, namely the skew-normal distribution, it is well-known that, in the vicinity of symmetry, the Fisher information matrix is singular and the profile log-likelihood function for skewness admits a stationary point whatever the sample under consideration. Since that moment, researchers have tried to determine the subclasses of skew-symmetric distributions who suffer from each of those problems, which has led to the aforementioned two conjectures. This thesis completely solves these two problems. The second part of the thesis, namely Chapters 4 and 5, aims at applying and constructing extremely general skewing mechanisms. As such, in Chapter 4, we make use of the univariate mechanism of Ferreira and Steel (2006) to build optimal (in the Le Cam sense) tests for univariate symmetry which are very flexible. Actually, their mechanism allowing to turn a given symmetric distribution into any asymmetric distribution, the alternatives to the null hypothesis of symmetry can take any possible shape. These univariate mechanisms, besides that surjectivity property, enjoy numerous good properties, but cannot be extended to higher dimensions in a satisfactory way. For this reason, we propose in Chapter 5 different general mechanisms, sharing all the nice properties of their competitors in Ferreira and Steel (2006), but which moreover can be extended to any dimension. We formally prove that the surjectivity property holds in dimensions k>1 and we study the principal characteristics of these new multivariate mechanisms. Finally, the third part of this thesis, composed of Chapter 6, proposes a test for multivariate central symmetry by having recourse to the concepts of statistical depth and runs. This test extends the celebrated univariate runs test of McWilliams (1990) to higher dimensions. We analyze its asymptotic behavior (especially in dimension k=2) under the null hypothesis and its invariance and robustness properties. We conclude by an overview of possible modifications of these new tests./ Cette thèse traite de différents aspects statistiques et probabilistes de symétrie et asymétrie univariées et multivariées, et est subdivisée en trois parties distinctes. La première partie, qui comprend les chapitres 1, 2 et 3 de la thèse, est destinée à la résolution de deux conjectures associées aux lois skew-symétriques multivariées. Depuis l'introduction en 1985 par Adelchi Azzalini du plus célèbre représentant de cette classe de lois, à savoir la loi skew-normale, il est bien connu qu'en un voisinage de la situation symétrique la matrice d'information de Fisher est singulière et la fonction de vraisemblance profile pour le paramètre d'asymétrie admet un point stationnaire quel que soit l'échantillon considéré. Dès lors, des chercheurs ont essayé de déterminer les sous-classes de lois skew-symétriques qui souffrent de chacune de ces problématiques, ce qui a mené aux deux conjectures précitées. Cette thèse résoud complètement ces deux problèmes. La deuxième partie, constituée des chapitres 4 et 5, poursuit le but d'appliquer et de proposer des méchanismes d'asymétrisation très généraux. Ainsi, au chapitre 4, nous utilisons le méchanisme univarié de Ferreira and Steel (2006) pour construire des tests de symétrie univariée optimaux (au sens de Le Cam) qui sont très flexibles. En effet, leur méchanisme permettant de transformer une loi symétrique donnée en n'importe quelle loi asymétrique, les contre-hypothèses à la symétrie peuvent prendre toute forme imaginable. Ces méchanismes univariés, outre cette propriété de surjectivité, possèdent de nombreux autres attraits, mais ne permettent pas une extension satisfaisante aux dimensions supérieures. Pour cette raison, nous proposons au chapitre 5 des méchanismes généraux alternatifs, qui partagent toutes les propriétés de leurs compétiteurs de Ferreira and Steel (2006), mais qui en plus sont généralisables à n'importe quelle dimension. Nous démontrons formellement que la surjectivité tient en dimension k > 1 et étudions les caractéristiques principales de ces nouveaux méchanismes multivariés. Finalement, la troisième partie de cette thèse, composée du chapitre 6, propose un test de symétrie centrale multivariée en ayant recours aux concepts de profondeur statistique et de runs. Ce test étend le célèbre test de runs univarié de McWilliams (1990) aux dimensions supérieures. Nous en analysons le comportement asymptotique (surtout en dimension k = 2) sous l'hypothèse nulle et les propriétés d'invariance et de robustesse. Nous concluons par un aperçu sur des modifications possibles de ces nouveaux tests.

