Portfolio Choice in the Presence of Non-Tradable Income: An Experimental Analysis

Abstract. This paper reports the results of an experiment on portfolio choice in the presence of non-tradable income. The non-tradable income part could either be riskless or risky (background risk). In many cases, we observe behavior that is qualitatively consistent with the predictions of normative theory. However, correlations between financial and non-tradable wealth are neglected. The computation of aggregated risk profiles helps subjects to partly overcome the deviations from normative theory due to neglect of correlations.     

Portfolio Choice for Increases in Risk and Prudence Revisited

This paper proposes the concept of a ``simple increase in risk across r in the K-L-L-S sense' (sIR_K (r)) for the subset of K-L-L-S increases in risk defined by Kroll, Leshno, Levy, and Spector (1995; called K-L-L-S) that extends the Rothschild-Stiglitz definition of risk to a larger set of cumulative distribution functions that could not be classified as more risky before. We show that for a risk-averse decision-maker with nonnegative third derivative of the utility function, the demand for the risky asset decreases for a simple increase in risk across r in the K-L-L-S sense in the standard portfolio decision problem.     

Precautionary Saving,Financial Risk,and Portfolio Choice

Relying on a direct question about the desired amount of precautionary wealth from the 2002 wave of the Italian “Survey of Household Income and Wealth,” I assess the main determinants of the precautionary motive for saving, focusing on the role played by financial risk on households' saving decisions. Households that invest mainly in safe assets do not need to protect themselves against future and unexpected financial losses. Consequently, once we control for households' sources of risk beside financial ones, the amount of precautionary savings of a household investing exclusively in safe assets should be lower compared to households who detain a non‐negligible share of risky assets in their portfolio. Results show that, as expected, a strong and negative correlation exists between the desired amount of precautionary wealth and the ownership of a portfolio made exclusively of safe assets.     

资产选择、风险偏好与储蓄存款需求

本文以消费者最优资产选择模型为基础,采用局部均衡分析方法探讨了通货膨胀、股市收益波动、消费者风险偏好对储蓄存款需求的影响。2001年6月以后,通货膨胀方差下降,股市持续下跌,股市收益率下降,收益率方差也有所下降,但货币需求却加速增长。本文根据不同的相对风险回避指数,模拟了利率、通货膨胀、股市收益率、股市收益率方差等因素对2001年6月至2005年9月平均储蓄存款的影响。在适当的相对风险回避指数下,储蓄存款增加的30%左右可以由这些因素解释;如果不考虑GDP等规模变量,股市收益率下降是导致平均货币需求增长的主要因素。     

Portfolio Choice under Uncertain Lifetime

This paper revisits the theory on life cycle savings and portfolio choice under uncertain lifetime emphasizing the role of temporal risk aversion. It provides new insights on the impact of mortality rates on optimal financial strategies. This is of particular interest for the management of pension funds.     

Portfolio Choice and Liquidity Constraints*

We study the infinite‐horizon model of household portfolio choice under liquidity constraints and revisit the portfolio specialization puzzle. We show why the puzzle is robust to several model variations, and argue that positive correlation between earnings shocks and stock returns is unlikely to provide an empirically plausible resolution. We find that relatively small fixed costs for stock market entry are sufficient to deter stockholding because, for a plausible range of parameter values, households can achieve desired consumption smoothing with small or zero holdings of stocks. Such costs could arise from informational considerations, sign‐up fees, and investor inertia.     

健康与家庭资产选择

本文采用中国居民家庭微观调查数据,运用资产参与和资产分配模型,分别讨论健康状况对居民家庭资产配置行为的影响。研究结果表明:投资者的健康状况不显著影响其参与股票市场和风险资产市场的决定,但影响家庭的股票或风险资产在总财富中的比重,健康状况不佳会导致这两个比重较低,在控制了参保情况或时间展望期后这一影响仍然显著;而投资者风险态度和遗赠动机能够一定程度上解释健康风险的影响。     

Portfolio Composition Choice: A Behavioral Approach

This experimental study investigates portfolio composition choice for different types of financial assets and different levels of wealth. For a group of financially sophisticated executive MBA students with work experience in capital markets, the findings of this study indicate that the proportion of wealth invested in risky assets increases with wealth for all portfolio compositions examined, and increases with the degree of asset risk. This proportion is found to be as much as three times higher for common stocks than for options: For stock portfolios, it increases from 33% to 44% over the five wealth levels examined, and for options it increases from 11% to 17%. These results may imply a decreasing rel w proportions of their wealth in risky assets possess the following characteristics: they do not invest in options in real life; they sometimes buy lottery tickets; they assign a higher risk level to options than to common stocks; they are female; and they are employed.     

