We provide evidence for a causal link between the US economy and the global financial cycle. Using intraday data, we show that US macroeconomic news releases have large and significant effects on global risky asset prices. Stock price indexes of 27 countries, the VIX, and commodity prices all...

This study calibrates the term structure of risk premia before and during the 2007/2008 financial crisis using a new calibration approach based on credit default swaps. The risk premium term structure was flat before the crisis and downward sloping during the crisis. The instantaneous risk...

We estimate time-varying expected excess returns on the US stock market from 1983 to 2008 using a model that jointly captures the arbitrage-free dynamics of stock returns and nominal bond yields. The model nests the class of affine term structure (of interest rates) models. Stock returns and...

We show that the stock market price reaction to monetary policy surprises upon announcements of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) is explained mostly by changes in the default-free term structure of yields, not by changes in the equity premium. We reach this conclusion based on a new...

In this paper, I analyze the role of credit risk in explaining cross-sectional stock returns. I utilize Credit Default Swap (CDS) spreads to construct a credit risk factor-mimicking portfolio, which I label as Distressed-minus-Stable (DMS). As CDS contracts are written mainly on large firms, our...

We estimate the joint term-structure of U.S. Treasury cash and repo rates using daily prices of all outstanding Treasury securities and corresponding special collateral (SC) repo rates. This allows us to derive a risk premium associated to the SC value of Treasuries and quantitatively link this...

This paper empirically analyses the effect of foreign block acquisitions on the U.S. target firms' credit risk as captured by their CDS. The involvement of foreign investors leads to a significant increase in the target firms' CDS spreads. This effect is stronger when foreign owners are...

We study the effect of a bond's place in its issuer's maturity structure on credit risk. Using a structural model as motivation, we argue that bonds due relatively late in their issuers' maturity structure have greater credit risk than do bonds due relatively early. Empirically, we find robust...

This paper studies the intertemporal relation between U.S. volatility risk and international equity risk premia. We show that a common volatility risk factor constructed from the option-implied U.S. forward variances positively and significantly predicts future stock market returns of the...

Using a very large data set with more than 9,700 stocks listed on NYSE, AMEX and NASDAQ, we analyze overnight price jumps and report short-term investor overreaction to information shocks and document return reversal and predictability up to five days. For negative and positive overnight jumps,...