The benefits of endowment destruction documented by Ljungqvist and Uhlig (2015), and the related possibility that consumption can lower habits, are fragile. Both issues result from a particular way of discretely approximating the underlying continuous-time model or of adapting it to jumps. Other ways of calculating the discrete-time approximation or extending the model to jumps easily overturn the results, while making no difference to the model's description of asset prices and quantities. This analysis gives an example of how to extend models so that the jump gives the same result as a jump limit of continuous-sample-path movements.

The increasing frequency and scope of financial crises have made global financial stability one of the major concerns of economic policy and decision makers. This has led to the understanding that financial and banking supervision has to be thought of as a systemic task, focusing on the interdependent relations among the institutions. Using network theory, we develop a dynamic model that uses a bipartite network of banks and their assets to analyze the system’s sensitivity to external shocks in individual asset classes and to evaluate the presence of features underlying the system that could lead to contagion. As a case study, we apply the model to stress test the Venezuelan banking system from 1998 to 2013. The introduced model was able to capture monthly changes in the structure of the system and the sensitivity of bank portfolios to different external shock scenarios and to identify systemic vulnerabilities and their time evolution. The model provides new tools for policy makers and supervision agencies to use for macroprudential dynamical stress testing.

We examine whether donors reward nonprofit organizations that report better governance. From a sample of 10,846 organizations from 2008 to 2010, we first identify seven nonprofit governance dimensions using factor analysis. We then test whether the quality of governance influences donor decisions by including the seven governance factors in the standard donor's demand model. We find consistent evidence that donations and government grants are positively associated with six of the seven factors that capture good governance, including formal written policies (e.g., conflict of interest), independent audits and audit committees, review and approval of executive compensation, board oversight (e.g., board independence), management characteristics (e.g., no related parties), and accessible financial information. Our results have implications for nonprofit managers and regulators. Moreover, mandatory disclosure of governance policies for nonprofit organizations provides an interesting contrast to mandatory adoption of governance policies for publicly traded companies. JEL Classifications: G18; G38; H39; L30; L31; L38; M40; M41; M42; M48. Data Availability: All data are publicly available.

Using a clean sample of private equity placements over the period of 1999 to 2012, we examine the determinants of the discounts on private placements. Classifying various determinants into three categories, namely risk, illiquidity, and marketability, we show that risk and marketability are significant determinants of the discount on private placements over the entire sample period. However, we identify a structural break in the relation between the discount on private placements with illiquidity and, to a lesser degree, marketability. Specifically, we find that liquidity is a more important determinant during the pre-2003 period, but marketability becomes a more important determinant during the post-2003 period. We attribute the structural break to substantial changes in market microstructure during our sample period. Lower transaction costs make illiquidity less of a concern for investors, whereas more active trading by investors calls for a higher discount for the lack of marketability.

In this study, we examine whether firms that act more socially responsible receive more favorable media coverage, and we consider whether firms use CSR to actively manage their media image. We focus on all news stories about a firm, not just those that report on specific CSR initiatives, and find that more socially responsible firms receive more favorable news reportage overall, i.e., they have a more positive media image. These findings are robust after controlling for potential endogeneity. Further, consistent with firms actively managing their media image, we find a stronger relation between CSR and media favorability when incentives to improve a firm’s media image are high, e.g., among firms in sin industries, during periods of low investor sentiment, and prior to seasoned equity offerings. Finally, we find that for firms that demonstrate superior social responsibility and receive more favorable news reporting, there is a significant interaction between social responsibility and media favorability that increases (decreases) a firm’s equity valuation (cost of capital). Our results are consistent with the media slanting their reporting in favor of good performing CSR firms. Overall, we contribute to the literature by showing that firms can influence their media coverage through a relatively subtle channel, CSR performance.

We posit that a change in analyst interest in a firm is an early indicator of the firm's future fundamentals, capital market activities, and stock returns. We measure increases in analyst interest by obser.ving analysts who do not cover a firm but participate in that firm's earnings conference call, and we measure decreases in analyst interest by observing analysts who cover a firm, yet are absent from that firm's call. We find that increases in analyst interest are positively associated with future changes in firm fundamentals and capital market activities, while decreases in analyst interest are negatively associated with capital market activities. We also find that increases (decreases) in analyst interest are positively (negatively) correlated with future stock returns over the next three months and that a hedge portfolio yields a significant abnormal return. Overall, our study shows that analyst interest is a novel and early indicator of future firm fundamentals and capital market consequences.

To deter financial misstatements, many companies have recently adopted compensation recovery policies—commonly known as ‘‘clawbacks’’—that authorize the board to recoup compensation paid to executives based on misstated financial reports. Clawbacks have been shown to reduce financial misstatements and increase investors’ confidence on earnings information. We show that the benefits come with an unintended consequence of certain firms substituting for accruals management with real transactions management (e.g., reduce research and development [R&D] expenditures), especially firms with strong incentives to achieve short-term earnings targets, such as firms with high growth or high transient institutional ownership. As such, the total amount of earnings management does not decrease subsequent to clawback adoption. We further show that although real transactions management temporarily boosts those clawback adopters’ short-term profitability and stock performance, this trend reverses after three years. In summary, clawbacks may have unexpected effects for a subset of firms whose managers are under greater pressure to meet earnings goals.

We examine high stakes three-person bargaining in a game show where contestants bargain over a large money amount that is split into three unequal shares. We find that individual behavior and outcomes are strongly influenced by equity concerns: those who contributed more to the jackpot claim larger shares, are less likely to make concessions, and take home larger amounts. Contestants who announce that they will not back down do well relative to others, but they do not secure larger absolute amounts and they harm others. There is no evidence of a first-mover advantage and little evidence that demographic characteristics matter.

We offer the first empirical evidence on the adverse effect of credit default swap (CDS) coverage on subprime mortgage defaults. Using a large database of privately securitized mortgages, we find that higher defaults concentrate in mortgage pools with concurrent CDS coverage, and within these pools the loans originated after or shortly before the start of CDS coverage have an even higher delinquency rate. The results are robust across zip code and origination quarter cohorts. Overall, we show that CDS coverage helped drive higher mortgage defaults during the financial crisis.