A Selectivity Model of Household Pork Consumption Behavior in Taipei, Taiwan

Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN EQUILIBRIUM AND INTEGRATION IN MARKETS ANALYSIS

This paper introduces a new market analysis methodology based on maximum likelihood estimation of a mixture distribution model incorporating price, transfer cost, and trade flow data. Not only does this method obviate statistical problems associated with conventional price analysis methods, it also permits differentiation between market integration and competitive market equilibrium. The model generates estimates of the frequency of alternative regimes, combinations of which provide useful, intuitive measures of intermarket tradability, competitive market equilibrium, perfect integration, segmented equilibrium, and segmented disequilibrium. An application to trade in soybean meal among Pacific Rim economies demonstrates the usefulness of the method.international trade, law of one price, market integration, spatial equilibrium, International Relations/Trade,

FACTOR AND PRODUCT MARKET TRADABILITY AND EQUILIBRIUM IN PACIFIC RIM PORK INDUSTRIES

This study uses a new market analysis methodology to examine price and trade relationships in eight Pacific Rim factor and product markets central to the Canadian and U.S. pork industries. The new method enables direct estimation of the frequencies with which a variety of market conditions occur, including competitive equilibrium, tradability, and segmented equilibrium. While extraordinary profit opportunities emerge episodically in a few niche markets, the vast majority of the markets studies are highly competitive- exhibiting zero estimated marginal profits to spatial arbitrage at monthly frequency- and internationally contestable. With a few notable exceptions due primarily to nontariff barriers, and despite significant remaining tariffs in some niches, the Pacific Rim is effectively a single market for pork producers and processors today.Demand and Price Analysis,

The Fallacy of Nearby Contract Commodity Futures Price Analysis: Intramarket Futures Contracts are not Identically Distributed

Marketing,

Price and Trade Relations and Market Integration in Pacific Pork Markets

Market integration testing is important to agricultural marketing, industrial organization, international trade, and international model design. With reliable market integration information, decision makers can undertake appropriate actions to maximize profits, welfare, or both. Level I market analysis, which uses price data solely, has proved unreliable especially in the presence of discontinuous or bidirectional trade, or significant or nonstationary transaction costs. Level II market analysis methods, which incorporate both transactions costs and prices, permit spatial markets to be integrated in some periods and segmented in others, thereby obviating many level I method problems. However, level II methods still fail to distinguish between market integration and spatial market equilibrium. Both level I and level II methods omit the rich information provided by trade flow data. This dissertation develops the first level III method-combining price, transactions costs, and trade flow data, and thus can move beyond the flaws remaining in levels I and II methods. The full information parity bounds model (FIPBM) enables researchers to distinguish between market integration, a concept of market conduct, and spatial market equilibrium, one of market performance. FIPBM also shows real promise in signaling the importance of unobservable transactions costs, the frequencly of nontrading periods of competitive disequilibrium likely due to nontariff trade barriers, and the effects of asymmetric trade policies. FIPBM seems better suited to international markets analysis than do other existing methods. This dissertation applies levels I,II, and III methods to analyze price, trade, and market relationships in the product and factor markets of pork industries in key Pacific Rim countries. This empirical work highlights the superiority of the FIPBM approach. FIPBM finds that pork, hog, and feed grain markets between Canada and the United States are almost always integrated. But they are not in competitive equilibrium, implying that there frequently exist positive accounting profits to arbitrage. By contrast, markets between Asian (Taiwan and Japan) and North American countries (Canada and the United States) are integrated less frequently than are intra-North American markets. This reflects greater trans-Pacific transactions costs that reduce tradability. However, markets between Asian and North American countries are commonly in competitive equilibrium

Low temperature and high magnetic field spectroscopic ellipsometry system

We report on the design and implementation of a spectral ellipsometer at near-infrared wavelength (700-1000 nm) for samples placed in high magnetic fields (up to 14 T) at low temperatures (~4.2 K). The main optical components are integrated in a probe, which can be inserted into a conventional long-neck He dewar and has a very long free-space optical path (~1.8 m×2). A polarizer-sample-(quarter-wave plate)-rotating analyzer configuration was employed. Two dielectric mirrors, one before and one after the sample in the optical path, helped to reflect the light back to the analyzer and a two-axis piezo-driven goniometer under the sample holder was used to control the direction of the reflected light. Functional test results performed on an intrinsic GaAs wafer and analysis on the random error of the system are shown. We obtained both amplitude and phase ellipsometric spectra simultaneously and observed helicity transformation at energies near the GaAs exciton transitions in the phase spectra. Significant shifts of them induced by magnetic fields were observed and fitted with a simple model. This system will allow us to study the collective magneto-optical response of materials and spatial dispersive exciton-polariton related problems in high external magnetic fields at low temperatures

The Fallacy of Nearby Contract Commodity Futures Price Analysis: Intramarket Futures Contracts Are Not Identically Distributed

Researchers commonly use nearby contract futures prices series in empirical analysis and commodity hedging applications based on the assumption that the maturing contract is always an appropriate proxy for more distant contracts. This paper discusses the implications of this practice based on econometric tests for equivalence between nearby and specific contract wheat futures price behavior. Nearby futures prices are inconsistent with each of the five contracts available on the Chicago Board of Trade

Wheat Futures Price Behavior: Theoretical and Empirical Considerations

This study analyzes the time series statistical properties of wheat futures prices to determine whether price behavior differs among intramarket contracts. We argue that the differential role of inventories, information, hedging objectives and probability of stockout across seasons provide a theoretical basis and empirical interest for finding such a difference. The behavior of May and September futures prices are indeed found to be significantly different and in ways consistent with theory. Furthermore, an endogenous contract arrival effect is found for both contracts, demonstrating the importance of developing models which incorporate market activity proxies