An Analysis of the Stability and Growth Pact

We use a stylised model to analyse the Stability and Growth Pact for countries that have formed the European Monetary Union (EMU). In our model, shortsighted governments fail to internalise the consequences of their debt policies for the common inflation rate fully. Therefore, while governments have no incentive to sign a stability pact in the absence of a monetary union, they do so with monetary union to restrain this externality. With uncertainty, a monetary union combined with an appropriately designed pact will be strictly preferred to autonomy. With differences in initial conditions, conflicts of interest arise. We study the Nash bargaining solution.     

The German economy in the Autumn of 1993

The German economy in the Autumn of 1993     

A law of large numbers for large economies

Summary LetX(i),i[0; 1] be a collection of identically distributed and pairwise uncorrelated random variables with common finite mean and variance ². This paper shows the law of large numbers, i.e. the fact that ₀ ¹ X(i)di=. It does so by interpreting the integral as a Pettis-integral. Studying Riemann sums, the paper first provides a simple proof involving no more than the calculation of variances, and demonstrates, that the measurability problem pointed out by Judd (1985) is avoided by requiring convergence in mean square rather than convergence almost everywhere. We raise the issue of when a random continuum economy is a good abstraction for a large finite economy and give an example in which it is not.I am indebted to Hugo Hopenhayn. Furthermore I would like to thank Dilip Abreu, Glenn Donaldson, Ed Green, Ramon Marimon, Nabil Al-Najjar, Victor Rios-Rull, Timothy van Zandt and the editor for useful comments. The first version of this paper was written in 1987.     

A model of a systemic bank run

This paper provides a model of the view that the 2008 financial crisis is reminiscent of a bank run, focussing on six stylized key features. In particular, core financial institutions have invested their funds in asset-backed securities rather than committed to long-term projects: in distress, these can potentially be sold to a large pool of outside investors at steep discounts. I consider two different motives for outside investors and their interaction with banks trading asset-backed securities: uncertainty aversion versus adverse selection. I shall argue that the version with uncertainty averse investors is more consistent with the stylized facts than the adverse selection perspective: in the former, the crisis deepens, the larger the market share of distressed core banks, while a run becomes less likely instead as a result in the adverse selection version. Therefore, the outright purchase of troubled assets by the government at prices above current market prices may both alleviate the financial crises as well as provide tax payers with returns above those for safe securities.     

Cultural heritage and destination management in the Mediterranean

The challenge for destination management and marketing based on cultural tourism becomes obvious with the example of the Mediterranean region. This area especially is abounding with different expressions of cultural heritage, with special consideration of architectural heritage. Nevertheless, it is difficult to open this cultural heritage in a way to satisfy the customers' expectations on the one hand, and on the other hand to facilitate cooperation between individual countries of the Mediterranean region, which are hindered by broad variations and strong local or regional identities. The article shows the necessity for professional integration of culture‐touristic products and services in the framework of destination management, taking into consideration the various levels of responsibility and identity on a national, regional, and local level, in order to create a basis for cooperation in the Mediterranean region. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Location Matters: An Examination of Trading Profits

The electronic trading system Xetra of the German Security Exchange provides a unique data source on the equity trades of 756 professional traders located in 23 different cities and eight European countries. We explore informational asymmetries across the trader population: Traders located outside Germany in non-German-speaking cities show lower proprietary trading profit. Their underperformance is not only statistically significant, it is also of economically significant magnitude and occurs for the 11 largest German blue-chip stocks. We also examine whether a trader location in Frankfurt as the financial center, or local proximity of the trader to the corporate headquarters of the traded stock, or affiliation with a large financial institution results in superior trading performance. The data provide no evidence for a financial center advantage or of increasing institutional scale economies in proprietary trading. However, we find evidence for an information advantage due to corporate headquarters proximity for high-frequency (intraday) trading.     

Management buy-outs as an instrument of privatization in Eastern Europe

Privatizing government enterprises is one of the most difficult tasks in the transformation process taking place in the former socialist economies. What contribution do management buy-outs have to make in coping with that task?     

Growth Effects of Economic Integration: Evidence from the EU Member States

After compiling an index of economic integration that accounts for global (GATT) as well as regional (European) integration of the EU member states we test for permanent and temporary growth effects in a growth accounting framework, using a panel of fifteen EU member states over the period 1950–2000. While the hypothesis of permanent growth effects is rejected, the results—though not completely robust to controlling for time-specific effects—suggest sizeable level effects: GDP per capita of the EU would be approximately one-fifth lower today if no integration had taken place since 1950. JEL no. C33, F15, F43, O52