A variational approach for pricing options and corporate bonds

Summary We show that option prices can always be obtained as the values of simple optimization problems. This easy remark has two consequences: sensitivity analysis is simplified (by applying the envelope theorem) and numerical procedures are improved. We give two examples of applications: options on coupon bonds and corporate bonds.     

Stochastic convexity in dynamic programming

Summary. This paper explores sufficient conditions for a continuous stationary Markov optimal policy and a concave value function in stochastic dynamic programming problems. Also, the paper addresses conditions needed for the differentiability of the value function. The paper uses conditions such as first order stochastic dominance, second order stochastic dominance and concave stochastic dominance that are widely applied in economics. Received: February 23, 2001; revised version: May 19, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" I am deeply indebted to Prajit Dutta for patient assistance and advice. This paper has benefited from discussions with Tsz Cheong Lai, Tackseung Jun, Werner Stanzl and Satyajit Bose as well as feedback from an anonymous referee.     

The global financial environment and spanish cooperative banking

The phenomenon of globalization has an effect on all the fields of economic and financial activity. In this increasing competitive environment, the majority of the Spanish credit institutions have been integrated in a cooperative banking group: the Grupo Caja Rural. In other countries of long cooperative tradition, important credit institutions have responded to challenges presented by economy internationalization and the increasing competence in financial markets with the abandonment of mutuality and cooperative model. These changes have been justified by companies in order for their own survival and business growth necessities. In Spain, the reaction has been the opposite. In spite of that, some elements can make one think of a possible demutualization process in the Grupo, due to the trivialization of cooperative principles. (JEL G21, O52)     

Range convexity and ambiguity averse preferences

We show that range convexity of beliefs, a `technical' condition that appears naturally in axiomatizations of preferences in a Savage-like framework, imposes some unexpected restrictions when modelling ambiguity averse preferences. That is, when it is added to a mild condition, range convexity makes the preferences collapse to subjective expected utility as soon as they satisfy structural conditions that are typically used to characterize ambiguity aversion. Received: February 25, 2000; revised version: April 17, 2000     

Innovation in corporate law

In most countries large business enterprises today are organized as corporations. The corporation with its key attributes of independent personality, limited liability and free tradeability of shares has played a key role in most developed market economies since the 19th century and has made major inroads in emerging markets. We suggest that the resilience of the corporate form is a function of the adaptability of the legal framework to a changing environment. We analyze a country's capacity to innovate using the rate of statutory legal change, the flexibility of corporate law, and institutional change as indicators. Our findings suggest that origin countries are more innovative than transplant countries. Journal of Comparative Economics 31 (4) (2003) 676–694.     

The impact of electronic commerce on small and midsized spanish companies

Electronic commerce (EC) is not new for some European Union countries, but in others, such as Spain, it is only at the developmental stage. Now that Spain has joined the third phase of the economic and monetary union, Spanish companies' internationalization and the progressive change in the Spanish consumers' buying habits are determining the search for new business strategies. Starting with an analysis of the Spanish business environment, followed by an internal scanning of small and midsized Spanish companies, this paper will analyze the viability of EC as a new business strategy.     

Wage-setting institutions and corporate governance

We present a model in which wage-setting structures explain cross-country variation in corporate governance. The model predicts a nonmonotonic relationship between the level of centralization in wage-bargaining institutions and the levels of firm ownership concentration and investor protection legislation. Low and high degrees of centralization yield less concentrated ownership and more investor protection than intermediate degrees. Like recent research, this paper highlights labor as a key constituent in shaping corporate governance. However, our theory can resolve an important puzzle this research confronts, namely, why Scandinavian countries with higher than average labor strength also have higher than average investor protection legislation.     

关于债券凸性对冲的构造及检验

债券是人们重要的投资工具之一，在进行投资分析过程中，投资者会运用债券的久期、凸度等指标来衡量债券的利率风险。在投资过程中，投资者可以运用这些指标来构造债券的组合，实现凸性对冲。本文根据凸性对冲的原理：提出了构造债券组合一种方法，并利用最近债券市场的交易数据进行检验，发现确实存在凸性对冲的机会。     

Beta-convergence and sigma-convergence in corporate governance in Europe

This paper tests for beta-convergence and sigma-convergence in the corporate governance models, using a sample of corporate governance ratings for 198 European corporations listed on the FTSE Eurofirst 300 index. A piecewise linear regression is deployed to select a model and the Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood estimator is also applied to estimate an exponential model. It concludes that there is statistical evidence of beta- and sigma-convergence within countries and the results suggest that institutional differences between countries are statistically relevant.     

