Reserve requirements: A modern perspective

The discussion in many money and banking textbooks would suggest that the Federal Reserve requires depository institutions to hold a minimum level of non-interest-earning reserves because (1) reserve requirements are a monetary policy tool that allows the Fed to expand the money supply and lower interest rates, and (2) reserve requirements improve the safety and soundness of depository institutions. This article argues that this "conventional wisdom" view is too narrow. ; The Fed often uses reserve requirement changes, the authors contend, to achieve non-monetary-policy objectives, as it did in 1992 to improve the profitability of depository institutions and ease the credit crunch of that time. The authors also challenge the notion that higher reserve requirements necessarily lead to greater safety and lower default risk for depository institutions. ; The article examines the relationship between reserve requirement changes and monetary policy, with the aim of demonstrating the recent, limited usefulness of reserve requirements as a monetary policy tool. The article proposes a more modern view of reserve requirements as a tax on depository institutions, ponders who really bears this tax, and summarizes a large and growing literature suggesting that perceived bank profitability is inversely affected by announced changes in reserve requirement ratios. The article also provides new evidence that the 1992 reserve requirement reductions were not associated with an increase in default risk for financial institutions that issue reservable instruments, as the conventional view would suggest.Monetary policy ; Financial institutions ; Bank reserves

A Validation Study of a Seismically Induced Ground Strain Model Using Strong Motion Array Data

This study concerns ground strains that result from spatially variable ground motions unrelated to ground failure. Prior empirical work shows a dependence of peak ground strain (PGS) on peak ground displacement (PGD) but is applicable only for weak motions (PGD \u3c 10 cm). Prior semi-empirical work, in which strains were evaluated from simulated ground motions that preserve the coherency, Fourier amplitude variability and wave passage observed in array recordings, found a similar dependence of PGS on PGD but also a significant dependence on separation distance of observation points. Here we describe a procedure to calculate PGS between pairs of stations in an array to test the separation dependence of PGS. The Lotung LSST array was selected due to its closely spaced stations (6 to 85 m) and large number of recordings. The PGS estimated from station pairs from 11 events illustrate that the distance dependence of PGS is statistically significant, with PGS increasing as separation distance decreases

Purpose, Meaning, and Exploring Vocation in Honors Education

This paper examines the importance of cultivating a sense of vocation in honors education. Through examples of coursework, program initiatives, and advising strategies, authors from across five institutions align the scholarship of vocation with best practices and principles in contemporary honors discourse, defining vocation in the context of higher education and describing how this concept works within honors curricula to enrich student experience and cultivate individual understandings of purpose. By focusing on critical reflection processes, Ignatian pedagogy, and theories of moral development and reasoning, the authors offer different models to advance the thesis that honors educators can and should address personal fulfillment in addition to intellectual talent, and they posit vocational exploration and discernment as tools for extending and deepening their students’ personal sense of meaning in local and global communities

How Do Minimum Payment Changes Affect Credit Card Arbitrage?

This paper examines how changes in the minimum payment percentage and effective maturity of introductory offers affect credit card arbitrage.  Credit Card arbitrage involves taking a cash advance on, or making purchases against, a credit card that offers a low or zero percent introductory interest rate.  The proceeds are deposited into a Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) insured money market account.  Profits from this strategy are dependent on factors including the minimum payment due on the credit card each month.  Recently, under pressure from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, some banks have increased the minimum monthly payment percentage on their cards.  We measure the sensitivity of Credit Card arbitrage profits to changes in the offer maturity and the required minimum monthly credit card payment.  We also analyze how offer duration changes with changes in the minimum monthly payment.  These calculations represent an important contribution to the literature because of the unique pattern of credit card loan payments

Functional analysis of a putative membrane-bound endo-β-1,4-glucanase from Panicum virgatum

