Estimating the term structures of corporate debt

This paper investigates the corporate bond market by estimating monthly interest rate term structures for investment grade credit classes using both S&P's and Moody's ratings. Term structures are modeled by a piecewise constant forward rate curve and estimated on noncallable coupon paying bonds issued by industrial firms. The iterative estimation algorithm minimizes the sum of squared errors between market prices and model prices while identifying and removing outliers from the sample. Although the forward rate model is successful at pricing corporate debt, additional factors are found to be significant at explaining the residual price error that remains after the forward rate model is fit to market prices. Six necessary no-arbitrage conditions are derived for the term structures of risky and risk-free debt. Occasionally, some of these no-arbitrage conditions are violated and a few violations are asymptotically statistically significant. Finally, trading strategies that capture mispricing in the corporate debt market and violations of no-arbitrage bounds are discussed.This paper was adapted from my dissertation, completed at Cornell University. An earlier version of this paper was titled The Term Structures of Corporate Debt. Thanks to participants at the Cornell University finance workshop, Warren Bailey, Peter Carr, Antoine Giannetti, and especially Robert Jarrow for their helpful comments.     

谈我国内需不足的成因及对策

内需不足已成为制约我国经济增长的一个重要因素。探索其成因，并制定对策启动消费，对保证我国经济持续康发展有着重要意义。     

美国对华直接投资对中国技术进步和产业竞争力的影响

20世纪90年代以来美国对华投资发展迅速,投资规模不断扩大,在华子公司引进技术的水平也呈不断提高态势。从美国对华投资的特点来看,其主要集中在技术密集型和资本密集型产业。而且,美国对华投资以市场寻求型为主,研发当地化以适应国内市场的需求就成为其必然选择。本文将在简述美国对华投资企业技术特点的基础上,分析其对中国技术进步以及产业竞争力提升的影响,为中国在引资过程中趋利避害提供理论参考。     

A Note on the Theme of Too Many Instruments*

The difference and system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimators are growing in popularity. As implemented in popular software, the estimators easily generate instruments that are numerous and, in system GMM, potentially suspect. A large instrument collection overfits endogenous variables even as it weakens the Hansen test of the instruments’ joint validity. This paper reviews the evidence on the effects of instrument proliferation, and describes and simulates simple ways to control it. It illustrates the dangers by replicating Forbes [American Economic Review (2000) Vol. 90, pp. 869–887] on income inequality and Levine et al. [Journal of Monetary Economics] (2000) Vol. 46, pp. 31–77] on financial sector development. Results in both papers appear driven by previously undetected endogeneity.     

Ownership concentration and corporate governance practices: substitution or expropriation effects?

The objective of this study is to analyze the relation between ownership concentration and corporate governance practices of a group of Canadian companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange. We rely on the corporate governance index developed by the Report on Business (ROB) in 2002. Our empirical results are consistent with the expropriation effect argument that predicts a negative relation between deviation from the one share‐one vote rule and corporate governance best practices. In this context, the dominant shareholder has incentives to maintain weak internal controls in order to facilitate expropriation. In addition, consistent with prior research, our results give partial support to the substitution effect argument by showing a negative impact of ownership concentration on the board composition subindex. Copyright © 2007 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

加入“WTO”后我国银行的竞争力分析

我国金融业的对外开放,从实质来讲是一个自觉地引入外部竞争者、主动出让市场份额的渐进过程。加入WTO后,我国的国有商业银行与外资银行的竞争将更加激烈。文章简要论述了如何增强国有商业银行的竞争力。     

无人机通信总线应用系统的研究

本文介绍了我国无人机的发展现状,对几种总线标准进行了比较,最终选择了1553B总线,对无人机通信系统进行了规划,并设计了一套地面测试系统,给出了系统的软硬件实现方法。     

The sufficiency strategy: Would rich-world frugality lower environmental impact?

One alleged weapon against unsustainable environmental impact is for the wealthy to consume less. This sufficiency strategy is to complement the efficiency strategy of lowering ratios of resource inputs to economic outputs; the former would reduce the affluence factor in I = PAT, the latter the technology factor. That the latter strategy suffers from a consumption rebound is widely recognized. This paper identifies a similar rebound when the affluence factor is autonomously lowered: The lower initial demand lowers prices, which in turn stimulates new demand by others. The strategy moreover addresses only the rich, raising questions of its theoretical maximum efficacy. Its proponents usually conflate frugality with the North-South dichotomy and intragenerational with intergenerational equity. Moreover, there are difficulties with the supporting arguments that frugality is good for one’s own sake as well as for the environment, and that the rich should ‘lead the way’ to living more lightly. Personal behaviour change is furthermore not a substitute for international political efforts. Finally, since all changes in right-side factors of the I = PAT equation change other right-side factors, such indirect attacks on impact should be abandoned in favor of supply and emissions quotas.     

加快地勘单位企业化经营的基本思路

本文对地勘队伍属地化后,如何加快企业化经营进程,结合山东省地勘局的实际做法提出了基本思路.