Knowledge that Transforms

This article presents a one-tick dynamic model of a limit order market. Agents choose to submit a limit order or a market order depending on the state of the limit order book. Each trader knows that her order will affect the order placement strategies of those who follow and the execution probability of her limit order is endogenous. All traders take this into account which, in equilibrium, generates systematic patterns in transaction prices and order placement strategies even with no asymmetric information. Article published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Financial Studies in its journal, The Review of Financial Studies.

In this article we use a single unifying framework to analyze the sources of profits to a wide spectrum of return-based trading strategies implemented in the literature. We show that less than 50% of the 120 strategies implemented in the article yield statistically significant profits and, unconditionally, momentum and contrarian strategies are equally likely to be successful. However, when we condition on the return horizon (short, medium, or long) of the strategy, or the time period during which it is implemented, two patterns emerge. A momentum strategy is usually profitable at the medium (3- to 12-months) horizon, while a contrarian strategy nets statistically significant profits at long horizons, but only during the 1926–1947 subperiod. More importantly, our results show that the cross-sectional variation in the mean returns of individual securities included in these strategies play an important role in their profitability. The cross-sectional variation can potentially account for the profitability of momentum strategies and it is also responsible for attenuating the profits from price reversals to long-horizon contrarian strategies.

Existing time-varying covariance models usually impose strong restrictions on how past shocks affect the forecasted covariance matrix. In this article we compare the restrictions imposed by the four most popular multivariate GARCH models, and introduce a set of robust conditional moment tests to detect misspecification. We demonstrate that the choice of a multivariate volatility model can lead to substantially different conclusions in any application that involves forecasting dynamic covariance matrices (like estimating the optimal hedge ratio or deriving the risk minimizing portfolio). We therefore introduce a general model which nests these four models and their natural “asymmetric” extensions. The new model is applied to study the dynamic relation between large and small firm returns.

[In this article I identify optimal incentive contracts for managers of firms competing in the product market. Such firms often confront similar decisions and uncertainties. Managers can improve decision quality by generating private signals through costly effort. However, since signals are likely to be correlated, firms that decide later get additional information from the actions of earlier firms. This impacts effort choice. Decision quality is also affected if later managers disregard their own signals and blindly imitate preceding decisions. In a competitive environment, such cascading hurts profits. Contracts that solve both moral hazard and cascading problems typically put more weight on firm profits, making them expensive. Contacts with more weight on decision quality are less expensive but result in cascades. Share-holders choose contracts that maximize their net surplus. This results in testable implications about which industries may have more convergence in investment choices, greater pay-for-profit sensitivity, larger differences in observed contracts, more innovation, larger-size firms, and potential for overcompensation.]

[Recent evidence shows that higher trader participation increases exchange rate volatility. To explore this linkage, we develop a dynamic model of endogenous entry of traders subject to heterogenous expectational errors. Entry of a marginal trader into the market has two effects: it increases the capacity of the market to absorb exogenous supply risk, and at the same time it adds noise and endogenous trading risk. The competitive entry equilibrium is characterized by excessive market entry and excessively volatile prices. A positive tax on entrants can decrease trader participation and volatility while increasing market efficiency.]

[This article solves the equilibrium problem in a pure-exchange, continuous-time economy in which some agents face information costs or other types of frictions effectively preventing them from investing in the stock market. Under the assumption that the restricted agents have logarithmic utilities, a complete characterization of equilibrium prices and consumption/investment policies is provided. A simple calibration shows that the model can help resolve some of the empirical asset pricing puzzles.]

[In this article, we consider the relative merits of net versus gross settlement of interbank payments. Net settlement economizes on the costs of holding non-interest-bearing reserves, but increases moral hazard problems. The "put option" value of default under net settlement can also distort banks' investment incentives. Absent these distortions, net settlement dominates gross, although the optimal net settlement scheme may involve a positive probability of default.]

[This article shows how rational asset pricing models restrict the regression-based criteria commonly used to measure return predictability. Specifically it invokes no-arbitrage arguments to show that the intercept, slope coefficients, and R^2 in predictive regressions must take specific values. These restrictions provide a way to directly assess whether the predictability uncovered using regression analysis is consistent with rational pricing. Empirical tests reveal that the returns on the CRSP size deciles are too predictable to be compatible with a number of well-known pricing models. However, the overall pattern of predictability across these portfolios is reasonably consistent with what we would expect under circumstances where predictability is rational.]

[Fama (1977) and Miller (1977) predict that one minus the corporate tax rate will equate after-tax yields from comparable taxable and tax-exempt bonds. Empirical evidence shows that long-term tax-exempt yields are higher than theory predicts. Two popular explanations for this empirical puzzle are that, relative to taxable bonds, municipal bonds bear more default risk and include costly call options. I study U.S. government secured municipal bond yields which are effectively default-free and noncallable. These municipal yields display the same tendency to be too high. I conclude that differential default risk and call options do not explain the municipal bond puzzle.]