All too often, the concept of risk-neutral probabilities in mathematical finance is poorly explained, and misleading statements are made. The aim of this paper is to provide an intuitive understanding of risk-neutral probabilities, and to explain in an easily accessible manner how they can be...

The complexity of the global financial crisis beginning 2007 has challenged professionals. For students, the crisis's interconnected elements, covered in multiple courses and the concepts of derivatives central to it, are overwhelming. Providing short answers to their questions often creates...

In this paper we present an application where advanced undergraduate students can solve the expected utility portfolio model with a risk-free and a risky asset with both up and down returns in the Stock Market. With real Stock Market data, we use Excel Solver to find the portfolio decision and...

Under the CAPM assumptions, the market capitalization weighted portfolio is mean-variance efficient. In real world applications it has been shown by various authors that low risk portfolios outperform the market capitalization weighted portfolio. We revisit this anomaly using high-frequency data...

We present a tractable model of the effects of nonfinancial risk on intertemporal choice. Our purpose is to provide a simple framework that can be adopted in fields like representative-agent macroeconomics, corporate finance, or political economy, where most modelers have chosen not to...

The precautionary principle (PP) applied to environmental policy stipulates that, in the presence of physical uncertainty, society must take robust preventive action to guard against worst-case outcomes. It follows that the higher the degree of uncertainty, the more aggressive this preventive...

In this paper stochastic dynamic programming is used to investigate habitat conservation by a multitude of landholders under uncertainty about the value of environmental services and irreversible development. We study land conversion under competition on the market for agricultural products when...

Nowadays, as stressed by important strategic documents like for instance the 2009 EU White Paper on Adaptation or the recent 2009 "Copenhagen Accord", it is amply recognized that both mitigation and adaptation strategies are necessary to combat climate change. This paper enriches the rapidly...

We implement a long-horizon static and dynamic portfolio allocation involving a risk-free and a risky asset. This model is calibrated at a quarterly frequency for ten European countries. We also use maximum-likelihood estimates and Bayesian estimates to account for parameter uncertainty. We find...