Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-options-ii-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2013/m5/b/iii/solution

For , apply Markov's inequality to the nonnegative random variable . The exponential is then increasing, so
At the right side is one. For it exceeds one because , so the same displayed bound remains true trivially; the upper-tail Markov argument itself uses .
Complete the square . Choosing gives the strongest bound from this family, . The distribution is symmetric, so the same bound holds for . A union bound gives
One may also cap this at one. Its exponential decay is stronger than the polynomial Chebyshev bound for fixed and large .

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