Financial Market Risk and Macroeconomic Stability Variables: Dynamic Interactions and Feedback Effects

This study investigates dynamic interactions and feedback effects between financial market risk proxied by VIX and key macroeconomic stability variables that include the rate of unemployment, headline inflation and market-based inflation expectations reflected by the breakeven inflation. I argue that market risk should play a stronger role in macroeconomic modeling and forecasting than it has been recognized thus far in the literature. I employ vector autoregression with impulse response functions, as well as two-state Markov switching tests to examine these interactions on the longest available US monthly data. The empirical tests show that the association between market risk and macroeconomic fundamentals is predominantly neutral at normal, predictable economic conditions. It becomes however very pronounced at times of financial distress, in the environment of elevated market risk coupled with uncertain expectations for macroeconomic variables. Shocks in VIX have a longer impact on macroeconomic stability than that generally claimed in the prior literature. The Markov switching tests for CPI and breakeven inflation indicate that households and businesses are concerned primarily about episodes of increasing inflation, while bond market participants are worried mainly about declining inflation and deflation

Montmorilonit – usporedba metoda za njegovo određivanje u ljevaoničkim bentonitima

A comparison and estimation of usefulness of a quantitative analysis of montmorillonite in foundry bentonites, was the aim of this research. The investigations were made by means of three different techniques: methylene blue (MB) adsorption method, Cu(II)-triethylenetetramine complex (Cu(II)-TET) adsorption method, and infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) method. Tests were performed for 9 kinds of bentonites originated from various producers. The achieved results indicated that, the results obtained by the FTIR method were, in general, even 10% lower than the ones obtained by other methods. The best correlation with the data given by the producers were obtained for the Cu(II)-TET method. In addition, this method was characterised by the smallest value of standard deviations. A very essential advantage of the Cu(II)-TET method is a much shorter time needed for the analysis and its easier execution, which is important under production conditions.Cilj ovog istraživanja je bila procjena upotrebljivosti kvantitativne analize montmorilonita u ljevaoničkim bentonitima. Istraživanja su provedena pomoću tri različite tehnike: adsorpcija metilenskog modrila (MB), adsorpcija Cu(II)-trietilentetramin kompleksa (CU(II)-TET), i infracrvena spektroskopija (FTIR). Ispitivanja su provedena na 9 vrsta bentonita koji potječu od različitih proizvođača. Rezultati dobiveni FTIR metodom u prosjeku su za čak 10,0% niži od rezultata dobivenih ostalim metodama. Najbolja korelacija s podatcima od proizvođača dobivena je primjenom Cu(II)-TET metode. Osim toga, kod te metode najmanje su vrijednosti standardnih devijacija. Vrlo važna prednost Cu(II)-TET metode je znatno kraće vrijeme potrebno za anaalizu i lakše provođenje, što je značajno u proizvodnim uvjetima

Sign problems, noise, and chiral symmetry breaking in a QCD-like theory

The Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model reduced to 2+1 dimensions has two different path integral formulations: at finite chemical potential one formulation has a severe sign problem similar to that found in QCD, while the other does not. At large N, where N is the number of flavors, one can compute the probability distributions of fermion correlators analytically in both formulations. In the former case one finds a broad distribution with small mean; in the latter one finds a heavy tailed positive distribution amenable to the cumulant expansion techniques developed in earlier work. We speculate on the implications of this model for QCD.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figures; Published version with minor changes from the origina

Gravitational Wave Backgrounds from Colliding ECOs

Long baseline atom interferometers offer an exciting opportunity to explore mid-frequency gravitational waves. In this work we survey the landscape of possible contributions to the total 'gravitational wave background' in this frequency band and advocate for targeting this observable. Such an approach is complimentary to searches for resolved mergers from individual sources and may have much to reveal about the Universe. We find that the inspiral phases of stellar-mass compact binaries cumulatively produce a signal well within reach of the proposed AION-km and AEDGE experiments. Hypothetical populations of dark sector exotic compact objects, harbouring just a tiny fraction of the dark energy density, could also generate signatures unique to mid- and low-frequency gravitational wave detectors, providing a novel means to probe complexity in the dark sector.Comment: 32 pages, 5 figure

Direct detection of bound states of asymmetric dark matter

We study the reach of direct detection experiments for large bound states (containing 10⁴ or more dark nucleons) of asymmetric dark matter. We consider ordinary nuclear recoils, excitation of collective modes (phonons), and electronic excitations, paying careful attention to the impact of the energy threshold of the experiment. Large exposure experiments with keV energy thresholds provide the best (future) limits when the dark matter is small enough to be treated as a point particle, but rapidly lose sensitivity for more extended dark bound states, or when the mediator is light. In those cases, low threshold, low exposure experiments (such as with a superfluid helium, polar material or superconducting target) are often more sensitive due to coherent enhancement over the dark nucleons. We also discuss indirect constraints on composite asymmetric dark matter arising from self-interaction, formation history, and the properties of the composite states themselves