Libra — A Differentiated View on Facebook’s Virtual Currency Project

Intereconomics - Libra — a global virtual currency project initiated by Facebook — has been the subject of many controversial discussions since its announcement in June 2019. This paper...     

Green Finance in Europe — Strategy,Regulation and Instruments

A green transformation of nearly all parts of our economy is necessary, including but not limited to energy production and consumption, mobility, manufacturing and agriculture.

     

Virtual Currencies,Distributed Ledgers and the Future of Financial Services

The phenomenon of virtual currencies has to be distinguished from the underlying distributed ledger technologies. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies need to be subject to strict financial regulation and supervision to ensure investor protection. At the same time, distributed ledger technologies will shape the future of the financial services in many respects. The disruptive potential is illustrated for selected financial products and processes.     

Cross-border mergers and acquisitions vs. greenfield foreign direct investment: The role of firm heterogeneity

We develop a general equilibrium model with heterogeneous firms to address two sets of questions: (1) what are the characteristics of firms that choose the various modes of foreign market access (exporting, greenfield FDI, and cross-border M&A), and (2) how does the international organization of production vary across industries and country-pairs? We show that the answers to these questions depend on the nature of firm heterogeneity. Depending on whether firms differ in their mobile or immobile capabilities, cross-border mergers involve the most or the least efficient active firms. The comparative statics on industry and country characteristics display a similar dichotomy.     

Capital market efficiency and the relationship between equity returns, interest rates, and monetary aggregates in Australia

This paper examines the efficiency with which the Australian share market incorporates new information relating to interest rates and the monetary aggregates into share prices. It finds a strong relationship between medium term government security yields and equity returns although little relationship could be found between unanticipated changes in the monetary aggregates and share returns. Furthermore, the interest rate relationship involved long lags and suggests inefficiency in stock market pricing in Australia.     

Bitcoins,Blockchain und Distributed Ledgers

Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin were invented to facilitate instant payment services without the need for a central bank or financial intermediaries executing payments. Using cryptographic functions, any user of the bitcoin system can transfer units of the virtual currency globally on an anonymous basis. However, financial supervisory authorities are about to increase regulation of virtual currencies due to concerns that the anonymous character of the system facilitates money laundering and the financing of illegal transactions. Nevertheless, the underlying blockchain technology, or in broader terms the distributed ledger technology, may revolutionise several industries. This paper illustrates the functioning and recent market developments in the bitcoin industry as well as the disruptive potential of the underlying technologies.