Flood Hazards and Urban Housing Markets: The Effects of Katrina on New Orleans

This study examines the impacts on consumers’ willingness to pay for certain characteristics of housing in greater New Orleans before and after the flooding of Hurricane Katrina. Single-family home sales from January 2004 to August 2006 are collected and used in a hedonic price function to estimate the changes in the value of amenities, and structural, neighborhood and geographic characteristics, including the mean elevation of each property. Elevation, which buyers did not know for certain prior to the storm, but may now be inferred from water level marks in most neighborhoods, is found to have a positive relationship with selling prices. Results indicate that pre-Katrina, there was a premium of only 1.4% per foot in flood-prone areas, and was insignificant in areas not subject to flooding. This increased to 4.6% for flooded areas after Katrina. These findings are attributed to not only the perceived risk of flooding, but also to the potential of higher compliance costs associated with rebuilding under more stringent National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) guidelines.     

The Strategy of Going Public: How UK Firms Choose Their Listing Contracts

Abstract:   UK firms going public have a choice between public offers and placings. This choice has important implications in terms of who bears the risk of the issue failing and of its costs. We find that firms with higher ex ante uncertainty choose a placing contract. Highly reputable sponsors and creditor screening serve as signals of firm quality, enabling such firms to choose a public offer. Large and multinational firms usually choose a public offer whereas there is some evidence that very small issues choose a placing. Finally, the 'hotness' of the IPO market increases the probability of placings.     

The Financial Accelerator: Evidence from International Housing Markets

This paper shows novel evidence on the mechanism through which financial constraints amplify fluctuations in asset prices and credit demand. It does so using contractual features of housing finance. Among agents whose housing demand is constrained by the availability of collateral, those who can borrow against a larger fraction of their housing value (achieve a higher loan-tovalue, or LTV, ratio) have more procyclical debt capacity. This procyclicality underlies the financial accelerator mechanism. Our study uses international variation in LTV ratios over three decades to test whether (a) housing prices and (b) demand for new mortgage borrowings are more sensitive to income shocks in countries where households can achieve higher LTV ratios. The results we obtain are consistent with the dynamics of a collateral-based financial accelerator in international housing markets.We wish to thank an anonymous referee, Adam Ashcraft, Long Chen, Luigi Guiso (CEPR discussant), Steve Malpezzi, Walter Novaes, Marco Pagano (the editor), Raghuram Rajan, Luigi Zingales, and participants at the CEPR conference on Financial Structure and Monetary Policy Channels (Barcelona, July 2003) for helpful comments and suggestions. We also thank Olimpia Bover, Maria Chiuri, Nathalie Girouard, Tullio Jappelli, Steve Malpezzi, Felipe Morande, Marco Pagano, and Shiawee Yang for kindly providing us with data. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Price Rigidity and Vacancy Rates: The Framing Effect on Rental Housing Markets

The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics - This paper proposes a new explanation for housing rent price rigidity. When high inflation or low inflation occurs, the bargaining process for new...     

Effects of Asset Securitization on Seller Claimants

This study analyzes effects on debt and equity claimants of asset sales into securitizations. Shareholders' returns are increasing in shareholder capitalization. Average losses to shareholders in mortgage-backed securities issuers are explained historically. First time issuance and increased securitization frequency are shareholder-wealth-increasing. Securitizers with actively traded bonds enjoy substantial and significant shareholder gains, which are greater the poorer the creditworthiness of the seller. Wealth transfer from bondholders to shareholders occurs in asset-backed securities among sellers with low credit ratings. Banks' claimants have benefited significantly more than other FIs' claimants, suggesting that securitization can alleviate regulatory burden. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Number: G14, G21.     

The Effects of Banking Mergers on Loan Contracts

This paper studies the effects of banking mergers on individual business borrowers. Using information on individual loan contracts between banks and companies, I analyze the effect of banking consolidation on banks' credit policies. I find that in-market mergers benefit borrowers if these mergers involve the acquisition of banks with small market shares. Interest rates charged by the consolidated banks decrease, but as the local market share of the acquired bank increases, the efficiency effect is offset by market power. Mergers have different distributional effects across borrowers. When banks become larger, they reduce the supply of loans to small borrowers.     

