One of the most popular investment anecdotes relates how Isaac Newton, after cashing in some large early gains, staked his fortune on the success of the South Sea Company of 1720 and lost heavily in the ensuing crash. However, this tale is based on only a few scraps of hard evidence, some of...

This paper investigates how venture-backed companies are affected when others sharing the same investor suffer a negative shock. In theory, companies may be helped or hurt in this scenario. To examine the topic empirically, I estimate the impact of the collapse of the technology bubble on...

Combining monthly survey data with matching trading records, we examine how individual investor perceptions change and drive trading and risk-taking behavior during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. We find that investor perceptions fluctuate significantly during the crisis, with risk tolerance...

The hedge-fund industry has grown rapidly over the past two decades, offering investors unique investment opportunities that often reflect more complex risk exposures than those of traditional investments. In this article we present a selective review of the recent academic literature on hedge...

The real estate investment trust (REIT) industry experienced a liquidity crisis resulting from reduced access to credit commitments as banks were restoring their balance sheets during the 2007-2009 financial crisis. Employing generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity (GARCH)...

This paper provides a first step in developing a system-wide stress simulation. The model incorporates several important features of the financial system. These include several types of institution (including banks and non-banks) and how their actions may propagate and amplify stress. Rather...

Assessments of investors’ risk appetite/aversion stance via indicators often yields results which seem unsatisfactory (see e.g. Illing and Aaron (2005)). Understanding how such indicators work therefore seems essential for further improvements. The present paper seeks to contribute to this...

This multi-faceted analysis of institutional investment defines fiduciary finance institutions as the third pillar of the financial system, alongside banks and insurers. It documents the role played by investment funds and the money management industry during the recent financial crisis, and...

We identify flight-to-safety (FTS) days for 23 countries using only stock and bond returns and a model averaging approach. FTS days comprise less than 2% of the sample, and are associated with a 2.7% average bond-equity return differential and significant flows out of equity funds and into...

We identify flight-to-safety (FTS) days for 23 countries using only stock and bond returns and a model averaging approach. FTS days comprise less than 2% of the sample, and are associated with a 2.7% average bond-equity return differential and significant flows out of equity funds and into...