Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2014/iii/paper-26/3/2/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 26 3 2 Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
For , write for the standard normal distribution function. Since the Brownian running maximum is nonnegative, gives simply .
For and , reflect the Brownian motion after its first hit of . This is a stopping time, and the Strong Markov property together with symmetry of Brownian increments shows that reflection preserves its law. On paths that hit , it sends the endpoint to . Thus the event with endpoint at most maps to endpoints at least , all of which necessarily hit . This provesThe same reflection gives . If , every path with has hit , so subtracting that endpoint tail gives the complete answer:The expressions agree at . This is the joint distribution of Brownian motion and its running maximum. In particular has the distribution of and has no atoms for . If , the pair is deterministically, so the requested probability is .
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