This study provides a comprehensive overview of the use of credit default swaps by U.S. corporate bond funds and analyzes in detail whether certain characteristics of managers, in addition to the fundamentals of a fund, determine how their use these credit derivatives. Results suggest that a...

This study analyzes current regulation with respect to the use of derivatives and leverage by mutual funds in the U.S. and Germany. After presenting a detailed overview of U.S. and German regulations, this study thoroughly compares the level of flexibility funds have in both countries. I find...

Débat du pouvoir et des finalités des marchés financiers et plaide pour une réhabilitation de la politique qui peut constituer un contrepoids.

L'auteur tente de montrer que les menaces réelles liées à la mondialisation peuvent être évitées si la politique économique reconnaît dans le social une composante essentielle de l'efficacité économique.

Pour faire en sorte que le progrès social ne reste pas en panne, la politique doit imposer sa loi aux marchés financiers même si ceux-ci sont indispensables au fonctionnement de l'économie française en aidant à répartir la masse des risques. L'échec de la gauche en France s'explique...

This study analyzes the loss potential arising from investments into CDS for a sample of large U.S. and German mutual funds. Further, it investigates whether the comments funds make on CDS use in periodic fund reports are consistent with the disclosed CDS holdings. For several funds in the U.S.,...

We propose a new method to model hedge fund risk exposures using relatively high frequency conditioning variables. In a large sample of funds, we find substantial evidence that hedge fund risk exposures vary across and within months, and that capturing within-month variation is more important...

We propose a new method to capture changes in hedge funds' exposures to risk factors, exploiting information from relatively high frequency conditioning variables. Using a consolidated database of nearly 15,000 individual hedge funds between 1994 and 2009, we find substantial evidence that hedge...

Private savings for retirement, in the form of pensions, play an important role in most OECD countries. Given the scale of assets managed, these funds constitute a major institutional investor. The aim of this article is to present the financial behaviour of pension funds in these countries. A...

This paper deals with the principal-agent relationships involved by the management of pension funds. The focus is made on private defined benefit pension funds in the US. We first underline the main characteristics of management and financial pension policy. We then identify the principal-agent...