Cellulose is the most abundant carbohydrate in the world and is degraded by the synergistic action of multiple enzymes. One large family of enzymes capable of hydrolyzing cellulose is glycoside hydrolase family 9 (GH9), which includes several endoglucanases. Recent research into the molecular biology of plants has revealed certain genes coding for endo-β-1,4-glucanases (EGases). The EGases in plants are primarily functional during cell elongation through wall stress relaxation. GH9 enzymes have been found in insects, bacteria, oomycetes, and fungi. In insects, EGases enable the organism to digest cellulose; in fungi, EGases are suspected to play an important role in obtaining nutrition for the fungi and may be associated with defense mechanisms. In these systems, EGases play an important role in breaking the internal bonds of cellulose resulting in a disruption of the crystalline structure. EGases are able to cleave cellulose at the β-1,4 linkages in the cellulose chain with a net inversion of anomeric configuration. A putative EGase from switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) was isolated from leaf cDNA. This gene of interest was cloned into Escherichia coli via the pET160 expression system. Selection by antibiotic resistance confirmed transformation of E. coli. Protein expression was detected via SDS-PAGE and tested to confirm cellulose lysing. The optimal pH and temperature were determined using 3,5-Dinitrosalycilic acid (DNSA) assay at different pH and temperature settings measuring reduced sugars released. Functionality in plants was determined through a gene rescue experiment using Arabidopsis thaliana mutants known to be deficient in putative EGase homologs. Switchgrass containing an overexpression of the EGase was compared to wildtype switchgrass via histology and microscopy. The confirmation of a functional EGase from switchgrass may aid in the development of switchgrass transformants with an amorphous cellulose structure, thereby reducing the amount of resources required during biofuel refinery

Recent Advances in Terrestrial Lidar Applications in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering

During the past five years, geotechnical earthquake engineering and ground deformation research has benefited from the advent of terrestrial LIDAR technology, a revolutionary tool for characterizing fine-scale changes in topography. For ground deformation research, LIDAR is particularly useful for characterizing the dimensions of failures and for monitoring subtle deformations through time. Tripod mounted LIDAR systems have accuracies of approximately 0.4-2.0 cm, and can illuminate targets up to one kilometer away from the sensor. During several minutes of LIDAR scanning, millions of survey position points are collected and processed into an ultra-high resolution terrain model. During earthquake reconnaissance efforts, the detailed failure morphologies of landslides and liquefaction sites can be measured remotely and in a way that is either impractical or impossible by conventional survey means. The ultra-high resolution imagery of the complex surface morphology of ground failures allows the exploration and visualization of damage on a computer in orientations and scales not previously possible. Detailed understanding of the ground surface morphology allows for better numerical modeling of potential failure modes, deformation patterns, and morphologies. Finally, LIDAR allows for the permanent archiving of 3-D terrain models. In this paper, we present the evaluation of the accuracy, bias and dispersion of LIDAR data under controlled experimental conditions. Field applications of LIDAR-damage visualization and analysis are presented from data gathered during the 2004 Niigata Chuetsu (M6.6) earthquake and the 2007-2008 PARI-Ishikari, Hokkaido blast-liquefaction experiment

Transgenic Plant-Produced Hydrolytic Enzymes and the Potential of Insect Gut-Derived Hydrolases for Biofuels

Various perennial C4 grass species have tremendous potential for use as lignocellulosic biofuel feedstocks. Currently available grasses require costly pre-treatment and exogenous hydrolytic enzyme application to break down complex cell wall polymers into sugars that can then be fermented into ethanol. It has long been hypothesized that engineered feedstock production of cell wall degrading (CWD) enzymes would be an efficient production platform for of exogenous hydrolytic enzymes. Most research has focused on plant overexpression of CWD enzyme-coding genes from free-living bacteria and fungi that naturally break down plant cell walls. Recently, it has been found that insect digestive tracts harbor novel sources of lignocellulolytic biocatalysts that might be exploited for biofuel production. These CWD enzyme genes can be located in the insect genomes or in symbiotic microbes. When CWD genes are transformed into plants, negative pleiotropic effects are possible such as unintended cell wall digestion. The use of codon optimization along with organelle and tissue specific targeting improves CWD enzyme yields. The literature teaches several important lessons on strategic deployment of CWD genes in transgenic plants, which is the focus of this review

The Performance of Hillside Fills During the Northridge Earthquake

Many hillside fills located in the Santa Monica, Santa Susana, and San Gabriel Mountains were damaged during the 1994 Northridge Earthquake. While no deaths have been attributed to fill movement, on the order of tens of millions of dollars in property damage was caused by fill movements which typically involved less than about 7.5cm (3 inches) of localized displacement. Some of the damage was induced by permanent deformations of underlying native materials, but most appears to have resulted from ground failure or ground shaking phenomena associated directly with the fill materials. These phenomena include cyclic compaction, lurching, and amplification of shaking within the fills. This paper presents a preliminary summary of the typical distress to fills caused by the Northridge Earthquake, and discusses the probable mechanisms of failure

LED excitation of an on-chip imaging flow cytometer for bead-based immunoassay

A green LED is demonstrated to generate a uniform square illumination pattern for an on-chip imaging flow cytometer system. The proposed system is used to perform the detection of a bead-based immunoassay for a sepsis biomarker, procalcitonin