School-feeding is an important intervention to attract children to school and augment their learning. The benefits of school-feeding cover several domains. Key to the overall assessment of these benefits is understanding how different implementation models compare to each other and to other...

This paper examines whether urban leverage, defined by the bank loan-to-deposit ratio in a city, affects housing prices in China. Using a panel dataset of 236 cities and hedonic models, we find a depressing effect of urban leverage on housing price in first- and second-tier cities while leaving...

In this study, we compare the adjustments of credit ratings by an investor-paid credit rating agency (CRA), represented by Egan-Jones Ratings Company, and an issuer-paid CRA, represented by Moody’s Investors Service, vis-à-vis conflict of interest and reputation. A novel distribution dynamics...

With the daily and minutely data of the German DAX and Chinese indices, we investigate how the return-volatility correlation originates in financial dynamics. Based on a retarded volatility model, we may eliminate or generate the return-volatility correlation of the time series, while other...

To investigate the universal structure of interactions in financial dynamics, we analyze the cross-correlation matrix C of price returns of the Chinese stock market, in comparison with those of the American and Indian stock markets. As an important emerging market, the Chinese market exhibits...

In this study, we develop and empirically test a valuation model for a commonly encountered option in office leases: a tenant's option to renew at future market rent (a fair market value) with lease termination as the maturity date. The model integrates decision analysis with real options...

This article investigates whether changes in oceanographic conditions can be filtered out to measure their effect of the overall safety level of ships. The article is based on a unique dataset of 3.2 million observations from 20,729 individual vessels for the time period 1979 to 2007 in the...