OPTIMAL MONETARY POLICY AND FINANCIAL STABILITY IN A NON‐RICARDIAN ECONOMY

I present a model with discontinuous asset‐market participation (DAMP), where all agents are non‐Ricardian, and where heterogeneity among market participants implies financial‐wealth effects on aggregate consumption. The implied welfare criterion shows that financial stability arises as an additional and independent target, besides inflation and output stability. Evaluation of optimal policy under discretion and commitment reveals that price stability may no longer be optimal, even absent inefficient supply shocks: some fluctuations in output and inflation may be optimal as long as they reduce financial instability. Ignoring the heterogeneity among market participants may lead monetary policy to induce substantially higher welfare losses.     

Financial Intermediaries and Markets

A complex financial system comprises both financial markets and financial intermediaries. We distinguish financial intermediaries according to whether they issue complete contingent contracts or incomplete contracts. Intermediaries such as banks that issue incomplete contracts, e.g., demand deposits, are subject to runs, but this does not imply a market failure. A sophisticated financial system—a system with complete markets for aggregate risk and limited market participation—is incentive‐efficient, if the intermediaries issue complete contingent contracts, or else constrained‐efficient, if they issue incomplete contracts. We argue that there may be a role for regulating liquidity provision in an economy in which markets for aggregate risks are incomplete.     

Financial Market Globalization,Symmetry‐Breaking,and Endogenous Inequality of Nations

This paper investigates the effects of financial market globalization on the inequality of nations. The world economy consists of inherently identical countries, which differ only in their levels of capital stock. Each country is represented by the standard overlapping generations model, modified only to incorporate credit market imperfection. An integration of financial markets affects the set of stable steady states, as it changes the balance between the equalizing force of the diminishing returns technology and the unequalizing force of the wealth‐dependent borrowing constraint. The model is tractable enough to allow for a complete characterization of the stable steady states. In the absence of the international financial market, the world economy has a unique steady state, which is symmetric and stable. In the presence of the international financial market, symmetry‐breaking occurs under some conditions. That is, the symmetric steady state loses its stability and stable asymmetric steady states come to exist. In the stable asymmetric steady states, the world economy is endogenously divided into the rich and poor countries; the borrowing constraints are binding in the poor but not in the rich; the world output is smaller, the rich are richer and the poor are poorer in any of the stable asymmetric steady states than in the (unstable) symmetric steady state.     

INSTITUTION‐INDUCED PRODUCTIVITY DIFFERENCES AND PATTERNS OF INTERNATIONAL CAPITAL FLOWS

This paper studies theoretically how the cross‐country differences in the institutional quality (IQ) of domestic credit markets shape the patterns of international capital flows when such IQ differences also cause productivity differences across countries. IQ affects productivity by changing productivity–agency‐cost trade‐offs across heterogeneous investment projects. Such institution‐induced productivity differences are shown to have effects on the investment and capital flows that are opposite of exogenous productivity differences. This implies that the overall effect of IQ could generate U‐shaped responses of the investment and capital flows. Among other things, this means that capital could flow from middle‐income countries to both low‐income and high‐income countries, and that, starting from a very low IQ, a country could experience both a growth and a current account surplus after a successful institutional reform. More generally, the results here provide some cautions when interpreting the empirical evidence on the role of productivity differences and institutional differences on capital flows. It also calls into question the validity of treating the degree of financial frictions as a proxy for the quality of financial institutions, as commonly done in the literature.     

A Quantitative Theory of Unsecured Consumer Credit with Risk of Default

We study, theoretically and quantitatively, the general equilibrium of an economy in which households smooth consumption by means of both a riskless asset and unsecured loans with the option to default. The default option resembles a bankruptcy filing under Chapter 7 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. Competitive financial intermediaries offer a menu of loan sizes and interest rates wherein each loan makes zero profits. We prove the existence of a steady‐state equilibrium and characterize the circumstances under which a household defaults on its loans. We show that our model accounts for the main statistics regarding bankruptcy and unsecured credit while matching key macroeconomic aggregates, and the earnings and wealth distributions. We use this model to address the implications of a recent policy change that introduces a form of “means testing” for households contemplating a Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing. We find that this policy change yields large welfare gains.     

