For pension funds, international assets represent an opportunity to improve their returns while possibly reducing risks. Nonetheless, pension funds in many developing countries face regulations that limit the choice of international investments. This paper proposes a new methodology to estimate...

This paper analyzes bank stock prices around the world to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the banking sector. Using a global database of policy responses during the crisis, the paper also examines the role of financial sector policy announcements on the performance of bank stocks....

This paper studies loan conditions in a context where private banks can operate in two credit markets: a free-market with no government intervention and an earmarked market that relies on government funds and where interest rates are regulated. The paper examines the effects of earmarked lending...

Individuals often invest actively and generate inferior returns. Social interactions might exacerbate this tendency, but the causal effect from peer effects on active trading are difficult to identify empirically. This paper exploits the exogenous assignment of students to classrooms in a...

This paper studies the trading behavior and performance of foreign investors with different management styles. The analysis uses a comprehensive Colombian data with complete transaction records and unique investor identification, and finds that the aggregate under-performance of foreign...

Business groups, which are collections of publicly traded companies with significant amount of common ownership, dominate private sector activity in developing countries. This paper studies how information flows within these groups by analyzing the trading behavior of pension fund managers in...

This paper tries to explain why kidnapping has fallen so dramatically in Colombia during the period 2000-2008. The widely held belief is that the falling kidnapping rates can basically be explained as a consequence of the success of President Alvaro Uribe's democratic security policy. Without...

This paper looks at the impact of members' ability to switch pension fund provider and /or portfolio on the allocation of pension funds to long-term investments. The level of annual turnover in pension fund portfolios was compared with the amount of short-term investments (using government...