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Journal Article
Are stock returns different over weekends? a jump diffusion analysis of the \"weekend effect\"
The distribution of returns on common stocks is, arguably, one of the most widely studied financial market characteristics. The performance of stock prices during breaks in trading has received considerable attention in recent years, especially since the advent of "circuit breakers" designed to create stability when markets are chaotic. This study examines the distribution of daily returns on five popular stock price indices, with a special emphasis on the difference between returns over weekends and returns over adjacent intraweek trading days. The author revisits the "weekend effect" in ...
Journal Article
Margin requirements across equity-related instruments: how level is the playing field?
Investors can participate in the returns on the Standard and Poor's 500 composite index in a variety of ways, and these alternatives exist because they differ in important respects. This article assesses one dimension of these differences-margin requirements. ; Focusing on equity-related instruments, the author develops a model to simulate the values arising from several identical positions obtained by combinations of stocks and stock derivatives. The results are then used to assess the costs of margin requirements on alternative strategies. The primary conclusion is that the playing field is ...
Journal Article
The municipal bond market, Part I: politics, taxes, and yields
This article assesses recent changes in the structure of the municipal bond market. It reviews the tax legislation, judicial interpretations, and other factors that affect the yield on municipal bonds. These factors are then employed in a statistical analysis of the determinants of municipal bond yields. ; The results of the analysis show that the ratio of yield to maturity on municipal bonds to yields on U.S. Treasury bonds (the interest rate ratio) has varied greatly in the past two decades and is greater for longer maturities. They also show that debate during 1986 about tax reform ...
Journal Article
The municipal bond market, part II: problems and policies
Why does Congress allow municipal interest payments to be exempted from federal income taxes in the face of a very large chronic deficit in the federal budget, even though no constitutional provision requires that this tax policy continue? The rhetoric of tax exemption is philosophical, appealing to notions of appropriate intergovernmental relations and, in particular, to the doctrine of reciprocal immunity: no level of government should use its taxing authority to impose harm on another level. ; But the true force behind tax exemption is that it provides states and local governments with a ...
Journal Article
Living with the d-word
Journal Article
Mutual funds, part I: reshaping the American financial system
Since the mid 1980s the mutual fund industry has enjoyed explosive growth in the number of funds, the types of funds available, and total assets under management. Much of this growth is the result of the increasing convenience offered to owners of long-term assets. Mutual funds offer portfolio diversification and financial research unavailable to the individual investor. They do this in an economical way through economies of scale, and they provide liquidity not available to the owner of individual shares or debt instruments. It should come as no surprise that the proportion of equity and ...
Journal Article
Is margin lending marginal?
Discussion Paper
Pension accounting and corporate earnings: the world according to GAAP
This study?s underlying premise is that current pension plan accounting has two important negative effects. First, it distorts the measurement of earnings and net worth in the short run, as well as the pattern of earnings over future periods. Second, this distortion can send incorrect signals to investors about a firm?s health, resulting in the mispricing of a firm?s outstanding debt and equity instruments. The author demonstrates how these distortions are introduced, examines the magnitude of the distortions, and discusses proposals for reform.
Journal Article
Stock market crashes: what have we learned from October 1987?
Perhaps the most widely held view of the Crash of 1987 is the Cascade Theory: the Crash emerged from the interaction of stock prices with new financial strategies such as program trading and portfolio insurance, which use new financial instruments including stock index options and futures. According to this view, a decline in stock prices initiated by fundamental factors led to an overreaction in stock index futures prices, due largely to portfolio insurance. This, in turn, created a negative spread between stock prices and futures prices, hence encouraging a further decline in stock prices ...
Journal Article
Financial planning engines: motoring toward a better future