Spanish Economic Review referees (2003-2004)

Spanish Economic Review referees (2003-2004)

Spanish Economic Review referees (2003-2004)     

Elimination and accumulation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in urban stormwater wet detention ponds

The concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHS) in water and sediments of seven wet detention ponds receiving urban stormwater were investigated. The ponds comprised traditional wet detention ponds with a permanent wet volume and a storage volume as well as ponds that were expanded with sand filters and other means to improve the removal of micropollutants. The concentrations of sigmaPAH in the sediments varied between 6 +/- 5 and 2,222 +/- 603 ng g(-1) dry weight (mean +/- standard deviation), and were highest in the ponds with lower pond volume per catchment area and did not clearly reflect different activities in the catchments. In general, the concentrations of PAHS in the sediments decreased from inlet to outlet, especially in the systems with good conditions for sedimentation such as systems with flow perpendicular sand dikes and extensive submerged vegetation. High molecular weight PAHs were predominant in the sediments indicating the pyrogenic origin of the PAHS. There was no correlation between PAH species concentrations in water or sediments and their hydrophobicity (log K(ow)). PAH concentrations in water fluctuated in response to intensity and frequency of rain events, whereas concentrations in the sediments integrated the pollutant load over time. Pond systems expanded with sand filters and other technologies to enhance removal of micropollutants consistently had concentrations of PAHS in the effluents below the detection level.     

Mutual fund flows and window-dressing

We use a sequential game to analyze an agency problem in the mutual fund industry where a representative fund manager considers window-dressing his portfolio holdings for the purpose of attracting fund flows from a representative investor. The manager is motivated to window-dress to improve the investor's perception of managerial skill which may positively affect fund flows in the next period. However, the investor may suspect window-dressing and thus downgrade perceived managerial skill. The model supports a Bayesian Nash equilibrium where the manager window-dresses only when receiving a low return in the first period and the investor withdraws funds only when observing low returns in both periods. Consequently, we show that window-dressing is a rational behavior even when fund outflows may result.     

Price dynamics in limit order markets

This article presents a one-tick dynamic model of a limit ordermarket. Agents choose to submit a limit order or a market orderdepending on the state of the limit order book. Each traderknows that her order will affect the order placement strategiesof those who follow and the execution probability of her limitorder is endogenous. All traders take this into account which,in equilibrium, generates systematic patterns in transactionprices and order placement strategies even with no asymmetricinformation.     

Danish guidelines for small-scale constructed wetland systems for onsite treatment of domestic sewage.

The Danish Ministry of Environment and Energy has passed new legislation that requires the wastewater from single houses and dwellings in rural areas to be treated adequately before discharge into the aquatic environment. Therefore official guidelines for a number of onsite treatment solutions have been produced. These include guidelines for soakaways, biological sand filters, technical systems as well as different types of constructed wetland systems. This paper summarises briefly the guidelines for horizontal flow constructed wetlands, vertical flow constructed wetlands, and willow systems with no outflow and with soil infiltration. There is still a lack of a compact onsite solution that will fulfil the treatment classes demanding 90% removal of phosphorus. Therefore work is presently being carried out to identify simpler and robust P-removal solutions.     

TRADE LIBERALIZATION AND GROWTH: Evidence from Mexican Cities

Applying the most recent methodology for explaining economic growth differences across countries (Barro, 1997), education, learning by doing, infrastructure, and knowledge spillovers due to specialization have been considered relevant in explaining productivity growth differences in Mexican urban manufacturing (de León, 1999). In this article, I evaluated whether there is a significant change in the relevance of these variables under trade liberalization. In particular, I evaluated the hypothesis that trade liberalization would promote productivity growth in the northern cities as result of the dynamic effect of trade given that these cities are close to the new central market for Mexican manufacturing and the loss of relevance in the previous accumulated growth factors (Livas and Krugman, 1992; Hanson, 1994). In contrast to that hypothesis, I observed that urban manufacturing close to the United States did not show a better performance than the rest of the cities as expected and that accumulated growth factors, such as education, learning by doing, and infrastructure are still relevant in explaining productivity growth across urban manufacturing in Mexico.     

Explaining Differences in Milk Quota Values: The Role of Economic Efficiency

This article explores the relationship between milk quota values and economic efficiency in order to analyze government interventions in quota allocations among producers. For this purpose, we estimate quota values using a panel of Spanish dairy farms. Quota values are then decomposed into economic efficiency, price, and scale effects in order to assess the relative influence of these factors. We find that efficiency is important in explaining quota values but is uncorrelated with observable farm characteristics. This casts doubts on the government's ability to allocate quotas to efficient farms.     

The Return Performance of Cubic Market Model: An Application to Emerging Markets

This article studies the performance of the high-order moment capital asset pricing model (CAPM) market models in emerging markets. We apply the cubic market model (4-moment CAPM) to 16 emerging market stock indices ranging from January 2010 to September 2015. Performance of the model is evaluated through the Fama and MacBeth’s two-step regression and through different corrections proposed in the literature, as well as generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation. According to Fama–MacBeth’s procedure, CAPM, the quadratic and cubic market models seem to be insignificant for the analyzed sample; however, the GMM estimation shows that quadratic model is valid for Indian, Polish, and Thai country indices, whereas cubic market model is accurate for Indian country index.