Although the existing literature of Arbitrage Pricing Theory (APT) on different categories of stock markets is vast, it is non-existent in the case of frontier stock markets (defined as very small capital markets). This paper fills this gap by investigating how APT performs in a frontier stock...

We consider the infinite-horizon optimal portfolio liquidation problem for a von Neumann-Morgenstern investor in the liquidity model of Almgren (2003). Using a stochastic control approach, we characterize the value function and the optimal strategy as classical solutions of nonlinear parabolic...

The financial crisis has revealed fatal institutional and structural deficits at the finance market. Politics has reacted to the financial crisis with a sea of legal bills and regulations. But all regulating efforts are merely system-imminent reparation measures and do not solve the core...

Never has the issue of sovereign credit ratings attracted such an interest by policy and opinion makers, bankers and journalists, or even the public opinion, as witnessed in the last couple of years. In spite of being accused of contributing to the instability of financial markets, credit rating...

We consider the finite-time optimal portfolio liquidation problem for a von Neumann-Morgenstern investor with constant absolute risk aversion (CARA). As underlying market impact model, we use the continuous-time liquidity model of Almgren and Chriss (2000). We show that the expected utility of...

Credit rating agencies play a crucial role in financial markets. There are two competing views regarding their behavior: some argue that they engage in rating inflation, while others suggest that they deflate ratings. This article offers a rationale that reconciles the two opposite arguments. We...

Modeling defaults is critical to risk management as well as pricing debt portfolios and portfolio derivatives. In the recent financial crisis, multi-billion-dollar losses resulted from correlated defaults that were improperly modeled. This paper proposes statistical approximations which are more...

In the 1990s, companies collected billions in premiums from peculiarly structured put options written on their own stock while almost all of these puts expired worthless. Buyers of these options, primarily �nancial intermediaries, lost money as a result. Although these losses might seem...

Portfolio traders may split large orders into smaller orders scheduled over time to reduce price impact. Since handling many orders is cumbersome, these smaller orders are often traded in an automated (“algorithmic”) manner. We propose metrics using these orders to help measure various...

This paper attempts to assess the economic significance and implications of collateralization in different financial markets, which is essentially a matter of theoretical justification and empirical verification. We present a comprehensive theoretical framework that allows for collateralization...