We show theoretically that lower tail dependence (χ), a measure of the probability that a portfolio will suffer large losses given that the market does, contains important information for risk-averse investors. We then estimate χ for a sample of DJIA stocks and show that it differs systematically from other risk measures including variance, semi-variance, skewness, kurtosis, beta, and coskewness. In out-of-sample tests, portfolios constructed to have low values of χ outperform the market index, the mean return of the stocks in our sample, and portfolios with high values of χ. Our results indicate that χ is conceptually important for risk-averse investors, differs substantially from other risk measures, and provides useful information for portfolio selection.

This paper assesses the impact of the geographic diversification of bank holding company (BHC) assets across the United States on their market valuations. Using two new identification strategies based on the dynamic process of interstate bank deregulation, we find that exogenous increases in geographic diversity reduced BHC valuations. We also find that the geographic diversification of BHC assets increased insider lending and reduced loan quality. Taken together, these findings are consistent with theories predicting that geographic diversity intensifies agency problems.

This paper provides a new explanation for why closed-end bond funds coexist along with otherwise identical open-end bond funds. Closed-end bond funds offer investors the opportunity to leverage their fixed income investment at very low borrowing rates and are attractive to investors for this reason. We find that differences in leverage are reflected in the discount on closed-end bond funds in a manner consistent with the advantage of leverage.

This paper evaluates the effect of estate taxes on labor supply. The analysis decomposes the effect of estate taxation into the substitution effect of relative price changes and the two income effects for which the estate tax is responsible. These two income effects arise from tax burdens on those who leave estates plus tax burdens on those who receive them. Despite the double income burden of the estate tax, existing empirical evidence suggests that the net effect of estate taxation on aggregate labor supply is uncertain.

The price of oil increased more than 650 percent from 1972 to 1980. I review the policy discussion of the time through the lens of the printed press. I pay particular attention to whether gasoline taxes were “on the table” and how consumers viewed the different policies. Meaningful changes in gasoline taxes were on the table, but polling evidence at the time suggests that consumers preferred price controls, rationing and vehicle taxes. Given the saliency of rationing and vehicle taxes, it seems difficult to argue that these alternative polices were adopted because they hide their true costs.

Credence goods are characterized by informational asymmetries between sellers and consumers that invite fraudulent behaviour by sellers. This article presents a natural field experiment on taxi rides in Athens, Greece, set up to measure different types of fraud and to examine the influence of passengers' presumed information and income on the extent of fraud. We find that passengers with inferior information about optimal routes are taken on significantly longer detours, while lack of information on the local tariff system increases the likelihood of manipulated bills by about fifteen percentage points. Passengers' perceived income seems to have no effect on fraud.

We develop a model where: (i) banks take deposits and make investments; (ii) their liabilities facilitate third-party transactions. Other models have (i) or (ii), not both, although we argue they are intimately connected: we show that they both emerge from limited commitment. We describe an environment, characterize desirable allocations, and interpret the outcomes as banking arrangements. Banks are essential: without them, the set of feasible allocations is inferior. As a technical contribution, we characterize dynamically optimal credit allocations with frictions, show they involve backloading, and analyse how this interacts with banking. We also confront the theory with economic history.

When determining a stock to buy, Strahilevitz et al. (2011) demonstrate that individual investors often repurchase a stock previously traded for a profit as a learning process. When evaluating a decision, people use the most available information that comes to mind. We posit that the most recently sold stocks are the most salient. Our analysis reveals that the presence of another more recently sold stock decreases a household’s propensity to repurchase a different stock by 23%. This recency effect dominates the impact of prior profitability on the repurchasing decision. The repurchase activity of investors appears to be sub-optimal, partially due to commission costs and under-diversification of portfolios, which is magnified for households repurchasing at higher frequencies. More sophisticated investors demonstrate less of this behavior.

Empirical research on the effect of bank competition on bank risk has so far produced very inconclusive results. In this paper we revisit this long-standing debate and propose a new empirical approach that is concentrated on the relationship between deposit market competition and bank risk. This approach closely follows the traditional theoretical views of the competition and risk relationship and is focused on testing the classical moral hazard problem of the bank: deposit market competition raises the optimal risk choice of the bank by raising the costs of bank liabilities. Since banks can substitute between retail and wholesale funding, we relate deposit market competition to wholesale market conditions and examine their joint effect on the risk of bank assets. The analysis is based on a unique, comprehensive dataset, which combines retail deposit rate data with data on bank characteristics and data on local deposit market features for a sample of 589 US banks. Our results support the notion of a risk-enhancing effect of deposit market competition.

We propose a dynamic framework which encompasses the main risks in balance sheets of banks in an integrated fashion. Our contributions are fourfold: (1) solving a simple one-period model that describes the optimal bank policy under credit risk; (2) estimating the long-term stochastic processes underlying the risk factors in the balance sheet, taking into account the credit and interest rate cycles; (3) simulating several scenarios for interest rates and charge-offs; and (4) describing the equations that govern the evolution of the balance sheet in the long run. The models that we use address momentum and the interaction between different rates. Our results enable simulation of bank balance sheets over time given a bank’s lending strategy and provides a basis for an optimization model to determine bank asset–liability management strategy endogenously.