OPTIMAL EXCHANGE RATES: A MARKET MICROSTRUCTURE APPROACH

Motivated by the observation that exchange‐rate management resembles market‐making, we use microstructure theory to conduct a welfare analysis of exchange‐rate management, including the “corner solutions” of a free float and a fixed peg. We show that a policy that smoothes out exchange‐rate fluctuations needs to trade off the welfare gain due to lower risk exposure of local producers against the trading losses that the policy would generate due to speculation. We identify the conditions under which exchange‐rate management can increase welfare and argue that these conditions are more likely to be satisfied in illiquid markets, mainly small economies and emerging markets. We also explore the role of a Tobin tax (assuming enforceability) in facilitating exchange‐rate management. (JEL: E58, F31, G14, O24)     

UNDERSTANDING THE EVOLUTION OF THE US WAGE DISTRIBUTION: A THEORETICAL ANALYSIS

In this paper, we propose an analytically tractable overlapping‐generations model of human capital accumulation and study its implications for the evolution of the US wage distribution from 1970 to 2000. The key feature of the model, and the only source of heterogeneity, is that individuals differ in their ability to accumulate human capital. Therefore, wage inequality results only from differences in human capital accumulation. We examine the response of this model to skill‐biased technical change (SBTC) theoretically. We show that in response to SBTC, the model generates behavior consistent with some prominent trends observed in the US data including (i) a rise in overall wage inequality both in the short run and long run, (ii) an initial fall in the education premium followed by a strong recovery, leading to a higher premium in the long run, (iii) the fact that most of this fall and rise takes place among younger workers, (iv) a rise in within‐group inequality, (v) stagnation in median wage growth (and a slowdown in aggregate labor productivity), and (vi) a rise in consumption inequality that is much smaller than the rise in wage inequality. These results suggest that the heterogeneity in the ability to accumulate human capital is an important feature for understanding the effects of SBTC and interpreting the transformation of the US labor markets since the 1970s.     

UNINSURED COUNTERCYCLICAL RISK: AN AGGREGATION RESULT AND APPLICATION TO OPTIMAL MONETARY POLICY

We consider an incomplete markets economy with capital accumulation and endogenous labor supply. Individuals face countercyclical idiosyncratic labor and asset risk. We derive conditions under which the aggregate allocations and price system can be found by solving a representative agent problem. This result is applied to analyze the properties of an optimal monetary policy in a New Keynesian economy with uninsured countercyclical individual risk. The optimal monetary policy that emerges from our incomplete markets economy is the same as the optimal monetary policy in a representative agent model with preference shocks. When price rigidity is the only friction the optimal monetary policy calls for stabilizing the inflation rate at zero.     

全球金融危机下的股票市场波动跳跃研究——基于高频数据的中美比较分析

本文以雷曼破产日至2009年1月底这段时期内上证综指、恒生指数以及S&P500指数的日内高频数据作为研究对象,采用跳跃显著性检验方法和扩展HAR模型,对波动跳跃特征进行了实证研究.结果表明:雷曼危机导致股市波动的显著提高,但中国内地股市受到的影响最小;中国香港股市成为波动跳跃发生频率最高、跳跃幅度最大的市场,且波动跳跃主要发生在夜间休市时间内;雷曼危机使得波动率模型的预测精度大大降低,股市风险变得更加难以预测,对于新兴市场来说这一现象更加明显.     

Channel Strategies for Durable Goods: Coexistence of Selling and Leasing to Individual and Corporate Consumers

In durable goods markets, such as those for automobiles or computers, the coexistence of selling and leasing is common as is the existence of both corporate and individual consumers. Leases to corporate consumers affect the price of used goods on the second‐hand market which in turn affect the buying and leasing behavior of individual consumers. The setting of prices (or volumes) for sale and lease to individual and corporate consumers is a complicated problem for manufacturers. We consider a manufacturer who concurrently sells and leases a finitely durable good to both individual and corporate consumers. The interaction between the manufacturer and consumers is modeled as a dynamic sequential game, where each player seeks to maximize its own payoff over an infinite horizon. We study how the corporate channel substitutability of new goods and used goods and transaction costs in the second‐hand market affect the manufacturer's pricing decisions, consumer behavior, and social welfare in the retail market. Making a number of simplifying assumptions, including two‐period lifetime for the finitely durable goods, we consider Markov Perfect Equilibrium as the solution concept. We show that the manufacturer can maximize her profit by segmenting consumers according to their willingness to pay. Selling and leasing are the mechanisms used for price discrimination in the retail market. We show that as she leases a larger share of her production to the corporate consumer, (1) the manufacturer does not necessarily have to adjust the optimal selling price of new goods to individual consumers, and the volume of sales of new goods to individual consumers can stay the same; (2) the manufacturer does increase the retail lease price, and the number of individual leases decreases; (3) the net supply of used goods on the market increases, leading to a lower market price for used goods; and (4) more individual consumers are able to participate in the market, and their collective welfare or net utility improves. We also show that as production costs increase the manufacturer increases prices, reducing volumes across all channels. When transaction costs increase, the manufacturer reduces leasing in both corporate and retail channels.     

