Abel (2002) proposes a resolution of the riskfree rate and the equity premium puzzles by considering pessimism and doubt. Pessimism is characterized by subjective probabilistic beliefs about consumption growth rates that are stochastically dominated by the objective distribution. The subjective...

We analyze why formal credit, informal credit, and both types of credits coexist as consumer choices. We construct a model in which the households pay a fixed cost to access each type of market and face a market particular interest rate. The model induces a cost curve that defines an optimal,...

In this paper we study Norwegian rights issues with focus on the announcement effects of raising seasoned equity. The abnormal returns at announcement in Norway are around −8% to −10% for rights issues, and this is much higher than what is found in other countries. The average...

This study gives first evidence on the consequences of the introduction of a transaction tax in Italian financial markets in 2013. We discuss the consequences of this tax on trading volume, volatility, and trading costs of FTSE MIB stocks. The structure of the tax introduction gives us the...

The Ali (2013, EB) findings on the nexuses among institutions, finance and investment could have an important influence on policy and academic debates. This paper relaxes his hypotheses on the conception, definition and measurement of finance and institutions because they are less realistic to...

Why are women financially excluded? Is there an association between women empowerment laws, prevalence of discriminatory attitudes in a society towards women and financial empowerment of women? Using a cross-country survey, this paper finds statistical evidence that suggests women are...

This paper generalizes a costly state verification model à la Townsend (1979) along two dimensions: 1) diversity of opinion and 2) endogenous formation of a financial intermediary, modeled as a multi-lender coalition. Main results are 1) lenders forming the coalition are neither too optimistic...

In the financial crisis literature, it is usually argued that, contrary to the case of currency crises, construction of a time series index to identify banking crisis episodes is highly difficult, particularly because of the lack of reliable data on banking sector variables such as the level of...

This paper examines the interaction between financial development and economic growth of the Economic Community Of West African States (ECOWAS) and West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) using non-stationary panel data methodology and a panel cointegration approach. We estimate a...

Using proprietary audit trail transaction data compiled by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, we investigate, at the individual trader level, (1) the timing and (2) the determinants of dual traders' personal trades. Our analysis reveals an absence of any trade timing by dual traders in...