Capital and income financialization: Accounting for the 2008 financial crisis

Financialization is recognised as a key feature of the 2008 financial crisis. We argue that a lesson is the need for an accounting framework which focuses upon financialization allowing it to be monitored and controlled by stakeholders. We argue that financialization has been permitted through the failure of accounting to distinguish distributable income from capital gains/transfers and to distinguish productive from speculative capital. We introduce an accounting presentation (4S accounting) which effectively makes these distinctions. We use a stylized example to illustrate how it should be applied to the financial reporting of banks.     

Analysis of order book flows using a non-parametric estimation of the branching ratio matrix

We introduce a new non-parametric method that allows for a direct, fast and efficient estimation of the matrix of kernel norms of a multivariate Hawkes process, also called branching ratio matrix. We demonstrate the capabilities of this method by applying it to high-frequency order book data from the EUREX exchange. We show that it is able to uncover (or recover) various relationships between all the first-level order book events associated with some asset when mapped to a 12-dimensional process. We then scale up the model so as to account for events on two assets simultaneously and we discuss the joint high-frequency dynamics.     

On Cost Tradeoffs Between Conservative and Market Value Accounting

We identify a cost tradeoff relevant to the comparison of alternative accounting regimes. We compare equilibrium deadweight losses, due to transacting and auditing, across the historical cost, lower-of-cost-or-market, and market value regimes. We provide conditions for each of the regimes to dominate the other two. We show that while market-value accounting is likely to prevail in an inflationary setting, it may also be optimal under deflation. Similarly, lower-of-cost-or-market is likely to prevail in a deflationary setting, though it may also be optimal under inflation. Last, historical cost prevails only if the variation in asset prices is sufficiently high.     

Middlemen: the good,the bad,and the ugly

We examine the role of a middleman as an expert in markets. A seller's effort determines the quality of the good. Buyers observe neither the seller's effort nor the good's quality. A middleman, after observing a signal about the good's quality, decides whether to purchase it and then to sell it. We show that the presence of a middleman may either reduce or exacerbate the seller's moral hazard problem. We also consider a model with multiple middlemen. We find that the seller's effort is minimized if either the middleman's signal is perfect or the number of middlemen is large.     

Evaluating fund capacity: issues and methods

We examine the issues and methods involved in evaluating the size that an equity fund might attain before it becomes unable to create additional value for investors. We discuss how capacity is defined, identify ten drivers and outline methods for conducting capacity analysis. We detail models that predict capacity, assuming that a fund adjusts the manner in which it trades and constructs portfolios as funds under management grow. We also provide an overview of transaction cost modelling, which is integral to predicting capacity. This study is primarily intended as an aid for investment industry participants who wish to evaluate the capacity associated with a given investment signal.     

The Pension Protection Fund*

We develop a model of the Pension Protection Fund (PPF), a defined benefit pension guarantee system for the UK, based on an analogy between pension liabilities and corporate debt obligations. We show that the PPF is likely to face many years of low claims interspersed irregularly with periods of very large claims. There is a significant chance that these claims will be so large that the PPF will default on its liabilities, leaving the government with no option but to bail it out. The cause of this problem is the double impact of a fall in equity prices on the PPF: it makes sponsor firms more likely to default and it makes defaulted plans more likely to be underfunded. We use our model to derive a fair premium for PPF insurance under different circumstances, to estimate the extent of cross‐subsidies in the PPF between strong and weak sponsors, and to show that risk‐rated premiums are unlikely to have a substantial effect on either the size or the lumpiness of claims. We argue that for the PPF to operate effectively, it should be introduced in tandem with strong minimum funding requirements and a lower level of benefit guarantee than at present.     

A price dynamic equilibrium model with trading volume weights based on a price-volume probability wave differential equation

Guided by a price-volume probability wave differential equation in a new mathematical method, we study intraday market dynamic equilibrium in stock market. We select intraday cumulative trading volume distribution over a price range as individual mental representation and determine a price equilibrium point by the maximum volume utility price. We propose the hypothesis that a stock price can deviate away from the equilibrium point in momentum and restore to it in reversal, and the volume distribution embodies market dynamic equilibrium. Then, we examine it by a set of explicit price dynamic equilibrium models with trading volume weights from the differential equation against a large number of the price-volume distribution using tick-by-tick high frequency data in Chinese stock market in 2019. It holds true. We can infer that the theory is applied for a broader scope because it embraces core mathematical components in expected utility theory, prospect theory, and reflexivity theory.     