风险管理、内部控制与国有商业银行海外上市

本文探讨了风险管理、内部控制与国有商业银行海外上市的关系。共分四个部分:一、关于银行风险的几个基本问题;二、关于银行风险的监管要求;三、关于公司治理和内部控制的监管要求;四、关于国有商业银行完善风险管理、内部控制制度的几点建议。第一部分是本文的分析框架;第二、第三部分是从该分析框架的角度对上市监管要求进行的阐述;第四部分是结合分析框架和监管要求,对国有商业银行风险管理改革提出的建议。本文的基本论点是,满足海外上市监管要求是国有商业银行海外上市需达到的最低要求;制定并实施与自身业务战略相适应的风险战略,将直接影响国有商业银行的股票投资价值。     

Competition and Cooperation among Exchanges: Effects on Corporate Cross‐Listing Decisions and Listing Standards

In recent years, many European companies have listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), and companies from emerging market countries such as Israel, China, and India have listed not only on the NYSE, but on various other American and European exchanges such as the Nasdaq and the London Stock Exchange (LSE). At the same time, growing competition among exchanges has led to consolidation of the industry through mergers and alliances. In this article, the authors explore the main factors in corporate listing decisions as well as the expected effects on listing standards of both the growing competition and the recent wave of alliances and mergers among exchanges. When choosing an exchange, corporate issuers are likely to consider the listing requirements and reputations of the exchanges, as well as the sophistication of investors who trade on those exchanges and the extent of their knowledge of the firm's industry and business. As a general rule, value‐maximizing companies can be expected to list on the most reputable exchange they can, but may also choose listings (in some cases, dual or multiple listings) on less reputable (typically local) exchanges with more investors who are familiar with the issuer's industry or products. When setting their listing standards, publicly traded exchanges devote considerable attention to finding the optimal listing and disclosure standards, and may consider adjusting them to changes in circumstances. The setting and enforcement of the appropriate listing standards are the main determinant of an exchange's reputation, which in turn determines the kinds of companies that will choose to list on it. Exchanges with the highest listing standards and reputations are likely to work hard to maintain them, while exchanges with lesser reputations will seek to carve out niches by making opportunistic use of lower (though not too low) listing standards while possibly seeking alliances or mergers. But if less reputable exchanges use their lower listing standards (and fees) as a means of competing for listings with other exchanges, this will not necessarily lead to a “race to the bottom” in listing standards. Moreover, a merger between two exchanges is likely to result in a higher listing standard for the combined exchange than for (at least one of) the pre‐merger exchanges.     

Choosing to Disagree: Endogenous Dismissiveness and Overconfidence in Financial Markets

The psychology literature documents that individuals derive current utility from their beliefs about future events. We show that, as a result, investors in financial markets choose to disagree about both private information and price information. When objective price informativeness is low, each investor dismisses the private signals of others and ignores price information. In contrast, when prices are sufficiently informative, heterogeneous interpretations arise endogenously: most investors ignore prices, while the rest condition on it. Our analysis demonstrates how observed deviations from rational expectations (e.g., dismissiveness, overconfidence) arise endogenously, interact with each other, and vary with economic conditions.     

Agent Change and Seller Bargaining Power: A Case of Principal Agent Problem in the Housing Market

When a seller hires an agent to sell his/her property, a successful outcome depends on the list price, marketing time, unobserved relative bargaining power of the buyers and sellers, and the effort levels of the seller and the seller’s agent. A divergence with respect to the list/transaction prices and the expected effort levels between seller and agent will create a principal-agent interest conflict. This conflict in some cases results in an agent change before the house is sold. The change will reduce the relative bargaining power of the seller, affecting the observed marketing time and transaction price. This study estimates the effects of an agent change on marketing time and transaction price after controlling for degree of overpricing, list-price revisions, marketing time, and endogenous selection bias. Our results show that: (1) on average, an agent change increases the marketing time by about 3 months and adversely affects the transaction price by about 2.7 %. Furthermore, we found that an agent change before the expiration of the listing contract, compared to that of after the expiration, has a smaller effect on the marketing time (2.3 vs. 3.8 months) and has a smaller transaction price discount (2.1 % vs. 4.2 %).     

