The cross-sectional average of pairwise correlations across stocks traded on the NYSE, AMEX, and Nasdaq is a powerful predictor of U.S. economic activity at a horizon of one to four years. Its predictive ability is on a par with the slope of the yield curve and significantly exceeds that of some...

This paper evaluates the profitability of applying four different volatility forecasting models to the trading of straddles on the German stock market index DAX. Special care has been taken to use simultaneous intra-day prices and realistic transaction costs. Furthermore, straddle positions were...

We estimate forward-looking interest rate reaction functions in the spirit of Taylor (1993) for four major central banks augmented by implicit volatilities of stock market indices to proxy financial market stress. Our results suggest that the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve Bank and the...

Using a unique data set that contains the complete ownership structure of the German stock market, we study the momentum and contrarian trading of different investor groups. Foreign investors and financial institutions, and especially mutual funds, are momentum traders, whereas private...

Using a unique survey dataset, I study how financial market experts form their stock market expectations. I document a strong disagreement among experts about how important macroeconomic and financial variables are related to stock returns. The results of an analysis of the relationships between...

Using a unique survey dataset, the author studies how financial market experts form their stock market expectations. He documents a strong disagreement among experts about how important macroeconomic and financial variables are related to stock returns. The results of an analysis of the...

This paper investigates the dynamic linkages in terms of the first and second moments between stock and bond returns, within a wide range of advanced economies, over the different phases of the recent financial crisis. The adopted empirical framework is a bivariate volatility model, where...