Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2017 / iii / Paper 201 / 6 / e / Solution

Specify the sign convention for the Lévy characteristic exponent byConditioning on $T_a$ and using the Brownian first-passage Laplace transform givesThereforeThe absolute value is essential for negative $u$. The process is the standard symmetric Cauchy process; for $a>0$, $X_a$ has the Cauchy distribution with location zero and scale $a$. If the exponent convention instead uses $\mathbb{E}{e}^{iu{X}_a}=e^{a\psi (u)}$, the answer is $\psi (u)=-|u|$.