The reciprocal relationship between systemic risk and real economic activity

The contribution of this paper to the literature is three-fold: (1) it empirically uncovers the directionality and persistence of systemic risk surrounding "the great recession"; (2) it quantifies the reaction of the macro-economy to financial (banking) system shocks; and (3) it unearths feedback effects from the macro-economy to the (in)stability of a banking system. These contributions are attained by looking at the extremal dependence structure among banks, by presenting a multivariate framework for identifying and modeling their joint-tail distributions, and by constructing an aggregate system-wide distress index, a risk-stability index, which quantifies the systemic risk of a bank.Persistence, distress, contagion, panel VAR

How Does Financial Openness Affect Economic Growth and its Components?

This paper aims at uncovering the different channels through which de facto financial openness affects economic growth and its components. The results herein indicate that de facto measures of financial openness (as proxied by different types of capital inflows) stimulate economic growth. In particular, the results indicate that higher levels of FDI inflows stimulate GDP per worker growth and crowd-in domestic investment for developing and emerging markets. As far as developed economies, I find that higher levels of both FDI and Portfolio-type inflows improve GDP per worker growth, but that only the latter type of capital stimulates capital accumulation with crowding-in effects. The one similarity between developed and developing economies is that FDI positively affects total factor productivity in both cases.Capital account liberalization, capital flows, dynamic panels, foreign direct investment, total factor productivity

Can Financial Openness Help Avoid Currency Crises?

By introducing the concept of conditional probability of joint failure (CPJF), and by proposing a new measure for the systemic impact of currency crises, we provide new insights into the different sources of currency crises. We conclude that financial openness helps to diminish the probability of a currency crisis even after controlling for the onset of a banking crisis, that systemic currency crises mainly exist regionally, and that monetary policy geared towards price stability reduces the probability of a currency crisis.Systemic Crises, Systemic Impact, Exchange Market Pressure, Extreme Value Theory, Financial Openness.

Averting Currency Crises: The Pros and Cons of Financial Openness

We identify the benefits and costs of financial openness in terms of currency crises based on a novel quantification of the systemic impact of currency (financial) crises. We find that systemic currency crises mainly exist regionally, and that financial openness helps diminish the probability of a currency crisis after controlling for their systemic impact. To clarify further the effect of financial openness, we decompose it into the various types of capital inflows. We find that the reduction of the probability of a currency crisis depends on the type of capital and on the region. Finally yet importantly, we find that monetary policy geared towards price stability, through a flexible inflation target that takes into account systemic impact, reduces the probability of a currency crisis.Exchange market pressure, systemic risk, capital flows

Physics-Based Statistical Learning in Thermoacoustics

Thermoacoustic oscillations arise because of the interaction between acoustic waves inside a duct or a combustion chamber, and heat release rate oscillations at the flame or heater location. When certain conditions are met, these oscillations may grow significantly in time and cause severe problems, particularly in gas turbines used for propulsion, i.e. in systems characterized by high powers. Thermoacoustic oscillations are extremely sensitive to small changes in the system geometry, parameters, and boundary conditions. For this reason, it is challenging to build quantitatively-accurate models that are general. In this thesis, we propose to generate physics-based qualitatively-accurate reduced-order models, which are general, and then tune their parameters so that they become quantitatively accurate to describe the system under investigation. To do this, we use statistical learning techniques in combination with an experimental dataset consisting of O(10^6) datapoints. The dataset is obtained from more than 210 hours of automated experiments on an electrically-heated vertical Rijke tube. We use the ensemble Kalman filter to infer the parameters of a conjugate heat transfer model driven by natural convection. Then we use the Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method to infer the parameters of a linear acoustic model that is driven by the thermoacoustic mechanism and damped by visco-thermal dissipation and by radiation from the ends of the tube. We perform experiments only on the fully-assembled system, rather than on its individual components. We learn model parameters sequentially by using posterior values and uncertainties from early experiments as prior values and uncertainties for later experiments. With access to parameter uncertainties available with the MCMC, we quantitatively compare the marginal likelihood of the data for four tuned heat release rate models, thus finding the best performing model. Because it is physics-based, we find that the best model is quantitatively accurate, with known error bounds, significantly beyond the range of the training set. This process successfully combines physics-based modelling with data-driven methods in order to turn a qualitatively-accurate model into a quantitatively-accurate model, which is a significant challenge in thermoacoustics.The project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No. 766264

