We examine the quantification of operational risk for banks. We adopt a financial-economics approach and interpret operational risk management as a means of optimizing the profitability of an institution along its value chain. We start by defining operational risk and then propose a...

We use portfolio theory to quantify the efficiency of state-level sectoral patterns of production in the United States. On the basis of observed growth in sectoral value-added output, we calculate for each state the efficient frontier for investments in the real economy. We study how rapidly...

Institutional but also private investors have often limited flexibility in timing their investment decision. Therefore, they look for investments that would ideally be independent of the timing decision. We introduce a new class of derivative products whose payoff is linked to the trend of the...

Have the euro and accompanying measures of financial integration had a discernable impact on the degree of diversification of European investors? This is an empirical question that this paper tries to answer by exploring four alternative avenues. First we focus on the final outcome: If European...

This note shows that an investor who does not hold positive amounts of all available assets is eventually overtaken by a completely diversified rival investor.

This paper systematically analyses the market for syndicated loans over the period from 1982 till 2000. A sub-sample of high-information loans is studied over the period from 1982 until 2000. Aspects such as market credit quality, average spreads, average tenors and other market characteristics...

This paper investigates the relative influences of industrial and country factors in international stock returns. Until very recently, academic research has consistently found that country factors dominate industrial factors. This result is in contradiction with practitioners beliefs. This paper...

o obtain the maximum benefits from diversification, financial theory suggests that investors should invest internationally because of the larger potential for risk reduction. The question that we raise in this paper is how to select the optimal portfolio of countries? This article synthesizes...

Seit Begründung der modernen Portfoliotheorie ist bekannt, daß die Portfoliovolatilität im Fall niedriger Korrelationen zwischen den Anlageklassen bei sonst gleich bleibenden Parametern ohne Renditeeinbuße reduziert wird...