因為股票市場常具有厚尾、偏態和峰態的特性且在國際的股票市場之間，股票報酬長存在有尾端相依的情況，所以我們的資產模型不能選用Gaussian分配。 近幾年來，常用GH 分配建構單維度的股票報酬。這篇文章將利用多元仿射JD、多元仿射VG 和多元仿射NIG分配去建構風險性資產的報酬並請應用到資產配置。 建構風險性資產的報酬後，我們提供兩種不同形式的投資組合並且可以導出投資組合的期望值、變異數、偏態和峰態。我們嘗試以投資組合的期望值、變異數、偏態和峰態當成我們的目標函數，然後得出未來最佳的投資組合的權重。為了讓我們的資產配置更加動態和有效率，我們重新估計模型的參數、選擇最佳的投資組合權重，然後重新評估最佳的資產配置在每個決策日期。實證結果發現當股票市場的表現好的時候，我們建議資產配置應使用偏態當成我們的目標函數，但是當股票市場的表現太好的時候，我們建議資產配置應使用變異數當成我們的目標函數。 / Since the stock markets always have the characteristics of heavy-tailness, skewness and kurtosis and there exists tail dependence among the international stock markets, we can’t use the Gaussian distribution as our model. Recently, the generalized hyperbolic (GH) distribution has been suggested to fit the single stock returns. This article will use the multivariate affine JD (MAJD), multivariate affine variance gamma (MAVG) and multivariate affine normal inverse Gaussian (MANIG) distributions to construct the risky asset returns, and apply them to asset allocation. After constructing the risky asset returns, we provide two different forms of portfolio and obtain the mean, variance, skewness, kurtosis of portfolio. We can try to select the optimal weights of portfolio by using the mean, variance, skewness, kurtosis of portfolios as our objective functions. To make our asset allocation more dynamic and efficient, we re-estimate all parameters for our models, select the optimal weights of portfolio, and re-assess the optimal asset allocation at each decision date. Empirically, when the performances of stock markets are good, we suggest that our asset allocation uses the skewness as the objective function. When the performances of stock markets are not good, we suggest that our asset allocation uses the variance as the objective function.

This dissertation is composed of three articles describing novel approaches for analysis and modeling using multivariate skew-normal and skew-t distributions in econometrics and environmetrics. In the first article we introduce the Heckman selection-t model. Sample selection arises often as a result of the partial observability of the outcome of interest in a study. In the presence of sample selection, the observed data do not represent a random sample from the population, even after controlling for explanatory variables. Heckman introduced a sample-selection model to analyze such data and proposed a full maximum likelihood estimation method under the assumption of normality. The method was criticized in the literature because of its sensitivity to the normality assumption. In practice, data, such as income or expenditure data, often violate the normality assumption because of heavier tails. We first establish a new link between sample-selection models and recently studied families of extended skew-elliptical distributions. This then allows us to introduce a selection-t model, which models the error distribution using a Student’s t distribution. We study its properties and investigate the finite-sample performance of the maximum likelihood estimators for this model. We compare the performance of the selection-t model to the Heckman selection model and apply it to analyze ambulatory expenditures. In the second article we introduce a family of multivariate log-skew-elliptical distributions, extending the list of multivariate distributions with positive support. We investigate their probabilistic properties such as stochastic representations, marginal and conditional distributions, and existence of moments, as well as inferential properties. We demonstrate, for example, that as for the log-t distribution, the positive moments of the log-skew-t distribution do not exist. Our emphasis is on two special cases, the log-skew-normal and log-skew-t distributions, which we use to analyze U.S. precipitation data. Many commonly used statistical methods assume that data are normally distributed. This assumption is often violated in practice which prompted the development of more flexible distributions. In the third article we describe two such multivariate distributions, the skew-normal and the skew-t, and present commands for fitting univariate and multivariate skew-normal and skew-t regressions in the statistical software package Stata.

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