From the onset of the 2007-2009 crisis, the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank have aggressively lowered interest rates. Both sets of changes are at odds with an anti-inflationary stance of monetary policy; indeed, as the crisis began in August 2007 inflation expectations were high...

This paper sets out to investigate the forces behind the so-called "global capital flows paradox" and related "dollar glut" observed in the era of advancing financial globalization. The supposed paradox is that the developing world has increasingly come to pursue policies that result in current...

Both personal bankruptcy and redistributive taxes can insure households' consumption risk and both vary considerably across US states. We derive sufficient conditions under which more redistributive taxation makes bankruptcy exemptions less attractive both for the intratemporal insurance and for...

Financial innovations are a common explanation of the rise in consumer credit and bankruptcies. To evaluate this story, we develop a simple model that incorporates two key frictions: asymmetric information about borrowers' risk of default and a fixed cost to create each contract offered by...

This paper considers the role of Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) advances in stabilizing their commercial bank members' residential mortgage lending activities. Our theoretical model shows that using mortgage-related membership criteria or requiring mortgage-related collateral does not ensure that...

Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht den Zusammenhang zwischen politischen Zyklen und Aktienrenditen in Deutschland. Während sich die bis dato verfügbaren Studien über politisch bedingte Aktienmarktanomalien auf die USA konzentrieren, analysieren wir deren Existenz in deutschen Aktienrenditen....

Bis zum Amtsantritt von Gary Gensler ging die US Commodity Futures Trading Commission von einem geringen Einfluss der Spekulanten auf den Rohölpreis aus, während nun eine Neubewertung stattfindet.Dieser Artikel misst die Aktivität der Spekulanten mit Hilfe von Variablen der wöchentlichen...

This article discusses the influence of speculators in the futures market on crude oil prices. The results suggest the dispersion in beliefs influences both crude oil prices and price volatility.

Regulatory and media concern has focused heavily on the potentially manipulative distortion of market prices associated with naked short selling. However, naked shorting can also have beneficial effects for liquidity and pricing efficiency. We empirically investigate the impact of naked...

Many college and university 403(b) plans restrict the menu of investment choices to funds offered by TIAA-CREF, the current manager of over half of all 403(b) contributions. Further, in the face of Internal Revenue Code changes that will take effect in 2006 and will make 403(b) plan ERISA...