Price distortion induced by a flawed stock market index

Despite the introduction of sophisticated stock market indices, investors often trade portfolios of the flawed indices to change their exposure to the market. In this study, we show that these transactions cause significant mispricing in individual stocks, especially during periods of significant market movement. As an influential, albeit flawed, stock index, we focus on the Nikkei 225. We find index constituents that are excessively weighted on the index, experience buying (selling) pressure when the stock market surges (falls), and experience price corrections after such periods of change. In contrast, non-constituent stocks do not experience such trading pressure.     

Error correction exchange rate modeling: Evidence for Mexico

A set of error correction models are proposed for the nominal exchange rate between the Mexican peso and the United States dollar. The basic theoretical frameworks utilize balance of payments and monetary constructs. Empirical estimation results are fairly weak for both specifications irrespective of the interest rate variable selected. Although dynamic simulation properties of the equations are acceptable, in no case do they generate levels of accuracy that exceed those associated with a random walk. Partial funding support for this research was provided by El Paso Electric Company, the Fulbright Council for International Exchange of Scholars, the Center for Inter American and Border Studies at the University of Texas at El Paso, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Econometric research assistance was provided by David Torres and Roberto Tinajero. Helpful comments were provided by two anonymous referees, Joachim Zietz, Luis Berrnardo Torres, and participants at the 2001 American Statistical Association meetings in Atlanta.     

The Fable of the Keiretsu

Central to so many accounts of post-war Japan, the keiretsu corporate groups lacked economic substance from the start. Conceived by Marxists committed to locating "domination" by "monopoly capital," they found an early audience among western scholars searching for evidence of culture-specific group behavior in Japan. By the 1990s, they had moved into mainstream economic studies, and keiretsu dummies appeared in virtually all econometric regressions of Japanese industrial or financial structure. Yet the keiretsu began as a figment of the academic imagination, and they remain that today. Regardless of the keiretsu definition used, cross-shareholdings within the "groups" were trivial, even during the years when keiretsu ties were supposedly strongest. Neither does membership proxy for "main bank" ties. Econometric studies basing "keiretsu dummies" on the available rosters produce predictably haphazard and unstable results. In the end, the only reliably robust results are the artifacts of the sample biases created by the definitions themselves.     

Does Ownership Matter? Evidence from the Zaibatsu Dissolution Program

In 1985, Demsetz and Lehn argued both that the optimal corporate ownership structure was firm-specific, and that market competition would drive firms toward that optimum. Because ownership was endogenous to expected performance, any regression of profitability on ownership patterns would yield insignificant results. To test this hypothesis, we use the zaibatsu dissolution program from late-1940s Japan as a natural experiment: an exogenous shock to the equilibrium ownership structure. Through that program, the US-run occupation removed the more prominent shareholders from many of the most successful Japanese companies. By focusing on the way firms and investors responded to the mandated selloff, we accomplish two goals: (a) we avoid the endogeneity problem that has plagued much of the other research on the subject, and (b) we clarify the equilibrating dynamics by which competitive markets move firms toward their optimal ownership structure. With a sample of 637 Japanese firms for 1953 and 710 for 1958, we confirm the equilibrating mechanism behind the Demsetz-Lehn hypothesis: between 1953 and 1958, the ex-zaibatsu firms did retructure their ownership patterns. As of 1953, the unlisted ex-zaibatsu and new firms still had not been able to negotiate the transactions necessary to approach their profit-maximizing ownership structures. Even the listed firms had not fully undone the effect of the occupation-induced changes on managerial practices. By 1958 the firms had done this, and the earlier correlation between profitability and ownership disappeared. By then, firm profitability showed no correlation with ownership, whether under linear, quadratic, or piecewise specifications. We further find no evidence that ex-zaibatsu firms sought to strengthen their ties to banks over 1953–1958.     