Housing Prices and Maturing Real Estate Markets: Evidence from Uganda

Uganda, a less developed but rapidly growing East African nation, continues to correct the economic mismanagement of past governments. One important legacy of this mismanagement is the Land Decree of 1975, issued by then President Idi Amin Dada. This decree nationalized all land and made illegal all private real estate market transactions. This paper uses a rich, but little known, dataset to show that real estate markets appear to have continued operating reasonably efficiently in spite of the 1975 Decree. The Land Act of 1998 repealed the 1975 Decree. Our results suggest the recent Act has a high likelihood of success because its primary goal is to codify guarantees of security, transparency, and enforceable property rights in private real estate markets that appear to already exist.     

The Impact of Housing Markets on Consumer Debt: Credit Report Evidence from 1999 to 2012

We estimate the response of consumer debt portfolios to pronounced housing market swings from 1999 to 2012 using Equifax‐sourced credit report data and a variety of identification approaches. We find: (i) the extraordinary climb in home equity debt from 2002 to 2006 is an expression of a stable, longer‐term relationship between house price growth and home equity borrowing; (ii) all preboom homeowners, and older and prime postboom homeowners, demonstrate near dollar‐for‐dollar substitution between (expensive) credit card and (cheap) home equity debt in response to home equity changes; and (iii) little evidence of substitution between home equity and student loan debt.     

Contract Type and the Cost of Provision: Evidence from Maintenance Service Contracts*

More than half a billion dollars are spent each year on the maintenance of Australia's urban water and sewerage networks. Expenditure is governed through a mix of in‐house and outsourced maintenance service contracts. We re‐examine issues relating to the relationship between the cost of maintenance service provision and the type of contract used. We take advantage of the fact that water retailers in Melbourne use a mix of contract types – including fixed‐price (FP) and cost‐plus (C+) contracts – for the provision of water and sewerage network maintenance services. Our results suggest that the C+ contract results in substantial savings.     

房价波动与社会福利——基于内生化企业进入的研究

本文建立了一个两部门DSGE模型,模型中引入房地产部门,分析了在企业自由进入情况下,房价波动如何影响新企业的进入以及社会福利。研究发现,外部冲击导致的房价波动通过改变企业进入成本,对企业的进入决策产生影响,进而改变商品的多样性和总产出,对社会福利造成影响。不同冲击对社会福利的影响大小与房价对企业进入成本的传递程度和房地产部门占经济中的比重直接相关,特别是当房价对企业进入成本的传递程度较大时,非房地产部门的技术进步冲击不但没有带来非房地产部门企业数目的增加,反而是加剧了非房地产部门的垄断程度,降低了社会福利。最后,本文通过1998到2010年中国35个大中城市面板数据的实证研究对理论模型中房价影响企业进入行为的机制进行了验证。     

The Real Effects of Financial Markets: The Impact of Prices on Takeovers

Using mutual fund redemptions as an instrument for price changes, we identify a strong effect of market prices on takeover activity (the “trigger effect”). An interquartile decrease in valuation leads to a seven percentage point increase in acquisition likelihood, relative to a 6% unconditional takeover probability. Instrumentation addresses the fact that prices are endogenous and increase in anticipation of a takeover (the “anticipation effect”). Our results overturn prior literature that finds a weak relation between prices and takeovers without instrumentation. These findings imply that financial markets have real effects: They impose discipline on managers by triggering takeover threats.     

A Tale of Two Countries: Comparing the US and Chinese Housing Markets

The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics - The recent surge in property values in China has been similar to the surge in the U.S before the crash in 2007. This raises concerns about whether...     

试析国外住房抵押贷款合同设计

本文运用非对称信息经济学原理,研究国外住房抵押贷款合同设计,以此提出我国开发固定利率住房抵押贷款合同以及在合同中设定点数的重要性。     

The Effects of Macroeconomic Factors on Pricing Mortgage Insurance Contracts

Numerous empirical studies, including Abraham and Hendershott (1996) , Muellbauer and Murphy (1997) , Leung (2004) , and Oikarinen (2009) , have identified a significant relationship between housing prices and macroeconomic factors. Using a linear regression on the comovement of macroeconomic factors and housing prices, this article employs an option‐pricing framework to price and hedge the fair premia of mortgage insurance (MI). Our model provides improved performance in terms of MI premium pricing, especially during periods that are characterized by high housing prices. Ignoring the impacts of macroeconomic factors on housing prices will lead to an underestimation of MI premia.