Stock volatility and pension funds under an individual capitalization-based system

The existence of feedback effects between volatility and institutional investor holdings has been extensively studied for the United States. This article contributes to the literature by investigating this issue for Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs) in Chile. To this end, data on PFAs' holdings is gathered for 42 firms actively traded on the Santiago Stock Exchange during December 2002–July 2008. The main findings of this study are the following. First, an increase in PFAs' stock holdings translates into a mild effect on stock return volatility. Second, an increase in stock return volatility leads to a moderate decrease in PFAs' stock holdings, suggesting PFAs' preference for safer stocks. The key policy implication of these conclusions is that PFAs' stock trading does not have a destabilizing impact on the domestic stock market.     

The unfinished agenda: Indian agriculture under the structural reforms

Employing a dynamic nine-sector, seven-income classes computable general equilibrium (CGE) model for the Indian economy (1985–90). this paper analyses the medium-run effects of (agricultural) trade liberalization. Its focus is on the effects of trade reform on farmers' incentives, because it is often presumed that the lack of adequate incentives constitutes the major constraint on private agricultural investment and the use of modem inputs. The simulation results suggest that, given empirically plausible price response elasticities, the improvement in farmers' incentives consequent upon trade liberalization is unlikely to increase agricultural productivity and real incomes in a broad-based and sustained manner. It is with reference to these results that major technological, social and structural, and organizational barriers to private agricultural investment are discussed and an important role is identified for government intervention in fostering agricultural development.     

Strategic Behaviour under European Antidumping Duties

In this paper we develop a dynamic two-period model of imperfect competition to analyse the effects of European antidumping duties on firm behaviour and domestic welfare. Our model is one of the first to complement the European empirical literature on antidumping policy and can usefully be compared with papers dealing with the effects of US antidumping policy. We arrive at three important conclusions: (a) the strategic behaviour of European firms under European antidumping rules may run in the opposite direction compared to the incentives for US firms provided under the US antidumping rules; (b) US antidumping rules perform better than European rules in terms of domestic welfare and in terms of protecting domestic value added and employment; (c) the Strategic Trade Policy argument for protection need not apply for antidumping duties because the level of protection is endogenously determined by the firms involved.     

Import Diversion under European Antidumping Policy

This paper studies empirically the effects of European antidumping cases on trade diversion from importers named in an antidumping investigation, to countries not named in the investigation. For this purpose we use a unique data set at the 8-digit product level. The amount of import diversion can be regarded as an indication of the effectiveness of antidumping policy. We find that trade diversion in the European Union caused by antidumping actions—in contrast to the United States—is limited, suggesting that the European Union's antidumping policy is more effective in keeping imports out. This result holds even after controlling for selection bias in the antidumping investigation procedure. A number of explanations for this difference in trade diversion as a result of antidumping policy between the European Union and United States are formulated.     

Managed commodity funds

The performance of managed commodity fund investments during the years l982 through 1996 is examined, both as stand-alone investments and as assets in diversified stock and bond portfolios. Nine stylized commodity fund investments are examined: randomly-selected, single-CTAs, pool, and fund portfolios; equally weighted market portfolios (EWMPs) of CTAs, pools, and funds; and value-weighted portfolios (VWMP) of CTAs, pools, and funds. Further, two subperiods are examined: 1982–1988 and 1989–1996. Based on an analysis using Sharpe ratios as the performance criterion, several types of managed commodity funds make both good stand-alone investments and good portfolio assets; an EWMP of CTAs and a VWMP of pools receive the highest ranking among the alternative commodity fund investments. It is also shown that commodity indexes are not a substitute for a managed commodity fund investment. A number of issues warrant further study: Can investors still earn consistently attractive risk-adjusted returns on managed commodity fund investments if they do not hold diversified portfolios of CTAs and pools? Also: How can such high speculative returns be earned in efficient commodity markets? And: Are CTA and pool returns high because commodity fund managers have superior trading skill? An important issue for future research is to determine whether in fact CTAs do possess such skill. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 19: 377–411, 1999     

The development of mutual funds around the world

With few exceptions, mainly in Asia, mutual funds grew explosively in most countries around the world during the 1990s. Equity funds predominate in Anglo-American countries and bond funds in most of Continental Europe and in middle-income countries. Capital market development (reflecting investor confidence in market integrity, liquidity and efficiency) and financial system orientation are found to be the main determinants of mutual fund development. Restrictions on competing products may have acted as a catalyst for the development of money market and (short-term) bond funds.     

Management structure and the performance of funds of mutual funds

A rapidly growing mutual fund category is funds of funds (FOFs) which invest in other mutual funds instead of individual securities. This study reports on FOFs' characteristics and performance relative to traditional equity mutual funds and finds that FOFs compare favorably. FOFs with identified managers outperform their unidentified counterparts, and FOFs that invest in-family outperform both traditional equity funds and those FOFs investing out-of-family. Finally, replicating FOFs' holdings can be prohibitively expensive since they commonly hold funds with high minimum initial investments, closed funds and/or funds that are restricted to a particular investor type.     

论中国对冲基金权变监管模式的构建

全球对冲基金业在经过金融危机的冲击后卷土重来,在世界经济舞台上扮演重要角色的中国自然受到了对冲基金业的重视和青睐.发展对冲基金这种新兴投资工具,有利于促进我国证券市场发展,但其带来的风险同样需要高度重视.逐步建立和完善对冲基金在中国的监管,是我国繁荣发展对冲基金业的必然要求.本文针对中国资本市场.提出了对冲基金权变监管模式的构建.     

论中国对冲基金权变监管模式的构建

全球对冲基金业在经过金融危机的冲击后卷土重来,在世界经济舞台上扮演重要角色的中国自然受到了对冲基金业的重视和青睐.发展对冲基金这种新兴投资工具,有利于促进我国证券市场发展,但其带采的风险同样需要高度重视.逐步建立和完善对冲基金在中国的监管,是我国繁荣发展对冲基金业的必然要求.本文针对中国资本市场,提出了对冲基金权变监管模式的构建.     

企业资金管理措施分析

随着企业竞争日趋激烈,提高企业资金使用的效益和效率,已成为决定企业生存和发展的关键问题.本文揭示并分析了石油企业在资金管理上存在的问题,并提出了相应的改进措施.     

企业资金管理措施分析

随着企业竞争日趋激烈提高企业资金使用的效益和效率,已成为决定企业生存和发展的关键问题.本文揭示并分析了石油企业在资金管理上存在的问题并提出了相应的改进措施.     

The role of sovereign wealth funds in global financial intermediation

Sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) have experienced tremendous growth lately. Their combined wealth is currently estimated at $3 trillion, and the International Monetary Fund estimates that they will continue to grow to $10 trillion by 2012. SWFs' recent investments in the United States and Europe have been the focus of media and government scrutiny, given that a number of SWFs are not transparent, and emanate from authoritarian regimes, which are not political allies of the West. In this article, we provide a comprehensive overview, along with detailed summary statistics on various aspects of SWFs. We also provide recommendations to facilitate SWFs' role in global financial intermediation. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Bounds on European Option Prices under Stochastic Volatility

In this paper we consider the range of prices consistent with no arbitrage for European options in a general stochastic volatility model. We give conditions under which the infimum and the supremum of the possible option prices are equal to the intrinsic value of the option and to the current price of the stock, respectively, and show that these conditions are satisfied in most of the stochastic volatility models from the financial literature. We also discuss properties of Black–Scholes hedging strategies in stochastic volatility models where the volatility is bounded.