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Computing Brownian Integral Covariances with Itô Isometry

Article Quant Q&A · Author: Bogaso

Summary

The document works through a covariance involving the stochastic integral of cubed Brownian motion and the time integral of squared Brownian motion. It rewrites the latter using an Itô-integral representation plus a deterministic term. The deterministic contribution vanishes in the expectation because the stochastic integral has mean zero; Itô isometry then reduces the product expectation to an ordinary integral involving the fourth moment of Brownian motion. The response also gives the sixth-moment integral by applying the even-moment formula.

The derivation illustrates how a useful representation can turn a product of different types of integrals into a tractable calculation. It also notes the change of integration limits needed when reversing the order in a triangular double integral. These calculations rely on standard Brownian motion moment identities and suitable integrability for the stochastic integrals. The answer’s final scaled result refers to prefactors from an earlier problem, so it should not be confused with the covariance calculation alone.

Key ideas

  • Rewrite the time integral of squared Brownian motion as a stochastic integral plus a deterministic term.
  • Use the zero mean of the stochastic integral to discard its product with the deterministic term in expectation.
  • Apply Itô isometry to the product of stochastic integrals and evaluate the resulting Brownian fourth-moment integral.
  • Brownian even moments provide a direct method for evaluating integrals of expected powers.
  • When reversing a triangular double integral, adjust the bounds to cover the same region.

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Full text
# How to calculate the covariance involving Stochastic process


# How to calculate the covariance involving Stochastic process












I was looking at some old post : Variance of time integral of squared Brownian motion

I failed to grasp 2 derivations -

- $\text{Cov}\left(\int_{0}^{t}W^3_sdW_s\,,\,\int_{0}^{t}W^2_sds\right)$. I know this can eventually be written as $\mathbb{E} \left[ \left( \int_{0}^{t}W^3_sdW_s \right) \left( \int_{0}^{t}W^2_sds\right) \right]$, because $ \mathbb{E} \left[ \int_{0}^{t}W^3_sdW_s \right] = 0 $. But, how to proceed to the final expression from here?

- How to calculate the expression $ \int_{0}^{t}\mathbb{E}[W^6_s]ds$

Any pointer will be highly appreciated.

## Answer by StackG (score 6, accepted)

https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/57213

- Let's use the following expression (derived in Quantuple's answer in your link), which will help us tidy up the product using Ito's Isometry

\begin{align} \int^t_0 W^2_s ds = 2 \int^t_0 (t-s)W_s dW_s + {\frac {t^2} 2} \end{align}

Now looking at the expectation \begin{align} {\mathbb E}\Bigl[ \int^t_0 W^3_s dW_s \cdot \int^t_0 W^2_s ds \Bigr] &= {\mathbb E}\Bigl[ \int^t_0 W^3_s dW_s \cdot \Bigl( 2 \int^t_0 (t-s)W_s dW_s + {\frac {t^2} 2} \Bigr) \Bigr] \\ &= {\mathbb E}\Bigl[ {\frac {t^2} 2}\int^t_0 W^3_s dW_s + 2 \int^t_0 W^3_s dW_s \cdot \int^t_0 (t-s)W_s dW_s \Bigr] \end{align}

As you identified above, the expectation of the first term in the sum is $0$, and we can use Ito's Isometry on the second

\begin{align} {\mathbb E}\Bigl[ \int^t_0 W^3_s dW_s \cdot \int^t_0 W^2_s ds \Bigr] &= 0 + {\mathbb E}\Bigl[ 2 \int^t_0 (t-s) W^4_s ds \Bigr] \\ &= 2 \int^t_0 (t-s) {\mathbb E}\bigl[ W^4_s \bigr] ds \\ &= 2 \int^t_0 (t-s) 3s^2 ds \\ &= {\frac 1 2} t^4 \\ \end{align}

In the initial question, the expression has multiplicative prefactors of $2$, $4$ and $6$, so this multiplies out to $24t^4$

In the above, I used the expression ${\mathbb E}\bigl[ W^4_s \bigr] = 3s^2$, which comes from the step-down formula given in the question you linked, ie. \begin{align} {\mathbb E}\bigl[ W^{2n}_t \bigr] = {\frac {(2n)!} {2^n n!}} t^n \end{align}

- This can be solved using the same step-down formula \begin{align} \int^t_0 {\mathbb E} \bigl[ W^6_s \bigr] ds &= \int^t_0 {\frac {6!} {2^3 3!}} s^3 ds\\ &= 15 \Bigl[ {\frac 1 4} s^4 \Bigr]^t_0\\ &= {\frac {15} 4} t^4 \end{align}

- Limits of the Fubini double integral

\begin{align} \int_0^t \int^s_0 W_u dW_u ds = \int_0^t \int^t_u W_u ds dW_u \end{align}

This change of limits is required so that the double integral is integrating over the same part of the $(s,u)$ space, as shown in the diagram

Basically, we can parameterise the lower triangle either by letting $u$ run from $0$ to $s$, and then letting $s$ run from $0$ to $t$, or if we switch the order we need to let $s$ run from $u$ to $t$ and then let $u$ run from $0$ to $t$

Shown in full with attribution under the source's licence. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 (Stack Exchange)

This summary was written by Stratmill's research agent from the original; it is not a copy of the source.