Risk Pooling in the Presence of Moral Hazard

The size of an insurance pool that minimizes average risk per policy is derived for cases in which moral hazard offsets the benefits of pooling.     

流动性、生命周期与投资组合相异性——中国投资者行为调查实证分析

本文采用Probit和Tobit模型对中国居民的股票市场参与和投资组合的影响因素进行了分析,主要有以下的实证发现:首先,不流动性资产特别是房地产的投资显著影响了投资者的股票市场参与和投资组合,而且影响以“替代”效应或者说“挤出”效应为主。其次,投资者在进行投资组合时极少利用股票市场对其未来现金流所承担的风险进行对冲,也就是说,中国居民投资的“生命周期效应”不明显;第三,中国居民投资的“财富效应”非常显著。财富的增加既增加了居民参与股票市场的概率,也增加了居民参与股票市场的深度。     

考虑基准资产的动态投资组合选取

职业基金经理的目标经常是希望自己的投资组合以稳定的表现能够超越所某一基准资产或组合。因此本文给出一个考虑基准资产的动态均值——方差投资组合选取模型。假设状态之间的转移遵循马氏过程,给定状态转移矩阵,可以得到对风险资产最优投入的解析表达式。此表达式表明对风险资产的投入由三项构成,前两项是不考虑基准资产时对风险资产的投入,最后一项与基准资产有关;在基准资产上的权重由基准资产收益的大小来决定,与积极投资组合管理者的风险厌恶程度无关;随着风险厌恶程度的增加,管理者会减少在风险资产上的投入。数值分析显示考虑基准资产的投资组合是一个积极的投资组合。     

证券投资风险计量理论评述

证券投资是一种高风险高收益的金融投资。自Markowitz创立投资组合理论以来，对证券投资风险计量的研究一直是金融投资研究的热点问题之一。本文对现有计量理论进行评述，并对它们之间的关系进行分析，为证券投资风险计量的进一步研究提供基础。     

省外务工经历与农村家庭金融资产选择

本文运用2015年中国家庭金融调查数据(CHFS),研究了省外务工经历对农村家庭金融资产选择的影响。为避免模型可能存在内生性问题,本文还选取"各省近20年平均城镇失业率"作为工具变量,使用工具变量法进行估计。研究发现:省外务工经历能够显著提高农村家庭参与风险性金融市场的可能性,并且能够提高其风险性金融资产的配置比例;省外务工经历通过增加收入、增长金融知识、增强社会网络来提高农村家庭参与风险性金融市场的可能性和参与程度。据此可以有针对性地引导农村家庭合理配置金融资产,进而使农村居民更好地分享中国资本市场快速发展带来的红利。     

Technology Choice and Saving in the Presence of a Fixed Adoption Cost

This paper explores the relationship between technology choice and saving in the presence of fixed costs of technology adoption. While richer agents adopt the more productive technology immediately it is available, poorer agents optimally choose to wait before switching to the better technology. In the interim, they save more than others and more than in the absence of the prospect of switching to the new technology. The paper thus provides an explanation for the phenomenon that the saving rate and the growth rate of output increase over time in the transition.     

健康冲击对中国老年家庭资产组合选择的影响

利用中国健康与养老追踪调查(CHARLS)数据,研究健康冲击对老年家庭资产组合的影响。把健康冲击分为急性健康冲击和慢性健康冲击两类。遭受急性健康冲击时,老年家庭持有的风险资产减少;遭受慢性健康冲击时,投资于耐用消费性资产的量减少,但拥有房产价值的量增加;健康冲击对城乡老年家庭资产组合的影响不尽相同。     

基于半方差风险计量模型的组合投资分析

通过对马柯维茨的均值-方差模型(the μ-V)和笔者的半方差模型(the ESV)在组合投资中进行对比实证分析,文章廓清了笼罩在均值-方差模型及其风险定义上的迷雾,使半方差模型在组合投资中的突破性指导价值进一步明晰化.     

The Risk and Incentives Trade-off in the Presence of Heterogeneous Managers

Agency theory predicts a negative relationship between risk and incentives, yet recent empirical evidence has not consistently found such a relationship. In fact, some researchers have found a positive relationship. By introducing competition for heterogeneous managers, who differ in their degrees of risk aversion, into a standard agency model, this paper demonstrates that a negative or positive relationship is theoretically possible. Which arises depends on the relative risk aversion parameters of the managers and the absolute and relative riskiness of the environments.Acknowledgement I thank two anonymous referees for helpful comments.