Abstract: Only few efforts have been made in order to relax one of the key assumptions of the Black-Scholes model: the no-arbitrage assumption. This is despite the fact that arbitrage processes usually exist in the real world, even though they tend to be short-lived. The purpose of this paper is to develop an option pricing model with endogenous stochastic arbitrage, capable of modelling in a general fashion any future and underlying asset that deviate itself from its market equilibrium. Thus, this investigation calibrates empirically the arbitrage on the futures on the S&P 500 index using transaction data from September 1997 to June 2009, from here a specific type of arbitrage called “arbitrage bubble”, based on a t-step function, is identified and hence used in our model. The theoretical results obtained for Binary and European call options, for this kind of arbitrage, show that an investment strategy that takes advantage of the identified arbitrage possibility can be defined, whenever it is possible to anticipate in relative terms the amplitude and timespan of the process. Finally, the new trajectory of the stock price is analytically estimated for a specific case of arbitrage and some numerical illustrations are developed. We find that the consequences of a finite and small endogenous arbitrage not only change the trajectory of the asset price during the period when it started, but also after the arbitrage bubble has already gone. In this context, our model will allow us to calibrate the B-S model to that new trajectory even when the arbitrage already started. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Abstract: The Black-Scholes equation can be interpreted from the point of view of quantum mechanics, as the imaginary time Schrodinger equation of a free particle. When deviations of this state of equilibrium are considered, as a product of some market imperfection, such as: Transaction cost, asymmetric information issues, short-term volatility, extreme discontinuities, or serial correlations; the classical non-arbitrage assumption of the Black-Scholes model is violated, implying a non-risk-free portfolio. From Haven (2002) [1] we know that an arbitrage environment is a necessary condition to embedding the Black-Scholes option pricing model in a more general quantum physics setting. The aim of this paper is to propose a new Black-Scholes-Schrodinger model based on the endogenous arbitrage option pricing formulation introduced by Contreras et al. (2010) [2]. Hence, we derive a more general quantum model of option pricing, that incorporates arbitrage as an external time dependent force, which has an associated potential related to the random dynamic of the underlying asset price. This new resultant model can be interpreted as a Schrodinger equation in imaginary time for a particle of mass 1/sigma(2) with a wave function in an external field force generated by the arbitrage potential. As pointed out above, this new model can be seen as a more general formulation, where the perfect market equilibrium state postulated by the Black-Scholes model represent a particular case. Finally, since the Schrodinger equation is in place, we can apply semiclassical methods, of common use in theoretical physics, to find an approximate analytical solution of the Black-Scholes equation in the presence of market imperfections, as it is the case of an arbitrage bubble. Here, as a numerical illustration of the potential of this Schrodinger equation analogy, the semiclassical approximation is performed for different arbitrage bubble forms (step, linear and parabolic) and compare with the exact solution of our general quantum model of option pricing. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.