Narrow Framing and Long-Term Care Insurance

We propose a model of narrow framing in insurance and test it using data from a new module we designed and fielded in the Health and Retirement Study. We show that respondents subject to narrow framing are substantially less likely to buy long-term care insurance than average. This effect is much larger than the effects of risk aversion or adverse selection, and it offers a new explanation for why people underinsure their later-life care needs.     

Large Shareholders as Monitors: Is There a Trade-Off between Liquidity and Control?

This paper analyzes the incentives of large shareholders to monitor public corporations. We investigate the hypothesis that a liquid stock market reduces large shareholders' incentives to monitor because it allows them to sell their stocks more easily. Even though this is true, a liquid market also makes it less costly to hold larger stakes and easier to purchase additional shares. We show that this fact is important if monitoring is costly: market liquidity mitigates the problem that small shareholders free ride on the effort of the large shareholder. We find that liquid stock markets are beneficial because they make corporate governance more effective.     

Public initiatives to support entrepreneurs: Credit guarantees versus co-funding

We analyze financial support for the entrepreneurial sector. State support can raise welfare by relaxing financial constraints, but it can also reduce lending standards if entrepreneurs substitute public sources of collateral for their own assets, if it encourages excessive entrepreneurial entry, or if it undermines bank monitoring incentives. We derive a “pecking order” for support schemes: support funds should be channeled first to credit guarantee schemes and then, when entrepreneurs start to substitute public for private collateral, to co-funding entrepreneurial projects. The optimal level of credit guarantee is diminishing in the costs of incentivising bank monitoring. We show in an extension that the long-term effect of public subsidies may be to impair the private sector’s initiative to uncover cost savings.     

How Frequent Financial Reporting Can Cause Managerial Short‐Termism: An Analysis of the Costs and Benefits of Increasing Reporting Frequency

We develop a cost–benefit tradeoff that provides new insights into the frequency with which firms should be required to report the results of their operations to the capital market. The benefit to increasing the frequency of financial reporting is that it causes market prices to better deter investments in negative net present value projects. The cost of increased frequency is that it increases the probability of inducing managerial short‐termism. We analyze the tradeoff between these costs and benefits and develop conditions under which greater reporting frequency is desirable and conditions under which it is not.     

Religiosity,borrower gender and loan losses in microfinance institutions: a global evidence

We examine the impact of religious beliefs on loan repayments in 770 microfinance institutions (MFIs) across 65 countries over the period 2006–2018. We find robust evidence of a negative relationship between religiosity and loan losses in MFIs. We also find that the relationship between religiosity and loan losses is stronger for MFIs in Protestant-dominated countries than in Catholic-dominated countries. Moreover, religiosity improves the operational self-sufficiency of MFIs through a reduction in loan losses. We find that religiosity does not improve the loan repayment behaviour of women borrowers, but it reduces the loan size per borrower. Overall, our evidence suggests that although religiosity reduces loan losses through religiosity-induced lender-risk aversion, it does not improve the loan repayment behaviour of borrowers. We also use several approaches to evaluate our results to the effects of endogeneity.

     

How do exchange rates co-move? A study on the currencies of five inflation-targeting countries

This paper does three things. First, it explores the type of asymmetry in exchange rate correlation for five inflation-targeting countries. We show their currencies co-move more closely with the currencies of some influential foreign countries during joint appreciations than joint depreciations against a world currency. Second, it establishes empirically the linkage between interest rate differentials and exchange rate correlation. We find evidence that both widening and narrowing interest rate differentials will reduce the correlation. Third, it proposes a new version of the asymmetric dynamic conditional correlation model. The model proves to be capable of providing great insight into the two issues investigated.     

Endogenous networks in investment syndication

As an effective investment strategy, investors often invest jointly in a company by forming a syndicate. The unique feature of this paper is that it endogenizes the formation of an investment syndicate. We provide a theory on the endogenous formation of networks in investment syndication and analyze how several key factors such as risk aversion, productivity, risk and cost affect incentive and syndicated investment. We also apply the theory to venture capital investment and identify empirical evidence in support of it.     

