Adverse Selection and Competing Deposit Insurance Systems in Pre-Depression Texas

In 1910, Texas instituted a unique deposit insurance program for its state chartered banks by providing a choice between two separate plans: the depositors guaranty fund, similar to insurance schemes in several other states, and the depositors bond security system, which required the procurement of a privately issued guarantee of indemnity. While, under most deposit insurance schemes, the incentive to monitor the financial condition of individual banks simply devolves from depositors to regulators, the bond security system established in Texas distinguished itself by attempting to reintroduce market discipline through the indemnity requirement. Using a probit model with heteroscedasticity, we find evidence that the choice of insurance coverage led to risk-sorting among the banks, with relatively conservative and financially secure institutions opting for the comparatively rigorous bond security system. In addition, the bank failure record indicates the risk differentials between banks in the two plans persisted over time and even possibly grew, suggesting the bond security system at least partially avoided the moral hazard incentives associated with the fixed-rate depositors guaranty plan. These findings support the general view that market discipline is effective in banking.     

The Innovation Potential and Thematic Leadership of Austrian Industries: An Interpretation of the Technology Delphi with Regard to the Old Structures/High-performance Paradox

The Austrian Technology Delphi searched for problem-oriented fieldsof potential leadership of Austrian scientists and firms. This study classifies the Delphi results according to standard industry classifications in order to facilitate their use by industrial economists and to propose an explanation of the old structures/high performance paradox. It reveals that expertsawarded the top marks for innovativeness to low- and high-qualification as well as to mainstream and research intensive industries, not to medium qualification and to marketing and labour-intensive ones. This implies that innovation is by no means restricted to high-tech industries and that the standard industry classifications are not well suited to deal with aspects of technology policy. Old structures need not hinder high performance.     

Terminal Value,Accounting Numbers,and Inflation

In a 2008 article published in this journal, Michael Bradley and Gregg Jarrell argue that the well‐known Gordon‐Shapiro (henceforth “GS”) model for calculating terminal values does not properly account for the effects of inflation. Bradley and Jarrell suggest modifying the growth factor in the standard GS model by adding an additional term to the nominal growth rate that reflects the positive effect of inflation on the value of existing assets. In this article, the authors support the original Gordon‐Shapiro method for calculating terminal values by showing what they believe to be an oversight of the Bradley‐Jarrell critique. According to the authors, the disagreement stems from the use of fundamentally different assumptions about the effect of inflation on the capital investment required to sustain a business. Although Bradley‐Jarrell agree with the authors that intrinsic value is the discounted value of future free cash flows, their assumptions about capital investment effectively lead them to conclusions similar to those practitioners who attempt to value companies on the basis of discounted future accounting earnings. Despite much common practice, the GS model was meant to be applied to free cash flows, not accounting earnings. And for companies with substantial capital investment, the differences between accounting earnings that involve accruals and free cash flows can be very large.     

China and Its Dollar Exchange Rate: A Worldwide Stabilising Influence?1

China is criticised for keeping its dollar exchange rate fairly stable when it has a large trade (saving) surplus. This criticism is misplaced in two ways. First, no predictable link exists between the exchange rate and the trade balance of an international creditor economy. Second, since 1995, the stable yuan/dollar rate has anchored China’s price level and facilitated counter cyclical fiscal policies that have smoothed its high real GDP growth at a remarkable 9 to 11 per cent per year. With its now greater GDP, China displaces Japan as the largest economy in East Asia – but with a much stronger stabilising influence on East Asian neighbours from its higher economic growth and more stable dollar exchange rate. Now, an ever larger China is an essential stabiliser for the world economy – as exemplified by its prompt and effective fiscal response to the global credit crunch of 2008–09. However, cumulating financial distortions – in China and the United States – threaten to undermine China’s growth and its stabilising influence on the rest of the world.     

Strukturelle Verzerrungen im Währungskrieg

Die chinesische W?hrungspolitik steht weltweit in der Kritik. Die Dollarbindung des Yuan hat sich jedoch als Stabilit?tsanker für die ostasiatische Region bew?hrt. Der globale Handel profi tiert von der stabilen Wirtschaftsentwicklung in dieser Region. Allerdings führt das Festhalten an einem real unterbewerteten Yuan zu Verzerrungen der Wirtschaftsstruktur bei China und seinen Handelspartnern.     

Macroeconomic Policy Making,Exchange Rate Adjustment and Current Account Imbalances in Emerging Markets

Given a series of crisis events after 2007 the discussion about the adjustment channels of current account imbalances has been revived. We examine the role of exchange rates vs macroeconomic policies as determinants of current accounts for a set of 86 mainly emerging market economies between 1990 and 2013 to identify adjustment channels for global imbalances. We find that nominal exchange rates are not the main determinant of current account positions. Instead, depending on the region, monetary and/or fiscal policies are identified as the main driving force of current accounts. For East Asia and the oil exporting countries sterilization policies, i.e. relatively tight monetary policies, are the main determinants. In contrast for many European periphery countries fiscal policy stances are at the core of current account positions. Only for the Latin American countries does the exchange rate play a significant role as determinant of current account positions.     

The US Dollar and the Euro as International Currencies

For many decades the US dollar has remained unchallenged as the world’s dominant international currency. What is behind its persistent pre-eminence in the international monetary system and can this be expected to last? Could the euro rival or even surpass the dollar as the leading currency? If it did, what would be the consequences for Euroland?      

The wisdom of deliberate mistakes

Before the breakup of the Bell System, U.S. telephone companies were permitted by law to ask for security deposits from a small percentage of subscribers. The companies used statistical models to decide which customers were most likely to pay their bills late and thus should be charged a deposit, but no one knew whether the models were right. So the Bell companies made a deliberate mistake. They asked for no deposit from nearly 100,000 new customers randomly selected from among those who were considered high risks. Surprisingly, quite a few paid their bills on time. As a result, the companies instituted a smarter screening strategy, which added millions to the Bell System's bottom line. Usually, individuals and organizations go to great lengths to avoid errors. Companies are designed for optimum performance rather than for learning, and mistakes are seen as defects. But as the Bell System example shows, making mistakes--correctly--is a powerful way to accelerate learning and increase competitiveness. If one of a company's fundamental assumptions is wrong, the firm can achieve success more quickly by deliberately making errors than by considering only data that support the assumption. Moreover, executives who apply a conventional, systematic approach to solving a pattern recognition problem are often slower to find a solution than those who test their assumptions by knowingly making mistakes. How do you distinguish between smart mistakes and dumb ones? The authors' consulting firm has developed, and currently uses, a five-step process for identifying constructive mistakes. In one test, the firm assumed that a mistake it was planning to make would cost a significant amount of money, but the opposite happened. By turning assumptions on their heads, the firm created more than dollar 1 million in new business.