On the price of morals in markets: an empirical study of the Swedish AP-Funds and the Norwegian Government Pension Fund

This study empirically analyses the exclusion of companies from investors’ investment universe due to a company’s business model (sector-based exclusion) or due to a company’s violations of international norms (normbased exclusion). We conduct a time-series analysis of the performance implications of the exclusion decisions of two leading Nordic investors, Norway’s Government Pension Fund-Global (GPFG) and Sweden’s AP-funds. We find that their portfolios of excluded companies do not generate an abnormal return relative to the funds’ benchmark index. While the exclusion portfolios show higher risk than the respective benchmark, this difference is only statistically significant for the case of GPFG. These findings suggest that the exclusion of the companies generally does not harm funds’ performance. We interpret these findings as indicative that with exclusionary screening, as practiced by the sample funds, asset owners can meet the ethical objectives of their beneficiaries without compromising financial returns

State pension funds and corporate social responsibility: do beneficiaries’ political values influence funds’ investment decisions?

This study explores the underlying drivers of US public pension funds’ tendency to tilt their portfolios towards companies with stronger corporate social responsibility (CSR). Studying the equity holdings of large, internally-managed US state pension funds, we find evidence that the political leaning of their beneficiaries and political pressures by state politicians affect funds’ investment decisions. State pension funds from states with Democratic-leaning beneficiaries tilt their portfolios more strongly towards companies that perform well on CSR issues, and this tendency is intensified when the state government is dominated by Democratic state politicians. Moreover, we find that funds which tilt their portfolios towards companies with superior CSR scores generate a slightly higher return compared with their counterparts. Overall, our findings indicate that funds align their investment choices with the financial and non-financial interests of their beneficiaries when deciding whether to incorporate CSR into their equity allocations

Non-Standard Errors

In statistics, samples are drawn from a population in a data-generating process (DGP). Standard errors measure the uncertainty in estimates of population parameters. In science, evidence is generated to test hypotheses in an evidence-generating process (EGP). We claim that EGP variation across researchers adds uncertainty: Non-standard errors (NSEs). We study NSEs by letting 164 teams test the same hypotheses on the same data. NSEs turn out to be sizable, but smaller for better reproducible or higher rated research. Adding peer-review stages reduces NSEs. We further find that this type of uncertainty is underestimated by participants

Non-standard errors

In statistics, samples are drawn from a population in a data-generating process (DGP). Standard errors measure the uncertainty in estimates of population parameters. In science, evidence is generated to test hypotheses in an evidence generating process (EGP). We claim that EGP variation across researchers adds uncertainty: Non-standard errors (NSEs). We study NSEs by letting 164 teams test the same hypotheses on the same data. NSEs turn out to be sizable, but smaller for better reproducible or higher rated research. Adding peer-review stages reduces NSEs. We further find that this type of uncertainty is underestimated by participants

Empirical evidence on periodically collapsing stock price bubbles

According to the dividend discount model (DDM), a long run relationship should exist between stock prices and dividends. In this study, in order to test the validity of the DDM on the French, German, Japanese, UK and US stock markets from 1973 to 2002, cointegration tests corrected for skewness and excess kurtosis are implemented. As dividends distribution may be affected by stock repurchases strategies, the test is adjusted by taking earnings into account. It is found that the speculative bubble hypothesis cannot be rejected.

Une application de la formule de Jarrow et Rudd aux options sur indice CAC 40.

L'objectif de cet article est de verifier s'il est possible d'ameliorer l'evaluation des options sur indice CAC 40 grace a une meilleure estimation des parametres d'asymetrie et d'aplatissement de la fonction de distribution de l'actif sous-jacent.FIXATION DU PRIX ; MODELES ; PREVISIONS

Relations intrajournalieres entre l'indice CAC 40 et les options sur indice. Quel est le marche prefere des investisseurs informes ?

L'objet de cet article est de tester la presence de causalite lineaire et non-lineaire au sens de Granger entre l'indice CAC 40 et les options sur indice en 1997 et 1998. Nos resultats indiquent que le marche au comptant precede le marche des options de 20 a 30 minutes, signe que le MONEP n'est pas domine par la presence d'investisseurs informes. Nous trouvons egalement des interactions non-lineaires significatives entre les marches, revelatrices de l'activite des arbitragistes.INFORMATION ; INVESTISSEMENTS ; MARCHE FINANCIER