The Poisson boundary of random rational affinities

Abstract

The group of affine transformations with rational coefficients acts naturally on the real line, but also on the $p$-adic fields. The aim of this note is to show that, for random walks whose laws have a finite first moment, all these actions are necessary and sufficient to describe the Poisson boundary, which is in fact the product of all the fields that contract in mean.

13 pages