Self-Protection, Information and the Precautionary Principle

In this paper we examine the effect of information on investment in self-protection. We show that the relationship between more information and investment in self-protection is ambiguous in general. If absolute risk aversion is constant, then investment in self-protection always decreases with a better information structure. We show that if we interpret the Precautionary Principle as requiring more self-protection today, it is difficult to accept it on the grounds of efficiency, except for a particular subset of information structures.     

Relational delegation

We analyze a cheap talk game with partial commitment by the principal. We first treat the principal's commitment power as exogenous and then endogenize it in an infinitely repeated game. We characterize optimal decision making for any commitment power and show when it takes the form of threshold delegation—in which case the agent can make any decision below a threshold—and centralization—in which case the agent has no discretion. For small biases, threshold delegation is optimal for any smooth distribution. Outsourcing can only be optimal if the principal's commitment power is sufficiently small.     

Tax reform, the informal economy, and bank financing of capital formation

This paper develops a model that relates businesses’ entry into the underground economy to tax rates and the need to access the banking system. The model uses a dynamic approach in which both firms and banks optimize and in which the benefits to a firm of accessing the banking system are endogenous. A firm compares the return to capital with the marginal tax rate on capital income and uses the difference to determine how much of the tax to pay. At the same time, banks use a firm’s capital tax payments, combined with the capital tax rate to obtain an estimate of the firm’s minimum capital value. If the firm pays at least some taxes then it will have access to the banking system, which will allow it to finance investment. If the firm pays no taxes, then it cannot access the banks and cannot invest. We compare the equilibria resulting from tax compliance and tax evasion. We calibrate the model to a highly stylized version of the Russian economy, and analyze the effect of potential tax changes on the underground economy. We compute a dynamic equilibrium for our model, and note that it tracks the path of certain macroeconomic variables of the Russian economy (GDP, budget and trade balances, price level and interest rate) with some accuracy for the years 2001–2008. We are unable to track the underground economy, as this data is unobservable. We then carry out a series of counterfactual simulations, first asking if non-capital intensive firms have an incentive to evade taxes under existing value added tax rates. We find that they do, and that the incentive would have been greatly reduced if the value added tax rate had been selectively reduced for the non-capital intensive sectors. We then ask what the effect would be if the corporate tax rate were raised on capital intensive sectors. The simulations indicate that the capital intensive sectors would not increase their entry into the underground economy.     

Minimizing CVaR and VaR for a portfolio of derivatives

Value at risk (VaR) and conditional value at risk (CVaR) are frequently used as risk measures in risk management. Compared to VaR, CVaR is attractive since it is a coherent risk measure. We analyze the problem of computing the optimal VaR and CVaR portfolios. We illustrate that VaR and CVaR minimization problems for derivatives portfolios are typically ill-posed. We propose to include cost as an additional preference criterion for the CVaR optimization problem. We demonstrate that, with the addition of a proportional cost, it is possible to compute an optimal CVaR derivative investment portfolio with significantly fewer instruments and comparable CVaR and VaR. A computational method based on a smoothing technique is proposed to solve a simulation based CVaR optimization problem efficiently. Comparison is made with the linear programming approach for solving the simulation based CVaR optimization problem.     

Price setting, price dispersion, and the value of money: or, the law of two prices

We study models combining search, money, price posting, and preference shocks. We show how these features interact to influence the price level and price dispersion. First, price-posting equilibria exist with valued fiat currency. Second, although both are possible, price dispersion is more common than a single price. Third, we prove that generically there cannot be more than two prices. We provide intuition for this law of two prices, show it also holds in some nonmonetary search models, and discuss variations of the assumptions under which it may not hold.     

Perpetual American options in incomplete markets: the infinitely divisible case

We consider the exercise of a number of American options in an incomplete market. In this paper we are interested in the case where the options are infinitely divisible. We make the simplifying assumptions that the options have infinite maturity, and the holder has exponential utility. Our contribution is to solve this problem explicitly and we show that, except at the initial time when it may be advantageous to exercise a positive fraction of his holdings, it is never optimal for the holder to exercise a tranche of options. Instead, the process of option exercises is continuous; however, it is singular with respect to calendar time. Exercise takes place when the stock price reaches a convex boundary which we identify.