We decompose the squared VIX index, derived from US S&P500 options prices, into the conditional variance of stock returns and the equity variance premium. The latter is increasing in risk aversion in a wide variety of economic settings. We tackle several measurement issues assessing a plethora...

Lustig and Verdelhan (2007) argue that the excess returns to borrowing US dollars and lending in foreign currency "compensate US investors for taking on more US consumption growth risk," yet the stochastic discount factor corresponding to their benchmark model is approximately uncorrelated with...

The equity variance risk premium is the expected compensation earned for selling variance risk in equity markets. The variance risk premium is positive and shows moderate persistence. High variance risk premiums coincide with the left tail of the consumption growth distribution shifting down....

The hypothesis that the forward rate is an unbiased predictor of the future spot rate has been consistently rejected in recent empirical studies. This paper examines several sources of measurement error and misspecification that might induce biases in such studies. Although previous inferences...

We identify the relative importance of changes in the conditional variance of fundamentals (which we call "uncertainty") and changes in risk aversion ("risk" for short) in the determination of the term structure, equity prices and risk premiums. Theoretically, we introduce persistent...

We analyze a general equilibrium exchange economy with a continuum of agents who have 'catching up with the Joneses' preferences and differ only with respect to the curvature of their utility functions. While individual risk aversion does not change over time, dynamic redistribution of wealth...