Importance sampling of heavy-tailed iterated random functions

TL;DR

This paper develops a state-dependent importance sampling method to efficiently estimate rare event probabilities for heavy-tailed stochastic perpetuities, extending to recursive Lipschitz function models.

Contribution

It introduces a novel importance sampling algorithm for heavy-tailed perpetuities and recursive models, achieving strong efficiency without the Cramér condition.

Findings

The estimator is strongly efficient under natural conditions.

The method effectively estimates probabilities of large deviations.

Extension to recursive Lipschitz function models demonstrated.

Abstract

We consider a stochastic recurrence equation of the form $Z_{n+1} = A_{n+1} Z_n+B_{n+1}$, where $\mathbb{E}[\log A_1]<0$, $\mathbb{E}[\log^+ B_1]<\infty$ and $\{(A_n,B_n)\}_{n\in\mathbb{N}}$ is an i.i.d. sequence of positive random vectors. The stationary distribution of this Markov chain can be represented as the distribution of the random variable $Z \triangleq \sum_{n=0}^\infty B_{n+1}\prod_{k=1}^nA_k$. Such random variables can be found in the analysis of probabilistic algorithms or financial mathematics, where $Z$ would be called a stochastic perpetuity. If one interprets $-\log A_n$ as the interest rate at time $n$, then $Z$ is the present value of a bond that generates $B_n$ unit of money at each time point $n$. We are interested in estimating the probability of the rare event $\{Z>x\}$, when $x$ is large; we provide a consistent simulation estimator using state-dependent importance sampling for the case, where $\log A_1$ is heavy-tailed and the so-called Cram\'{e}r condition is not satisfied. Our algorithm leads to an estimator for $P(Z>x)$. We show that under natural conditions, our estimator is strongly efficient. Furthermore, we extend our method to the case, where $\{Z_n\}_{n\in\mathbb{N}}$ is defined via the recursive formula $Z_{n+1}=\Psi_{n+1}(Z_n)$ and $\{\Psi_n\}_{n\in\mathbb{N}}$ is a sequence of i.i.d. random Lipschitz functions.