This paper compares two well-known approaches for valuing a risky investment using real options theory: contingent claims (CC) with risk neutral valuation and dynamic programming (DP) using a constant risk adjusted discount rate. Both approaches have been used in valuing forest assets. A proof...

Volatility clustering is a well-known stylized feature of financial asset returns. In this paper, we investigate the asymmetric pattern of volatility clustering on both the stock and foreign exchange rate markets. To this end, we employ copula-based semi-parametric univariate time-series models...

This paper investigates whether convenience yield is an important factor in determining optimal decisions for a forestry investment. The Kalman filter method is used to estimate three different models of lumber prices: a mean reverting model, a simple geometric Brownian motion and the two-factor...

Selecting an estimator for the variance covariance matrix is an important step in hypothesis testing. From less robust to more robust, the available choices include: Eicker/White heteroskedasticity-robust standard errors, Newey and West heteroskedasticity-and-autocorrelation- robust standard...

This paper considers Value at Risk measures constructed under a discrete mixture of normal distribution on the innovations with time-varying volatility, or MN-GARCH, model. We adopt an approach based on the continuous empirical characteristic function to estimate the param eters of the model...

Wage posting models of job search typically assume that firms can commit to paying workers the posted wage. This paper investigates the consequences of relaxing this assumption. Under "downward" commitment firms can commit only to paying at least their advertised wage. We show that wage posting...

This paper develops an e±cient method for estimating the discrete mix- tures of normal family based on the continuous empirical characteristic function (CECF). An iterated estimation procedure based on the closed form objective distance function is proposed to improve the estimation effciency....

This paper extends the stochastic conditional duration model by imposing mixtures of bivariate normal distributions on the innovations of the observation and latent equations of the duration process. This extension allows the model not only to capture the asymmetric behavior of the expected...

I model the dynamic agency relationship underlying prevention. In each period, a principal can transfer resources to an agent that has private information about a problem, which the agent can direct to solving the problem or divert into rents. Problems are persistent and rectifiable: they...

We compare literacy skills and relative wage and employment outcomes of Australian, Canadian, and U.S. immigrants. We find substantially higher immigrant skill levels at the lower end of the distribution in Australia, especially among recent arrivals, but little difference at the top. In...