Korreferat zum Beitrag: Hanno Merkt,Die Rolle des Bilanzrechts in der aktuellen Corporate Governance-Diskussion

Objective of my discussion is to assess the findings of Hanno Merkt and to provide some suggestions regarding several of the discussed issues. The coactions of company law and capital market regulation as well as codices pertaining to accounting and corporate governance as mentioned by Hanno Merkt call for a differentiated approach. In particular, a distinction regarding capital market orientation of companies as well as regarding differing purposes of individual and consolidated financial statements has to be made. Also, I encourage the research community to discuss the company’s management and monitoring philosophy (“Unternehmensinteresse”) and its enforcement in more detail (again). In my opinion, financial reporting serves the purpose of accountability and therefore is—in this sense—only a part of corporate governance in the area of capital markets.     

基于协高阶矩检验体系的中国资本市场开放与风险传染效应研究

近年来,我国资本市场的开放不断向全面纵深推进,但有关这一进程中风险传染的研究却存在诸多待改进之处。以2000年后我国资本市场开放的若干重大事件为节点,运用协高阶矩风险传染检验体系,对我国资本市场与国际主要资本市场之间的风险传染状况及动态趋势进行了全面系统的考察,取得的主要结论包括：我国资本市场与国际主要资本市场之间的风险传染更多发生在波动、偏度和峰度等高阶矩层面;全球主要资本市场对我国资本市场的风险传染经历了上升—下跌—上升的非线性过程,其间,2006年合格境内机构投资者(QDII)正式进军国际市场和2018年A股正式纳入MSCI指数体系,对我国资本市场与国际主要资本市场之间的风险传染具有极为重要的影响;各国(地区)资本市场对我国资本市场的风险传染呈现聚集性,并在我国实施各类资本市场开放政策的前期更为显著;中国香港市场和日本市场对我国内地市场的风险传染效应最为显著,而2018年A股正式成为全球配资标的后,美国市场对我国内地市场的影响跃居第一,美国市场的影响力随着资本市场的逐渐开放而日益凸显。     

LIQUIDITY AND INEFFICIENT INVESTMENT

We study consumer liquidity in a general equilibrium model where the friction is the nonpledgeability of future income. Liquidity helps to overcome the absence of a double coincidence of wants. Consumers over‐hoard liquidity and the resulting competitive equilibrium is constrained inefficient. Fiscal policy following a large negative shock can increase ex‐ante welfare. If the government cannot commit, the ex‐post optimal fiscal policy will be too small from an ex‐ante perspective. The model throws light on the holding of foreign reserves in international markets.     

社会保险与家庭金融风险资产投资

社会保险是否影响家庭在金融风险资产中的投资决策呢?本文使用两期家庭最优决策模型得到的理论分析结果表明,社会保险不仅能够提高家庭在风险资产中的投资广度和深度,而且对于不确定性更大、风险承受更强家庭的影响更为显著.基于省级层面得到的宏观实证检验结果和基于2011年家庭金融调查数据得到家庭层面的微观实证检验结果都支持了上述理论结论.本文的发现对于协调社会保险发展和建立多层级金融市场具有很强的政策意义.     

INSULATION IMPOSSIBLE: MONETARY POLICY AND REGIONAL DEBT SPILLOVERS IN A FEDERATION

This paper studies the effects of monetary policy in the presence of debt spillovers within a monetary union. When capital markets are integrated, the fiscal policy of any member country will generally influence equilibrium wages and interest rates across the whole union. We ask whether there exists a monetary policy which can offset these spillovers. Within a general class of monetary policy rules, there does not exist one that completely insulates agents in one region from fiscal policy in the other. These debt spillovers will affect welfare through two channels: intertemporal efficiency and redistribution.     

