Individuals and asset managers trade aggressively, resulting in high volume in asset markets, even when such trading results in high risk and low net returns. Asset prices display patterns of predictability that are difficult to reconcile with rational expectations-based theories of price...

Using friendship data from Facebook, we study the effects of three aspects of social capital on household financial behavior. We find that the most important measure of social capital in explaining stock market and saving participation is Economic Connectedness, defined as the fraction of one's...

We study how the social transmission of public news influences investors' beliefs and securities markets. Using an extensive dataset to measure investor social networks, we find that earnings announcements from firms in higher-centrality locations generate stronger immediate price and trading...

A war-related factor model derived from textual analysis of media news reports explains the cross section of expected asset returns. Using a semi-supervised topic model to extract discourse topics from 7,000,000 New York Times stories spanning 160 years, the war factor predicts the cross section...

Using a semi-supervised topic model on 7,000,000 New York Times articles spanning 160 years, we test whether topics of media discourse predict future stock and bond market returns to test rational and behavioral hypotheses about market valuation of disaster risk. Focusing on media discourse...

We test and compare the effects of introduction of two new financial information technologies, EDGAR and XBRL, on well-known asset pricing anomalies often attributed to mispricing. EDGAR facilitates easier access to public accounting information about public firms; XBRL reduces the cost of...

We document a causal effect of social interactions on investor behavior using the number of local soccer games as a measure of social interaction intensity. Social transmission is identifiable in buy but not sell trades. The effect of Social Interaction Intensity (SII) on the sensitivity of...

<p>Biased information about the payoffs received by others can drive innovation, risk-taking, and investment booms. We study this cultural phenomenon using a model based on two premises. The first premise is a tendency for large successes, and the actions that lead to them, to be more salient to...</p>

Biased information about the payoffs received by others can drive innovation, risk-taking, and investment booms. We study this cultural phenomenon using a model based on two premises. The first is a tendency for large successes, and the actions that lead to them, to be more salient to onlookers...

Instructional presentation slides.What drives innovation, risk taking, and investment booms? We study these phenomena using a model of decision making by firms that make biased observations of prior returns. We assume that firms are more likely to observe large successes than small successes or...