We examine misconduct in credence good markets with price taking experts. We propose a market-level model in which price-taking experts extract surplus based on the value of their firm's brand and their own skill. We test the predictions of the model using sales complaint data for exclusive and...

The spectacular failure of top-rated structured finance products has brought renewed attention to the conflicts of interest of Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs). We model both the CRA conflict of understating credit risk to attract more business, and the issuer conflict of purchasing only the most...

This paper examines the impact of the financial crisis of 2008 on the federal funds market, specifically the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. Rather than a complete collapse of lending in the presence of a market wide shock, we see that banks become more restrictive in which counterparties they...

During the week of August 6, 2007, a number of quantitative long/short equity hedge funds experienced unprecedented losses. It has been hypothesized that a coordinated deleveraging of similarly constructed portfolios caused this temporary dislocation in the market. Using the simulated returns of...

Do financial advisers undo or reinforce the behavioral biases and misconceptions of their clients? We use an audit methodology where trained auditors meet with financial advisers and present different types of portfolios. These portfolios reflect either biases that are in line with the financial...

Quality certification programs help consumers to identify high-quality products or sellers in markets with information asymmetries. Using data from eBay UK's online marketplace, we study how certification's impact on consumer demand varies with market- and seller-level attributes, exploiting...

Experts claim that some Indian drug manufacturers cut corners and make substandard drugs for markets with non-existent, under-developed or emerging regulatory oversight, notably Africa. This paper assesses the quality of 1470 antibiotic and tuberculosis drug samples that claim to be made in...

We analyze the effectiveness of consumer financial regulation by considering the 2009 Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act in the United States. Using a difference-in- differences research design and a unique panel data set covering over 160 million credit card...