Credit default swaps:what are the social benefi ts and costs?

Credit default swaps (CDSs) are derivative contracts that allow agents to shift the risk of default on an underlying credit from a credit protection buyer to a credit protection seller. Like other derivatives they are standardised relative to the underlying cash markets and in this way can help promote market liquidity. This in turn can facilitate risk shifting and price discovery. In this way they may lead to accurate pricing of credit risk and ultimately to the reduced costs of borrowing. However, like other derivatives it is possible that CDS contracts could play a part in market manipulations, especially when the underlying cash market is not transparent. This is a potential cost of CDS trading that should be weighed against potential benefi ts of liquidity, risk shifting and price discovery. We discuss the balance of these trade-offs in the context of singlename corporate CDSs, index CDSs, sovereign CDSs and CDSs on structured credit product tranches. We also discuss other potential costs of CDS trading including that they “make selling short too cheap” and that they may create market instability by facilitating speculative attacks.

Bose Fluids Above Tc: Incompressible Vortex Fluids and "Supersolidity"

This paper emphasizes that non-linear rotational or diamagnetic susceptibility is characteristic of Bose fluids above their superfluid Tcs, and for sufficiently slow rotation or weak B-fields amounts to an incompressible response to vorticity. The cause is a missing term in the conventionally accepted model Hamiltonian for quantized vortices in the Bose fluid. The resulting susceptibility can account for recent observations of Chan et al on solid He, and Ong et al on cuprate superconductors

Vacuum Polarisation and the Black Hole Singularity

In order to investigate the effects of vacuum polarisation on mass inflation singularities, we study a simple toy model of a charged black hole with cross flowing radial null dust which is homogeneous in the black hole interior. In the region $r^2 \ll e^2$ we find an approximate analytic solution to the classical field equations. The renormalized stress-energy tensor is evaluated on this background and we find the vacuum polarisation backreaction corrections to the mass function $m(r)$. Asymptotic analysis of the semiclassical mass function shows that the mass inflation singularity is much stronger in the presence of vacuum polarisation than in the classical case.Comment: 12 pages, RevTe

Particle-hole symmetry breaking in the pseudogap state of Pb0.55Bi1.5Sr1.6La0.4CuO6+d: A quantum-chemical perspective

Two Bi2201 model systems are employed to demonstrate how, beside the Cu-O \sigma-band, a second band of purely O2p\pi character can be made to cross the Fermi level owing to its sensitivity to the local crystal field. This result is employed to explain the particle-hole symmetry breaking across the pseudo-gap recently reported by Shen and co-workers, see M. Hashimoto et al., Nature Physics 6, (2010) 414. Support for a two-bands-on-a-checkerboard candidate mechanism for High-Tc superconductivity is claimed.Comment: 25 pages, 8 figure

Mobile radio alternative systems study. Volume 1: Traffic model

The markets for mobile radio services in non-urban areas of the United States are examined for the years 1985-2000. Three market categories are identified. New Services are defined as those for which there are different expressed ideas but which are not now met by any application of available technology. The complete fulfillment of the needs requires nationwide radio access to vehicles without knowledge of vehicle location, wideband data transmission from remote sites, one- and two way exchange of short data and control messages between vehicles and dispatch or control centers, and automatic vehicle location (surveillance). The commercial and public services market of interest to the study is drawn from existing users of mobile radio in non-urban areas who are dissatisfied with the geographical range or coverage of their systems. The mobile radio telephone market comprises potential users who require access to the public switched telephone network in areas that are not likely to be served by the traditional growth patterns of terrestrial mobile telephone services. Conservative, likely, and optimistic estimates of the markets are presented in terms of numbers of vehicles that will be served and the radio traffic they will generate

Semiclassical charged black holes with a quantized massive scalar field

Semiclassical perturbations to the Reissner-Nordstrom metric caused by the presence of a quantized massive scalar field with arbitrary curvature coupling are found to first order in \epsilon = \hbar/M^2. The DeWitt-Schwinger approximation is used to determine the vacuum stress-energy tensor of the massive scalar field. When the semiclassical perturbation are taken into account, we find extreme black holes will have a charge-to-mass ratio that exceeds unity, as measured at infinity. The effects of the perturbations on the black hole temperature (surface gravity) are studied in detail, with particular emphasis on near extreme ``bare'' states that might become precisely zero temperature ``dressed'' semiclassical black hole states. We find that for minimally or conformally coupled scalar fields there are no zero temperature solutions among the perturbed black holes.Comment: 19 pages; 1 figure; ReVTe

Improving fertiliser management: redefining the relationship between soil tests and crop responses for wheat in WA

Most soils in Western Australia (WA) are highly weathered with very low levels of phosphorus. WA soils initially contained adequate indigenous soil potassium for cropping but removal of potassium over time in harvested grain has gradually resulted in the some soils becoming potassium-deficient for grain production. Fertiliser costs represent a significant part of the variable costs of growing crops in WA. Chen et al. (2009) identified the need for updated soil test interpretations due to substantial changes in farming systems, fertiliser practices and crop yield potential. The aims of this study were (1) to compile experimental data containing the standard soil test measurements and observed wheat crop yield responses for both nil and fertilised treatments across different soil types and seasons from published or unpublished sources, and (2) to critically analyse soil test-crop response relationships to derive better critical soil test values in soils and environments suitable for wheat grain production in WA

The origin of phase in the interference of Bose-Einstein condensates

We consider the interference of two overlapping ideal Bose-Einstein condensates. The usual description of this phenomenon involves the introduction of a so-called condensate wave functions having a definite phase. We investigate the origin of this phase and the theoretical basis of treating interference. It is possible to construct a phase state, for which the particle number is uncertain, but phase is known. However, how one would prepare such a state before an experiment is not obvious. We show that a phase can also arise from experiments using condensates in Fock states, that is, having known particle numbers. Analysis of measurements in such states also gives us a prescription for preparing phase states. The connection of this procedure to questions of ``spontaneously broken gauge symmetry'' and to ``hidden variables'' is mentioned.Comment: 22 pages 4 figure

Neutron irradiation of Am-241 effectively produces curium

Computer study was made on the production of multicurie amounts of highly alpha-active curium 242 from americium 241 irradiation. The information available includes curium 242 yields, curium composition, irradiation data, and production techniques and safeguards

Tridiagonalized GUE matrices are a matrix model for labeled mobiles

It is well-known that the number of planar maps with prescribed vertex degree distribution and suitable labeling can be represented as the leading coefficient of the $\frac{1}{N}$-expansion of a joint cumulant of traces of powers of an $N$-by-$N$ GUE matrix. Here we undertake the calculation of this leading coefficient in a different way. Firstly, we tridiagonalize the GUE matrix in the manner of Trotter and Dumitriu-Edelman and then alter it by conjugation to make the subdiagonal identically equal to $1$. Secondly, we apply the cluster expansion technique (specifically, the Brydges-Kennedy-Abdesselam-Rivasseau formula) from rigorous statistical mechanics. Thirdly, by sorting through the terms of the expansion thus generated we arrive at an alternate interpretation for the leading coefficient related to factorizations of the long cycle $(12\cdots n)\in S_n$. Finally, we reconcile the group-theoretical objects emerging from our calculation with the labeled mobiles of Bouttier-Di Francesco-Guitter.Comment: 42 pages, LaTeX, 17 figures. The present paper completely supercedes arXiv1203.3185 in terms of methods but addresses a different proble