In this paper we investigate the importance of acquaintance networks for financial decisions by households. We construct a variable capturing the expected proximity or social closeness to a subpopulation of financially savvy people using an overdispersed Poisson model. This measure captures the...

The increasing portion of individuals' wealth in art sets the stage for art-backed lending services. Considering widely used credit default swaps, the paper applies the structure to art-backed loans and develops an extensive pricing model for the derivatives contract, explicitly taking art...

The comparatively poor performance of traditional asset classes in recent years has driven the search for greater returns via alternative asset classes. The desire to reap higher risk adjusted returns from diversification into assets which offer low and even negative correlation with equities...

Deviations from normality in financial return series have led to the development of alternative portfolio selection models. One such model is the downside risk model, whereby the investor maximizes his return given a downside risk constraint. In this paper we empirically observe the...

Sustainable development entails meeting our present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. This requires us to treat economic, social and environmental aspects in an integrated way, but little is known about the nature of individual preferences towards...

We study the role of experience in internet art auctions by analyzing repeated bidding by the same bidder in a unique longitudinal field dataset. Our results show that experience significantly lowers the level of bids suggesting that bidders change their bidding behavior throughout time....

This paper examines how variation in mood influences subjective risk and hence auction prices for art in London during the period 1990–2007. The private value of an object is closely related to taste and mood which is proxied for by the variation in weather. Using a unique data set that...