We address the question to what extent a central bank can de-risk its balance sheet by unconventional monetary policy operations. To this end, we propose a novel risk measurement framework to empirically study the time-variation in central bank portfolio credit risks associated with such...

We investigate covariance matrix estimation in vast-dimensional spaces of 1,500 up to 2,000 stocks using fundamental factor models (FFMs). FFMs are the typical benchmark in the asset management industry and depart from the usual statistical factor models and the factor models with observed...

The socio-economic mosaic of urban neighbourhoods changes under the influence of three distinctive distributional processes: reordering of the socio-economic position of urban neighbourhoods; changing levels of inequality between neighbourhoods; and an overall growth or decline in income levels...

The potential relationship between domestic environmental regulation and internationalcompetitiveness has evoked various speculations. The common neoclassical train of thought is thatstrict environmental regulation is detrimental to the competitiveness of industry, and that itinduces phenomena...

Using a limiting approach to portfolio credit risk, we obtain analyticexpressions for the tail behavior of the distribution of credit losses. We showthat in many cases of practical interest the distribution of these losses haspolynomial ('fat') rather than exponential ('thin') tails. Our...

This paper studies how schooling admission tests affect economic performance in an economy where individuals are endowed with both academic and non academic abilities and both abilities matter for labor productivity. We develop a simple model with selective government held schools, where...

We develop a simple search equilibrium model of workplace training and education based on two features. First, investment in education improves job-related learning skills and reduces training costs burdened by firms. Second, firms with vacant skilled job slots can choose between recruitment...

The linear Gaussian state space model for which the common variance istreated as a stochastic time-varying variable is considered for themodelling of economic time series. The focus of this paper is on thesimultaneous estimation of parameters related to the stochasticprocesses of the mean part...

We study the performance of two analytical methods and one simulation method for computing in-sample confidence bounds for time-varying parameters. These in-sample bounds are designed to reflect parameter uncertainty in the associated filter. They are applicable to the complete class of...