Benefits to Homeowners from Mortgage Portfolios Retained by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Mortgage investing is the domain of financial intermediaries, such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who possess specialized knowledge and experienced analytic teams. Capital is channeled to homeowner/borrowers at lower cost through such entities. As the demand for mortgage borrowing outstrips aggregate domestic saving (which is currently negative) foreign sources of capital should become even more significant. Foreign capital can be channeled efficiently into the U.S. mortgage market by Fannie and Freddie. Their debt has the highest credit standing and their risk management ability has been demonstrated by their enormous retained portfolios of mortgages.     

Financial sector structure and financial crisis burden

We consider an overlapping generations model in the presence of financial intermediation. The paper focuses on the analysis of the consequences of a sudden negative repayments shock on financial intermediation capacity and consequently on the economy as a whole. The model exhibits a property of the ‘chain reaction’ when a single macroeconomic shock can lead to the exhaustion of credit resources and subsequently to the collapse of the banking system. To maintain the capability of the system to recover, a regulatory intervention is needed even in presence of the state guarantees on agents’ deposits in the banks. We compare the results for an intermediated economy with those derived for the market economy and draw some broad conclusions regarding the crisis consequences depending on the financial sector structure. We also compare the model predictions with the stylised facts about the Russian financial crisis of 1998.     

经济转型时期行政性垄断的规制

行政性垄断以及政府所属部门依据其行政权力而形成的垄断，是阻碍市场竞争的主要因素。因此，分析我国行政转型时期行政性垄断的特殊性及其成因、特征和危害，并借鉴西方发达国家对行政性垄断规制的经验，结合我国实际对行政性垄断进行规制，在当前显得十分重要。     

自然垄断行业规制的理论与改革

本文从自然垄断行业规制的理论基础出发 ,论述了我国政府在规制自然垄断行业的实践中遇到的问题 ,并对这一类行业的改革提出了建议。     

市场份额不应是认定垄断的惟一标准

我们习惯于根据市场份额的大小判断垄断是否成立,而事实上"市场"是个弹性概念,需要放到特定的市场结构当中,结合消费者的选择余地、产品的需求弹性、潜在竞争及技术创新等因素加以考量才具有意义;判断垄断的过程其实就是一个搜寻竞争者的过程。     

Liquidity Pools, Risk Sharing, and Financial Contagion

This paper reevaluates the Allen–Gale (2000) analysis of interbank deposits to explain financial contagion. This paper modifies the pecking order of asset liquidation developed in Allen–Gale, which is essential in fragility analysis. Furthermore, we also provide a claim structure called liquidity pool that can both achieve risk sharing and prevent financial contagion across regions when asymmetric information about bank assets is absent. This model can partly explain why bank panics reduced substantially after the founding of the Fed and the role of IMF in regional financial crises.     

Is more finance better? Disentangling intermediation and size effects of financial systems

Financial systems all over the world have grown dramatically over recent decades. But is more finance necessarily better? And what concept of financial system – a focus on its size, including both intermediation and other auxiliary “non-intermediation” activities, or a focus on traditional intermediation activity – is relevant for its impact on real sector outcomes? This paper assesses the relationship between the size of the financial system and intermediation, on the one hand, and GDP per capita growth and growth volatility, on the other hand. Based on a sample of 77 countries for the period 1980–2007, we find that intermediation activities increase growth and reduce volatility in the long run. An expansion of the financial sectors along other dimensions has no long-run effect on real sector outcomes. Over shorter time horizons a large financial sector stimulates growth at the cost of higher volatility in high-income countries. Intermediation activities stabilize the economy in the medium run especially in low-income countries. As this is an initial exploration of the link between financial system indicators and growth and volatility, we focus on OLS regressions, leaving issues of endogeneity and omitted variable biases for future research.     

Phasing out the GSEs

We develop a new model of the mortgage market that emphasizes the role of the financial sector and the government. Risk tolerant savers act as intermediaries between risk averse depositors and impatient borrowers. Both borrowers and intermediaries can default. The government provides both mortgage guarantees and deposit insurance. Underpriced government mortgage guarantees lead to more and riskier mortgage originations and higher financial sector leverage. Mortgage crises occasionally turn into financial crises and government bailouts due to the fragility of the intermediaries’ balance sheets. Foreclosure crises beget fiscal uncertainty, further disrupting the optimal allocation of risk in the economy. Increasing the price of the mortgage guarantee “crowds in” the private sector, reduces financial fragility, leads to fewer but safer mortgages, lowers house prices, and raises mortgage and risk-free interest rates. Due to a more robust financial sector and less fiscal uncertainty, consumption smoothing improves and foreclosure rates fall. While borrowers are nearly indifferent to a world with or without mortgage guarantees, savers are substantially better off. While aggregate welfare increases, so does wealth inequality.     

自然垄断理论研究综述

论文在总结自然垄断理论的传统演变和创新发展的基础上,指出了基于网络经济效益概念的创新理论存在的明显不足,同时提出回归自然垄断传统思想的观点。     

对自然垄断行业电信业的规制改革

自然垄断行业是几个企业的联合生产不及同产业中一个单一供给者提供相同产量时便宜,即单个企业能比两家或两家以上的企业更有效率地向市场提供同样数量的产品。电信行业作为自然垄断产业,面对技术的进步,市场需求的变化,政府对其加以管制,比如引入竞争因素来使得电信业从垄断变成了寡头垄断的行业。本文介绍电信业的改革历程,并指出了电信业规制改革中存在的一些问题,如准人规制、互联互通等方面,进而提出了对电信业规制改革的深化的一些措施,包括规制的内容,规制机构的改革,以及法律方面的保障等。     

银行与基金:金融中介发展趋势分析

从银行的产生与发展到基金等中介的兴起,都是交换与分工不断深化的必然结果,金融中介创新和发展的动力来自于市场和其他中介的竞争压力;同时,金融管制的不断放松,全球金融逐渐走向自由化为金融中介的发展创造了宽松的条件,这些就是金融中介不断演变的内在规律。对金融中介演变规律的理论解释是基于三条线索展开的。     

Rules versus discretion in loan rate setting

Loan rates for seemingly identical borrowers often exhibit substantial dispersion. This paper investigates the determinants of the dispersion in interest rates on loans granted by banks to small and medium sized enterprises. We associate this dispersion with the loan officers’ use of “discretion” in the loan rate setting process. We find that “discretion” is most important if: (i) loans are small and unsecured; (ii) firms are small and opaque; (iii) the firm operates in a large and highly concentrated banking market; and (iv) the firm is distantly located from the lender. Consistent with the proliferation of information-technologies in the banking industry, we find a decreasing role for “discretion” over time in the provision of small credits to opaque firms. While widely used in the pricing of loans, “discretion” plays only a minor role in the decisions to grant loans.     

企业集团财务信息的充分披露

信息需求者在需要关于企业集团整体财务信息的同时,也同样需要多样化的其他方面的财务信息,以满足决策的需要。本文认为,企业集团财务信息需求的多样化表现在许多方面,其中以对特殊行业子公司财务信息和母公司本身财务信息方面的需要表现得最为突出。本文对特殊行业子公司纳入合并范围带来的问题进行了分析,并指出应当披露企业集团中特殊行业子公司的财务信息;同时,本文对母公司财务报表披露的必要性和披露方式进行了分析讨论。