Pricing Cryptocurrency options: the case of CRIX and Bitcoin

Abstract

The CRIX (CRyptocurrency IndeX) has been constructed based on a number of cryptos and provides a high coverage of market liquidity, hu.berlin/crix. The crypto currency market is a new asset market and attracts a lot of investors recently. Surprisingly a market for contingent claims hat not been built up yet. A reason is certainly the lack of pricing tools that are based on solid financial econometric tools. Here a first step towards pricing of derivatives of this new asset class is presented. After a careful econometric pre-analysis we motivate an affine jump diffusion model, i.e., the SVCJ (Stochastic Volatility with Correlated Jumps) model. We calibrate SVCJ by MCMC and obtain interpretable jump processes and then via simulation price options. The jumps present in the cryptocurrency fluctutations are an essential component. Concrete examples are given to establish an OCRIX exchange platform trading options on CRIX.