Migration Robots: Dialogue, the Space in Between, the Section of a Construct That Does Not Exist

This essay is written under several assumptions, which give me the opportunity to establish a platform of reference for my work, my work within my practice and the work within my academic studio

Modelos y teorías computacionales de la memoria humana: un estado de la cuestión y análisis crítico

Las funciones de la memoria están íntimamente ligadas a todos los procesos cognitivos humanos. El estudio de la memoria humana está sumido en un sinnúmero de teorías y modelos de toda índole, por lo que es necesario aclarar el panorama de estudio para crear mejores aplicaciones en educación y en otras áreas relacionadas. Este artículo sobre modelos y teorías computacionales de la memoria es parte de una línea de investigación en memoria humana que busca crear un estado de la cuestión sobre el peso de los estudios actuales en el área. Se realiza una revisión crítica de 37 artículos sobre computación y memoria utilizando un instrumento de análisis que se ha denominado "tamiz". Se identifican los aspectos más relevantes encontrados en estos artículos y se concluye con unas observaciones generales sobre lo encontrado. Los resultados muestran que hay una gran dependencia a la utilización de la metáfora computacional de la mente para explicar los procesos cognitivos de los seres humanos

Unlocking the Value of Cross-Border Mergers and Acquisitions

Most FDI takes place between the developed countries, which suggests that the market-seeking motive is important for understanding FDI. However, given the stylized fact that trade barriers (e.g. transportation costs and financial barriers) have declined over the past 20 years, models that aim to explain market-seeking FDI tend to predict a decline in FDI. Neary (2008) offers two explanations for this puzzle: (1) the export platform motive (where firms gain access to an integrated market by investing in one of the “integrated” countries); (2) Neary’s (2007) GOLE model, which explains cross-border mergers and acquisitions (this model is of interest since most FDI comes in the form of M&As). By using a gravity framework, where we also deal with the “zero gravity problem”, we confirm the predictions of the GOLE model.cross-border M&As, financial openness, economic integration

La intervención grupal de índole orientadora: demandas de sentido y competencias para el ejercicio profesional

Este artículo hace referencia a los aprendizajes obtenidos a partir de la reflexión sobre el trabajo realizado en una intervención orientadora, ejecutada de manera participativa con un grupo de hombres con VIH/Sida residentes en el Hogar Nuestra Señora de la Esperanza en Cartago, con la cual se buscaba obtener información acerca de su realidad y aportar a su bienestar emocional. Se hace alusión a los argumentos que dieron pie a dicha intervención, al posicionamiento epistemológico, teórico y metodológico asumido por la facilitadora y se presenta el prototipo de acción que se construye para tal fin. Se delimitan algunas demandas de sentido y se esbozan ciertas competencias necesarias para una intervención orientadora de tipo grupal, a la vez se abordan algunos elementos de la comunicación que resultan importantes para este tipo de intervención y se sugieren ciertos patrones de relación e interacción que deben evitarse para obtener los beneficios potenciales de procesos de dicha índole. Estos aspectos amplían los referentes teóricos y metodológicos para la intervención, lo cual constituye un insumo importante para la actualización profesional, de manera que se aporta a la Orientación como disciplina y profesión

Towards a fuzzy logic model for chemical risk assessment by inhalation in laboratories

ConferenciaThis paper presents a computational Fuzzy Logic Model for chemical hazards risk assessment by inhalation in laboratories. Some influence factors on chemical risk are deterministic but not completely measurable. As a result, this research focusses on Fuzzy Logic, instead of a probabilistic approach. Data for simulation is based on a hypothetical but completely realistic laboratory. Dependency on time has been identified as an important factor, describing events on the laboratory installation. Exposure levels for individual factors, labor hours and general health overcome current known strategies used on risk assessment. These conditions are included in the proposed model