Alan Greenspan's paper (March 2010) presents his retrospective view of the crisis. His theme has several parts. First, the housing price bubble, its subsequent collapse and the financial crisis were not predicted either by the market, the FED, the IMF or the regulators in the years leading to...

This interdisciplinary paper explains how mathematical techniques of stochastic optimal control can be applied to the recent subprime mortgage crisis. Why did the financial markets fail to anticipate the recent debt crisis, despite the large literature in mathematical finance concerning optimal...

Contemporary financial stochastic programs typically involve a trade-offbetween return and (downside)-risk. Using stochastic programming we characterize analytically (rather than numerically) the optimal decisions that follow from characteristic single-stage and multi-stage versions of such...

This paper explores the application of contingent claims analysis (CCA) to two quot;hotquot; issues in life-cycle finance: (1) investing for retirement and (2) deciding when, if ever, to switch careers. Participants in individual retirement accounts do not have the time or the knowledge to make...

Contemporary financial stochastic programs typically involve a trade-offbetween return and (downside)-risk. Using stochastic programming we characterize analytically (rather than numerically) the optimal decisions that follow from characteristic single-stage and multi-stage versions of such...

The mutual fund industry has experienced huge growth internationally, becoming one of the primary vehicles through which individuals and most institutions invest in capital markets. Thus, the evaluation of the performance of mutual funds has become a very interesting research topic both for...

We consider the portfolio selection problem in the accumulation phase of a defined contribution (DC) pension scheme. We solve the mean-variance portfolio selection problem using the embedding technique pioneered by Zhou and Li (2000) and show that it is equivalent to a target-based optimization...

In this study we consider the suitability of two methods of returns based style analysis for classification of investment styles for a single asset class, US Diversified Equity Funds. We extend Sharpe (1992) style Returns Based Style Analysis (RBSA) to form style groups using cluster analysis...

The paper deals with taxation effects on optimal portfolio rules of de fined contribution (DC) and de fined benefi t (DB) pension funds in a continuous-time setting. Following practice, three tax types are considered: on contributions, investment gains and pensions. We focus on the tax effects...

We analyze the rationale for the pay-as-you-go (paygo) pension system existence on diversi fication grounds. A continuous-time portfolio choice setting is built, basing on Merton (1971)´s analysis, where a reasonable balance between the taking account of the economic and fi nancial facets of...