In a provocative paper, Galí (2014) showed that a policymaker who raises interest rates to rein in a potential bubble will only make a bubble bigger if one exists. This poses a challenge to advocates of lean-against-the-wind policies that call for raising interest rates to mitigate potential...

The Eurozone is in the midst of a deep crisis. We argue that the attempts to control government deficits and debts using the Stability and Growth Pact have failed. Moreover, austerity policies are inducing downward spirals in terms of growth. Political leaders have promised deeper political,...

Stock returns of domestically listed Chinese firms are lower than that of externally listed firms and listed firms from large developed and emerging countries. The performance gap, measured by net cash flows, between domestically listed and externally listed and matched unlisted Chinese firms,...

At the end of January 2021, a group of stocks listed on US stock exchanges experienced sudden surges in their stock prices, which - coupled with high short interest – led to brief short squeeze episodes. We argue that these short squeezes were the result of coordinated trading by retail...

On October 26, 2008, Porsche announced a largely unexpected domination plan for Volkswagen. The resulting short squeeze in Volkswagen's stock briefly made it the most valuable listed company in the world. We argue that this was a manipulation designed to save Porsche from insolvency and the...

Financial contagion is modeled as an equilibrium phenomenon. Because liquidity preference shocks are imperfectly correlated across regions, banks hold interregional claims on other banks to provide insurance against liquidity preference shocks. When there is no aggregate uncertainty, the...

Interconnectedness has been an important source of market failures, leading to the recent financial crisis. Large financial institutions tend to have similar exposures and thus exert externalities on each other through various mechanisms. Regulators have responded by putting more regulations in...

A short squeeze is triggered if there is pressure on short sellers to cover their positions because of a sharp price increase or a recall of borrowed shares. This drives short sellers to close their positions early. We find that stock-day short-squeeze events are rare and short-lived. However,...

Galí (2014) showed that a monetary policy rule that raises interest rates in response to bubbles can paradoxically lead to larger bubbles. This comment shows that a central bank that wants to dampen bubbles can always do so by raising interest rates aggressively enough. This result is different...

The financial sector is heavily regulated in order to prevent financial crises. The recent crisis showed how ineffective this regulation and other types of government intervention were in achieving this aim. We argue that the crisis was primarily caused by housing price bubbles. These occurred...