In this paper, we establish sample path large and moderate deviation principles for log-price processes in Gaussian stochastic volatility models, and study the asymptotic behavior of exit probabilities, call pricing functions, and the implied volatility. In addition, we prove that if the volatility function in an uncorrelated Gaussian model grows faster than linearly, then, for the asset price process, all the moments of order greater than one are infinite. Similar moment explosion results are obtained for correlated models. AMS 2010 Classification: 60F10, 60G15, 60G18, 60G22, 41A60, 91G20.
Keywords:Gaussian stochastic volatility models, Volterra type models, sample path large and moderate deviations, central limit regime, moment explosions, implied volatility asymptotics. T with state space R was earlier established in Forde and Zhang [17] in the case, where the function σ satisfies the global Hölder condition, while the process B is fractional Brownian motion. In [25], we proved the Forde-Zhang LDP under very mild restrictions on σ and B. We formulate the latter result in Section 2.If 0 < β < H, then the model is in the moderate deviation scaling regime (see, e.g., [4,13,20], and the references therein for more information on moderate deviations). In Section 3, we prove a sample path moderate deviation principle (MDP) for the process ε → X ε,β,H (see Theorem 3.1), and derive a corresponding MDP for the process ε → X ε,β,H T (see Corollary 3.5). As it often happens in the theory of moderate deviations, the rate function in Corollary 3.5 is quadratic. At the end of Section 3, we explain how to pass from small-noise large and moderate deviation principles to small-time ones under the condition that the volatility process is self-similar.The case where β = H corresponds to the central limit (CL) scaling regime. In Section 4, we characterize the limiting behavior on the path space of the distribution function of the process ε → X ε,H,H (see Theorem 4.1), and also that of the process ε → X ε,H,H T in the space R (see Theorem 4.3). The results in the CL regime can be considered as degenerate MDPs with the rate function equal to a constant (see Remark 4.4 in Section 4). An example 3 of a CL scaling can be found in [22]. The volatility of an asset in [22] is modeled by the process δ → σ(δ U), where σ is a smooth function, while U is the stationary fractional Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process (our notation is different from that used in Section 3 of [22]). The CL scaling in [22] corresponds to the following values of the parameters: H = 1 and β = 1 (our notation).It follows from what was said above that the class of small-noise parametrizations of the log-price process in a Gaussian stochastic volatility model (see formula (1.4)) can be split into three disjoint subclasses, which correspond to large deviation, moderate deviation, and central limit scaling regimes. An interesting discussion of certain differences between those regimes can be found in [13]. Gaussian stochastic volatility models and their scaled versions were stud...