An important literature has pointed out the coordination problems faced by the agents, in particular the financial one when they have to manage risk and their portfolio. If we follow Kaldor and its definition of speculation, then we could point out that in this case agents are short term...

Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is a linear programming based method for evaluating performance of comparable production units such as firms. Although the method is already extensively applied in many areas of economics, its use in environmental economics and related fields remains limited. The...

Many performance measures, such as the classic Sharpe ratio have difficulty in evaluating the performance of mutual funds with skewed return distributions. Common causes for skewness are the use of options in the portfolio or superior market timing skills of the portfolio manager. In this...

The Commitment to Development Index of the Center for Global Development rates 21 rich countries on the “development-friendliness” of their policies. It is revised and updated annually. In the 2004 edition, the component on foreign assistance combines quantitative and qualitative measures of...