Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2009/iii/paper-37/1/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 37 1 Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-14
Write and . The derivatives of the cumulant-generating function areSince and , the first three cumulants areThe last equality follows by expanding the cube and taking expectations. We use the paper's unstandardized third central moment throughout. The usual skewness coefficient divides this quantity by ; its sign is the same whenever the variance is positive.
There is a minor domain qualification: finite ordinary moments do not guarantee a finite moment-generating function for positive arguments. The differentiations are valid in a neighborhood of zero when a positive exponential moment exists. For positive variables with the stated finite moments, all formulas also follow from left derivatives at zero, because for and dominated convergence applies. Thus no extra exponential-moment assumption is needed for the moment identities themselves.
For the random sum of independent claims, condition on . Independence of the claims and independence from the count giveTaking expectations and then logarithms yields the random-sum transform identity and the cumulant composition for a random sum:Here is the probability generating function. These identities hold wherever the transforms are finite, in particular for with positive claims.
For reuse in the three cases, write and . Applying the chain rule three times givesor equivalentlyThis expresses the requested third central moment in raw claim moments, while keeping the contribution of claim-count variability explicit.
New to topics? Read the docs here!