It has been long recognized that endogenous default probabilities cannot explain spreads between corporate and the riskless bonds. Recently, this issue has been subjected to rigorous scrutiny. Previous studies have found that for investment-grade debt, structural models explain only 15-25% of...

In this paper, we investigate components of the bond bid-ask spreads for the emerging market in Russian sovereign bonds in the late 90s. We identify the size of the bid-ask spreads with liquidity because many of trades in illiquid securities happen in closed transactions and accurate information...

In 2008, Epstein and Schneider formulated a microstructure-inspired theory in which one could determine price volatility through a number of other market parameters such as asset volatility, risk free rate and dividend rate. A particular feature of the Epstein-Schneider theory is an extremely...

This paper proposes and motivates a dynamical model of the Chinese stock market based on a linear regression in a dual state space connected to the original state space of correlations between the volume-at-price buckets by a Fourier transform. We apply our model to the price migration of...

There is not much doubt in the public mind that the dot-com boom on NASDAQ in the end of 90s represented a bubble. Indeed, major violations of rationality were observed. For instance, some dot-coms, which terminated their business still held positive market value. A market cap of the Internet...

In my essay, I formulate an alternative scenario for the current crisis of the US financial system. Unintended and poorly understood consequences of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley (1999) banking reform and, especially, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (2005) created numerous...

The method of the Wigner-Ville function proposed by Wigner, (1932) and Ville (1947) is widely used in quantum statistical mechanics and signal processing and historically preceded the continuous-time wavelets. (Gabor, 1946) Here it is proposed for the studies of the financial time series. One of...

The extremely useful method of Malliavin calculus has not yet gained adequate popularity because of the complicated analytical apparatus of this method. The author attempts here to propose a simplified algebraic formalism similar to Malliavin calculus, but based on the notion of...