A New Approach to Comparing VaR Estimation Methods

We develop a novel backtesting framework based on multidimensional Value-at-Risk (VaR) that focuses on the left tail of the distribution of the bank trading revenues. Our coverage test is a multivariate generalization of the unconditional test of Kupiec (Journal of Derivatives, 1995). Applying our method to actual daily bank trading revenues, we find that non-parametric VaR methods, such as GARCH-based methods or filtered Historical Simulation, work best for bank trading revenues.

Perignon C. and Smith D. (2008) A New Approach to Comparing VaR Estimation Methods. Journal of Derivatives.