A "sunspot" is a variable that has no direct impact on the economy’s fundamental condition, such as preferences, endowments or technologies, but may nonetheless affect economic outcomes through the expectations channel as a coordination device. This paper investigates how people react to sunspots in the context of a bank-run game in a controlled laboratory environment.
This paper examines the impact of product market competition and corporate governance on the cost of debt financing and the use of bond covenants. We find that more anti-takeover provisions are associated with a lower cost of debt only in competitive industries.
The end result of major sporting events has been shown to affect next-day stock returns through shifts in investor mood. By studying the soccer matches that led to the elimination of France and Italy from the 2010 FIFA World Cup, we show that mood-related pricing effects can materialize as sporting events unfold.
This paper deals with the estimation of the risk-return trade-off. We use a MIDAS model for the conditional variance and allow for possible switches in the risk-return relation through a Markov-switching specification.
This paper proposes new measures of the integrated variance, measures which use high-frequency bid-ask spreads and quoted depths. The traditional approach assumes that the mid-quote is a good measure of frictionless price.
This paper explores the volatility forecasting implications of a model in which the friction in high-frequency prices is related to the true underlying volatility. The contribution of this paper is to propose a framework under which the realized variance may improve volatility forecasting if the noise variance is related to the true return volatility.
We present CoMargin, a new methodology to estimate collateral requirements for central counterparties (CCPs) in derivatives markets. CoMargin depends on both the tail risk of a given market participant and its interdependence with other participants.
Changes in technology and regulation have resulted in an increasing number of trading venues in equity markets in Canada. New trading platforms have intensified price competition and have encouraged innovation, and they do not appear to have segmented trade. But the increasingly complex market structure has necessitated investments in expensive technology and has introduced new operational risks. Regulatory responses should be carefully adapted to retain the competition and innovation associated with this market fragmentation.
A large body of empirical literature investigates differences in financing structures across firms. Private firms’ financing receives little attention due to the lack of data.