This paper is concerned with the efficient allocation of a set of financial assets and its successful management. Efficient diversification of investments is achieved by inputing robust pair-copulas based estimates of the expected return and covariances in the mean-variance analysis of...

Volatility plays an important role when managing risks, composing portfolios, and pricing financial instruments. However it is not directly observable, being usually estimated through parametric models such as those in the GARCH family. A more natural empirical measure of daily returns...

Purpose – This paper aims to statistically model the serial dependence in the first and second moments of a univariate time series using copulas, bridging the gap between theory and applications, which are the focus of risk managers. Design/methodology/approach – The appealing feature of the...

This report evaluates and compares the evolution and the determinants of the capital structure of Brazilian firms, with a particular emphasis on external financing. One of its main conclusions is that country factors are nearly as important as firm level factors. Industry factors are not very...