Proxy contests and corporate democracy

A proxy contest is a fight between two management teams to gain proxies from shareholders.The management team which accumulates a majority of votes wins the competition for corpo rate control. This paper attempts to construct a formal model of proxy contests and analyze their implications for the shareholders’ benefit and power of control over the firm.     

Mergers and corporate debt financing

We investigate the effect of mergers on corporate debt financing using time series analysis. We find that corporate debt use increases during periods of very high merger activity but is not significantly affected by variations within the normal range of merger activity. Traditional trade-off and pecking order variables also significantly affect corporate financing choice.     

Adverse selection and corporate governance

This paper examines the impact of corporate governance on the adverse selection component of the bid-ask spread of stocks listed on the Singapore Exchange. These companies have been identified by Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia (CSLA) with the highest level of corporate governance among 25 emerging markets. We measure corporate governance by several criteria: discipline, transparency, independence, accountability, responsibilities, fairness, and social awareness. The results show that corporate governance has an inverse relationship with adverse selection. However, only the transparency dimension exhibits a significant inverse relationship with adverse selection. In addition, Government-Linked Companies (GLCs) are shown to have a smaller adverse selection component than non-GLCs.     

Asymmetry and Duration Dependence in Australian GDP and Unemployment

The periodic structure of business cycles suggests that significant asymmetries are present over different phases of the cycle. This paper uses markov regime-switching models with fixed and duration dependent trasition probabilities to directly model expansions, contractions and durations in Australian GDP growth and unemployment growth. Evidence is found of significant asymmetry in growth rates across expansions and contractions for both series. GDP contractions exhibit duration dependence implying that as output recessions age the likelihood of switching into an expansion phase increases. Unemployment growth does not exhibit duration dependence in either phase. Evidence is also presented that non-linearities in unemployment growth are well explained by the asymmetries in the GDP growth cycle. The analysis suggests that recessions are periods of rapid and intense job destruction, that Australian unemployment tends to ratchet up in recessionary periods and, in contrast to US and UK studies, that shocks to Australian unemployment growth are more persistent in recessions than expansions.     

The indexation of wages and bonds in Brazil

This paper analyses the dynamic relationship between the degrees of indexation of wages and public bonds in Brazil. A simple model is constructed to show that both degrees of indexation are determined simultaneously. We apply cointegration techniques and estimate error-correction representations to assess the temporal causality between them. Our results provide empirical support for the existence of simultaneity in the degrees of indexation in Brazil in the period 1980–93.     

企业的战略实施

战略源于军事术语,用于企业管理也只是近代的事。运筹帷幄,决胜千里,刻划了战略对最终战事结局举足轻重的作用。在竞争日趋激烈的今天,全球化和信息化的浪潮风起云涌,企业稍有不慎,便有可能遭受致命打击,战略管理已经成为企业在瞬息万变的市场竞争中立于不败之地的法宝。因此加强对战略管理的研究对指导国有企业的实践具有重要的现实意义。战略管理可以简单划分为制定和实施两个阶段,长期以来,不少学者对如何制定发展战略论述较多,而对战略实施的研究却相对欠缺。战略实施是将战略构想转化成战略行动的过程。如果制定的战略不能实…     

Tax enforcement and corporate profit shifting

We present empirical evidence suggesting that weak tax enforcement proxied by the extent of tax evasion in a country acts like a lower corporate tax rate in attracting profits of multinational corporations.     

Firm growth in multinational corporate groups

This paper formulates an econometric model of firm growth that explicitly accounts for interdependence of firm growth rates within multinational corporate networks. We apply a recently introduced IV-estimation procedure for peer group effects to directly test for growth spillovers within multinational corporate networks. Using European firm level data, our estimation results indicate negative spillovers within horizontally organized multinational networks, with this effect being most pronounced for corporate groups producing in a larger number of different countries. In contrast, they are positive for vertically organized multinational corporate groups. In the former case, the spillovers lead to more within-network heterogeneity in the firm growth processes and slower average size adjustments. In the latter case, multinational corporate groups as a whole are more stable and, on average, members adjust their size faster. Finally, the robustness analysis demonstrates that the growth spillover effects in purely domestic corporate groups differ from their multinational counterparts and shows that our baseline results are not driven by spurious correlation of individual firm growth rates.     

Total factor productivity and R&D capital in the spanish economy, 1965–1980

A formal model of productivity growth and technical progress is presented. The model takes into account embodied and disembodied technical progress as explanatory variables. The slowdown in productivity growth for the Spanish economy after 1972 is explained for 92% by the decline in the rate of growth of technical progress originated from domestic R&D and technology imports.