This paper assesses ownership of 16 financial products by households in different lifecycle stages amongst four ethnic groups (Africans, Coloureds, Asians, and Whites) in South Africa. The lifecycle hypothesis indicates younger households should own more debt-related financial products, whereas...

This paper proposes a framework to detect financial crises, pinpoint the end of a crisis in stock markets and support investment decision-making processes. This proposal is based on a hidden Markov model (HMM) and allows for a specific focus on conditional mean returns. By analysing weekly...

According to disposition effect theory, people hold losing investments too long. However, many investors eventually sell at a loss, and little is known about which psychological factors contribute to these capitulation decisions. This study integrates prospect theory, utility maximization...

Traditionally, relationship marketing focuses upon the interaction between suppliers and consumers. In this article, the authors propose that relationship marketing cannot ignore another type of (long-term) interaction: the one between consumers and products. Both types of interaction should be...

Tax rebates are instruments for stimulating consumer spending during recessions. Previous research assessed whether consumers use tax rebates for saving or, alternatively, purchasing goods and services. These studies concentrated on aggregate estimations. Based on the saving motive hierarchy...

The paper demonstrates application of the latent Markov model for assessing developments by individuals through stages of a process. This approach is applied by using a database on ownership of 12 financial products and various demographic variables. The latent Markov model derives latent...

We conduct an experiment to test whether the size of a loss and the time in a losing position affect investors’ adaptation to the loss situation and, subsequently, whether this adaptation affects future investment decisions. As investors adapt to losses, their neutral reference point shifts...