Welfare Effects of Endogenous Information Acquisition and Disclosure in Duopoly Markets

Abstract

This paper investigates the interaction between firms' information acquisition decisions and disclosure of internally acquired information in a Cournot duopoly market under demand uncertainty. The main results are as follows. When the correlation between firms' demands is positive and sufficiently high, disclosure of information on demand uncertainty can enhance social welfare, given that the quality of firms' private information is constant. However, in the setting where firms' private information is endogenously determined, mandatory disclosure is not always desirable. This is because, when disclosure is mandated, firms acquire less precise information compared with the case where the acquired information is not disclosed; hence, their internal information environments are deteriorated. This can lead to unintended consequences such that disclosure regulation decreases social welfare.     

Slow price reactions to analysts’ recommendation revisions

This study explores the reasons for the slow price reactions to analysts’ recommendation revisions. We predict that analysts’ recommendation revisions contain earnings-related information that is not incorporated in analysts’ earnings forecasts and that the slow price reaction is attributable to a gradual incorporation of this earnings-related information into stock prices. We find that, consistent with our prediction, stocks with recommendation upgrades subsequently experience more upward earnings forecast revisions than stocks with recommendation downgrades, and that the differences in subsequent stock returns between upgraded and downgraded stocks is attributable to differences between subsequent earnings forecast (especially, FY2 earnings forecast) revisions.     

Japanese industrial finance at the close of the 19th century: Trade credit and financial intermediation

In a series of recent studies, several economic historians (most prominently Richard Sylla) argue that successful economies experience “financial revolutions” before undergoing rapid growth. In the U.S., they suggest Hamilton masterminded the financial revolution by putting the public finance in order and facilitating private banks. Might Matsukata, they continue, have done the same in Japan? Japan did indeed experience a financial revolution in the late 19th century. Matsukata, however, did not mastermind the revolution in advance of private-sector demand. Instead, private investors created much of the financial infrastructure in response to demand from industrial firms. What is more, most firms (at least in the pivotal silk industry) raised the funds they needed through trade credit rather than securities markets or banks.     

The prospect of online communication in the event of a disaster

In modern society, enormous amounts of information are instantly exchanged, and topics shift rapidly. People desire and share information to foster a sense of membership in their societies. The trend of Internet communication is present in many types of groups. During the circumstances of disasters, the 2011 Great East Japan earthquake and Tsunami and Typhoon Haiyan (local name, Yolanda) in the Philippines in 2013, social networking services (SNS) constituted a considerably effective method for sharing/exchanging information about the significance of the disaster, confirming family members’ and friends’ whereabouts, locating shelters, relief, food and goods rationing, and so on. Not only did individuals seek/provide information, but government agencies also utilized the social media channels to communicate with the public. Hence, developing and adopting communication in a virtual space were considerably effective for decision-makers in providing emergency services. This study examined SNS users’ accounts based on discretionary decisions during two major disasters: the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami in 2011 and Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in 2013. In the case of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami in 2011, government agencies and NPOs actively utilized SNS functions, whereas the mass media distributed information during Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in 2013.     

Cross-selling across stores or within a store? Impacts of cross-buying behavior in online shopping malls

Abstract

This study investigates the impacts of cross-buying behavior in an online shopping mall where customers can purchase from additional product categories from various independent stores. We focus on the extent to which store loyalty and relationship duration moderate the cross-buying effects on three behavioral traits: customers’ purchase rate, lifetime duration, and spending. The results reveal that customers who engage in cross-buying more intensely purchase more frequently, have longer expected lifetime duration, and spend higher amounts in each transaction. The impacts on purchase frequency and customer retention are even greater for customers who exhibit higher behavioral loyalty toward some stores. However, store loyalty is found to weaken the association between cross-buying and average spending. Further, relationship duration appears to weaken the effects of cross-buying on purchase rate and spending. These results provide new insights into the impacts of cross-buying on customer value as well as managerial implications for shopping mall owners.