Valuation of Barrier Options in a Black-Scholes Setup with Jump Risk

Abstract

This paper discusses the pitfalls in the pricing of barrier options approximations of the underlying continuous processes via discrete lattice models. These problems are studied first in a Black-Scholes model. Improvements result from a trinomial model and a further modified model where price changes occur at the jump times of a Poisson process. After the numerical difficulties have been resolved in the Black-Scholes model, unpredictable discontinuous price movements are incorporated.