The goal of this paper is to assess, for the first time, the empirical impact of "Kaynes' beauty contest", or "higher order belief", on asset price volatility. The paper shows that heterogeneous expectations induce higher order beliefs and that heterogeneous expectation asset pricing models...

Previous research has shown that frictions might have a significant impact on the value of a contingent claim, as discussed, for example, in Karatzas & Kou (1996)and Collin-Dufresne & Hugonnier (2002). We consider two types of frictions particularly important: frictions related to trading, such...

This paper analyzes the effects that uncertainty about economic fundamentalshas on aggregate trading volume. First, the trading volume of an investor facinga standard consumption portfolio choice problem is derived. It is found that if theparameters describing the investment opportunity set...

In this paper we show that reputation formation in endogenously formed relationships is a decisive determinant for the existence and performance of credit markets. In theabsence of any third party enforcement of debt repayment the contracting parties succeed in establishing stable bilateral...

In June 2003 Swiss banks held over CHF 500 billion in mortgages. This important segment accounts for about 63% of all loan portfolios of Swiss banks. Since default insurance is not common in Switzerland, the corresponding risks are a severe threat for the health of the financial system. We...

We propose a new method for pricing options based on GARCH models with filtered historical innovations. In an incomplete market framework we allow for different distributions of the historical and the pricing return dynamics enhancing the model flexibility to fit market option prices. An...

This paper extends the class of deterministic volatility Heath-Jarrow-Morton (1992) models to a Markov chain stochastic volatility framework allowing for jump discontinuities and a variety of deformations of the term structure of forward rate volatilities. Analytical solutions for the dynamics...