By Topic

This Finance survey examines: It is appropriate advice for retail investors to tilt their portfolio away from the market portfolio towards factors that have been identified in the academic literature to earn positive abnormal returns relative to the Capital Asset Pricing Model 

This Finance survey examines (a) On 10 January 2024, the SEC approved spot Bitcoin exchange-traded products: https://www.sec.gov/news/statement/gensler-statement-spot-bitcoin-011023\ The SEC's approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded products makes investors overall measurably better off. 

This European survey examines (a) Creation of a more unified capital market in Europe - with a common pool of capital, a single rule book and a strengthened European Securities and Markets Authority, comparable to the US Securities and Exchange Commission – would lead to a substantial shift in the balance of companies listing their shares in the EU vis-a-vis the US; (b) Creation of a more unified capital market in Europe - with a common pool of capital, a single rule book and a strengthened European Securities and Markets Authority, comparable to the US Securities and Exchange Commission – would substantially increase the availability of funding for start-ups and growing companies across the EU 

This Finance survey examines (a) The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on working and shopping habits has not been fully priced into current private valuations of downtown commercial properties in major cities; (b) A continued fall in commercial real estate valuations would trigger another round of banking panic 

This US survey examines: A tolling program for New York City is out for public consultation with proposed charges on vehicles entering the central business district of Manhattan summarized here: https://new.mta.info/document/129191 (a) The proposed tolls on vehicles entering the central business district of Manhattan are likely to lead to a substantial reduction in traffic congestion in the targeted area; (b) The proposed tolls on vehicles entering Manhattan are likely to lead to a substantial increase in traffic congestion just outside the central business district, above 60th Street, in the outer boroughs and New Jersey 

This Finance survey examines (a) A bitcoin's value derives from the belief that others will want to use it, which implies that its purchasing power is likely to fluctuate over time to a degree that will limit its usefulness; b) A substantial source of the value of unbacked decentralized private cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, arises from their convenience for use in illegal activities; c) A properly diversified portfolio should include crypto assets 

This Finance survey examines (a) Despite the empirical failures of the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) in explaining expected stock returns, a shareholder-value maximizing publicly-traded firm should still use the CAPM to calculate the cost of equity in capital budgeting; (b) The equity risk premium that U.S. publicly traded firms should use in cost of equity calculations in April 2023 is above 6% 

In this Finance survey: Stock markets around the world have seen an increasing concentration of trades in or near the closing auction. In the US, for example, about a third of all S&P 500 stock trades are now executed in the final ten minutes of the session, up from 27% in 2021 (a) The increased concentration of trading in the final minutes of the trading day has a measurably detrimental effect on market quality; (b) Strict indexing implemented with trading at the close to avoid tracking error creates a measurable performance drag that could be avoided with more flexible passive strategies 

This European survey examines (a) A constitutional rule that limits the size of budget deficits that governments can run as a share of GDP is an effective way to impose discipline on a country’s public finances; (b) Germany’s debt brake is a substantial constraint on vital public investment in physical/digital infrastructure and the green transition