We investigate how trading frictions in asset markets affect portfolio choices, asset prices and efficiency. We generalize the search-theoretic model of financial intermediation of Duffie, Gârleanu and Pedersen (2005) to allow for more general preferences and idiosyncratic shock structure,...

This paper studies the effects of anticipated inflation on aggregate output and welfare within a search-theoretic framework. We allow money-holders to choose the intensities with which they search for trading partners, so inflation affects the frequency of trade as well as the quantity of output...

We construct a model where capital competes with fiat money as a medium of exchange, and we establish conditions on fundamentals under which fiat money can be both valued and socially beneficial. When the socially efficient stock of capital is too low to provide the liquidity agents need, they...

We develop a search-theoretic model of financial intermediation and use it to study how trading frictions affect the distribution of asset holdings, asset prices, efficiency, and standard measures of liquidity. A distinctive feature of our theory is that it allows for unrestricted asset...

We use minute-by-minute daily transaction-level payments data to document the cross-sectional and time-series behavior of the estimated prices and quantities negotiated by commercial banks in the fed funds market. We study the frequency and volume of trade, the size distribution of loans, the...

We develop a model of the market for federal funds that explicitly accounts for its two distinctive features: banks have to search for a suitable counterparty, and once they meet, both parties negotiate the size of the loan and the repayment. The theory is used to answer a number of positive and...

I develop an asset-pricing model in which financial assets are valued for their liquidity - the extent to which they are useful in facilitating exchange - as well as for being claims to streams of consumption goods. The implications for average asset returns, the equity-premium puzzle and the...

This paper proposes an aggregative model of Total Factor Productivity (TFP) in the spirit of Houthakker (1955-1956). It considers a frictional labor market where production units are subject to idiosyncratic shocks and jobs are created and destroyed as in Mortensen and Pissarides (1994). An...

Search-theoretic models of monetary exchange are based on explicit descriptions of the frictions that make money essential. However, tractable versions of these models typically need strong assumptions that make them ill-suited for studying monetary policy. We propose a framework based on...

A distinction is drawn between outside money - money that is either of a fiat nature or backed by some asset that is not in zero net supply within the private sector - and inside money, which is an asset backed by any form of private credit that circulates as a medium of exchange.