Is (Independent) Subordination Relevant in Equity Derivatives?

Abstract

Monroe (1978) demonstrates that any local semimartingale can be represented as a time‐changed Brownian Motion (BM). A natural question arises: does this representation theorem hold when the BM and the time‐change are independent? We prove that a local semimartingale is not equivalent to a BM with a time‐change that is independent from the BM. Our result is obtained utilizing a class of additive processes: the additive normal tempered stable (ATS). This class of processes exhibits an exceptional ability to calibrate the equity volatility surface accurately. We notice that the sub‐class of additive processes that can be obtained with an independent additive subordination is incompatible with market data and shows significantly worse calibration performances than the ATS, especially on short time maturities. These results have been observed every business day in a semester on a dataset of S&P 500 and EURO STOXX 50 options.