We study a risk-sharing economy where an arbitrary number of heterogenous agents trades an arbitrary number of risky assets subject to quadratic transaction costs. For linear state dynamics, the forward-backward stochastic differential equations characterizing equilibrium asset prices and...

We consider the derivatives pricing problem in credit risk. By assessing a market price to the hedged risks and a Capital Asset Pricing Model price to the unhedged part, we derive a generalized pricing formula that nests both the classic “Capital Markets” and “Corporate Finance” models....

Changes in credit supply induce large and frequent variations in households' access to unsecured debt. They generate a novel financial precautionary motive, which compounds the classical motive associated with idiosyncratic income risk, as borrowers accumulate risk-free bonds to hedge against...

The solution to dynamic portfolio choice models can be formulated in terms of a value function by the Bellman principle of optimality, which reduces the multi-period optimal policy choice problem to a sequence of one-period maximization problems. For two adjacent periods, economists compute the...

Previous writers have attempted to resolve the equity premium puzzle by employing a utility function that depends on current consumption minus (or relative to) past habit consumption. This paper points out that an individual's current utility may also depend upon how well off in the recent past...

Simulating a realistic-sized equity premium in macroeconomic models has proved a daunting challenge, hence the "equity premium puzzle." "Resolving'' the puzzle requires heavy lifting. Precise choices of particular preferences, shocks, technologies, and hard borrowing constraints can do the...

Transaction costs and risk have generally not been taken into account in assessing the Kyoto mechanisms JI, CDM and emissions trading. However, they can have a significant influence. With regard to the project-based mechanisms, the factor that most determines the influence of transaction costs...

We show that in a general equilibrium model with heterogeneity in risk aversion or belief, shifting wealth from an agent who holds comparatively fewer stocks to one who holds more reduces the equity premium. Since empirically the rich hold more stocks than do the poor, inequality should predict...

This paper highlights two new effects of credit default swap markets (CDS) in a general equilibrium setting. First, when firms' cash flows are correlated, CDSs impact the cost of capital{credit spreads{and investment for all firms, even those that are not CDS reference entities. Second, when...

This chapter is on quantitative models of sovereign debt crises in emerging economies. We interpret debt crises broadly to cover all of the major problems a country can experience while trying to issue new debt, including default, sharp increases in the spread and failed auctions. We examine the...