Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-probability-statistics-and-options-ii-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2010/t/t2/b/ii/solution

The expression presupposes that is invertible; positivity of the stated optimal coordinates alone would not prove that, so use the nonsingularity implicit in this expression. Let be the first components of and set . Then .
For any nonbasic column , introduce while changing the basic vector from to . This stays feasible for sufficiently small because every . Optimality at implies the objective slope . Therefore for every such column, and the basic columns satisfy equality. Thus is dual feasible, independently of the right-hand side.
For , the proposed is primal feasible and
Weak duality, valid with unrestricted equality multipliers, proves . This also explains the stability of an optimal basis while its new basic coordinates remain nonnegative.

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