跨部门金融机构系统重要性和共振效应的动态演化研究——基于中国A股市场的实证

金融机构由于其规模性和关联性对金融系统稳定有着举足轻重的作用。本文基于金融机构异质性风险下的收益，通过Granger因果引导关系构建金融部门的关联网络，从机构中心性、关联性和系统紧密性分析不同市场状态下银行、证券、保险和信托部门内和跨部门间的关联网络动态演化，并在关联分析的基础上引入规模指标，对金融机构的系统重要性进行综合评价。研究发现，我国金融系统的整体性和关联性日趋增强，系统内各部门之间和单一部门内金融机构联系都日趋紧密，跨部门间系统共振效应不断增强；银行和证券部门的影响力显著高于保险和信托部门，银行和保险部门的Granger影响力在熊市时相对增强，牛市时相对减弱，证券和信托部门的影响力则恰好相反；从多角度分析金融共振效应，最终给出我国金融机构系统重要性的分层级评价。结果不仅可以为金融机构的监管和系统性风险的控制提供参考依据，也可以对资本市场投资提供借鉴意义。     

Insurer Competition in Health Care Markets

The impact of insurer competition on welfare, negotiated provider prices, and premiums in the U.S. private health care industry is theoretically ambiguous. Reduced competition may increase the premiums charged by insurers and their payments made to hospitals. However, it may also strengthen insurers' bargaining leverage when negotiating with hospitals, thereby generating offsetting cost decreases. To understand and measure this trade‐off, we estimate a model of employer‐insurer and hospital‐insurer bargaining over premiums and reimbursements, household demand for insurance, and individual demand for hospitals using detailed California admissions, claims, and enrollment data. We simulate the removal of both large and small insurers from consumers' choice sets. Although consumer welfare decreases and premiums typically increase, we find that premiums can fall upon the removal of a small insurer if an employer imposes effective premium constraints through negotiations with the remaining insurers. We also document substantial heterogeneity in hospital price adjustments upon the removal of an insurer, with renegotiated price increases and decreases of as much as 10% across markets.     

多国股票市场的高频波动相关性研究

本文通过建立包含马尔科夫机制转换结构的MS-MHAR-DCC模型，并选取世界上比较发达的国家和地区股票市场的高频日内交易数据为样本，对多个股票市场波动相关性进行研究。通过引入包含马尔科夫结构的外部随机矩阵，本文识别出金融市场波动相关的截断时期，正态分布设定下相比在t分布设定下识别的截断时期更多且持续时间更长。在模型的截断时期内，多个股票市场的波动相关结构主要受到正向冲击，即在截断时期内的波动相关性大于平常状态的波动相关性。本文还发现，相同地域的股票市场间的动态波动相关性在大部分时期内表现为较强的正相关；美国股票市场和其余5个国家股票市场波动的动态相关性在大部分时期都表现为较强的正相关，表明美国作为全球巨头在世界金融市场波动的引导作用。     

金融投资中的教育溢价及其性别异质性——基于P2P网贷投资的实证检验

通过匹配出来的P2P网贷投资中关于投资者个人特征和投资结果的数据,本文从投资的成功率、违约率、收益率三方面检验了P2P网贷投资中的教育溢价及教育溢价的性别异质性。研究首先发现在金融投资绩效上存在显著的性别差异和教育溢价,男性在投资成功率和投资收益率上占优,女性在违约风险识别上占优。教育溢价效应在提高投资成功率、降低违约风险和提高投资收益率上均有体现。进一步的检验结果表明,教育溢价效应存在性别异质性,受教育水平的提高进一步提升了女性投资者在违约风险识别上的能力和男性投资者对投资机会上的把握能力以及投资收益上的获取能力。这意味着教育在整体改善投资绩效的同时,强化了男女性各自的优势,使得原有的性别差异进一步扩大。这些结论对于理解教育在金融投资中的作用及其异质性效果具有一定启示意义。     

内部资本市场存在性、有效性及其公平性的理论演绎

文章构建了大股东控制下的企业集团内部资金借贷优化模型,推导并演绎了内部资本市场的存在性、有效性和公平性。研究发现,理想型内部资本市场实现了资本配置的最优化,形成参与博弈各方"共赢"的局面;附加冲突成本的效率型内部资本市场在一定条件下存在和有效,可以持续维持参与博弈各方的持续合作,实现社会福利的增加;利益输送型内部资本市场资本配置扭曲,有损效率性和公平性,并且不可持续。本文的结论可以为实证研究提供理论依据。