Return Predictability of Stock Price Index in Tehran Stock Exchange

The question of whether asset price changes are predictable has long been the subject of many studies. Many studies, using historical returns based on random walk tests, have shown that stock return is not predictable. We study return predictability of the Tehran Exchange Price Index (TEPIX) based on monthly data from 2000 to 2011. For forecasting the return, we used a recursive estimation method in which the parameter estimates were updated recursively in light of new weekly observations, and also its regressors were changed recursively according to the Schwarz Bayesian Criterion. The results show that the daily stock returns are not predictable using publicly available information

Health Expenditure and Economic growth: An ARDL Approach for the Case of Iran

This paper examines the relationship between health expenditure and economic growth in Iran for the period 1970-2007, based on the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach. The study finds a cointegrating relationship among real GDP, health expenditure, capital stock, oil revenues and education, although among them, health spending explains just a small part of the economic growth. The results indicate that while health care expenditures are among the most important factors in the lowering of infant mortality, they do not make a significant marginal contribution to the economic growth in Iran. This findings call for pressing reforms and improved allocation of resources in health sector

The Relationship between Non-Oil Trade and GDP in Petroleum Exporting Countries

This paper investigates the causal relationship between non-oil international trade and the GDP in a panel of 11 selected oil exporting countries by using panel unit root tests and panel cointegration analysis. A three-variable model is formulated with oil revenues as the third variable. The results show a strong causality from oil revenues and economic growth to trade in the oil exporting countries. Yet, non-oil trade does not have any significant effects on GDP in short- and long-run. It means that it is the oil and GDP that drives the trade in mentioned countries, not vice versa. According to the results, decision makings should be employed to achieve sustainable growth through higher productivity and substantially enlarging the economic base diversification in the future

Pollution, Energy Consumption and Economic Growth: evidence from India, China and Brazil

This paper examines the relationships between the energy consumption, GDP growth and emission, using Panel Smooth Transition Regression (PSTR) model for BRIC countries over the period 1960 –2006. Our results reveal that environmental quality in these countries has increasingly suffered from high energy consumption. Moreover, rapid economic growth and international trade in energy intensive goods have progressively increased energy consumption. This suggests that excessively high economic growth is a curse for environmental quality and energy conservation policies to reduce unnecessary wastage of energy should be kicked off for energy-dependent BRIC countries

WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR DRINKING WATER CONNECTIONS:THE CASE OF LARESTAN, IRAN

Water scarcity in Iran has reached a level that calls for the attention of all stakeholders including water consumers. While government as water distributor has made significant efforts in managing water at the supply side, an annual average rainfall of 251 mm (Iran Meteorological Organization, 2008) limits the capacity of this supply-side approach. As a result, policy efforts have increasingly turned towards demand management approaches. The objective of this paper is to estimate drinking tap water demand for the households in Larestan. We determine the willingness to pay (WTP) for drinking taps water connections by the Larestan’s households, using contingent valuation method (CVM). We use data from 320 randomly selected households in Larestan, Iran. Our findings show that, once drinking tap water connected, the households are willing to pay US$0.24 on average in addition to their monthly charge for per cubic meter water consumed.willingness to pay (WTP), contingent valuation method (CVM), tap water demand, Larestan, demand-side approach.

The Causality between Capital Formation and Economic Growth in MENA Region

This paper investigates the causal relationship between gross domestic investment (INV) and GDP for Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region countries by using panel unit root tests and panel cointegration analysis for the period 1970-2010. The results show a strong causality from economic growth to investment in these countries. Yet, investment does not have any significant effects on GDP in short- and long-run. It means that it is the GDP that drives investment in mentioned countries, not vice versa. So the findings of this paper support the point of view that it is higher economic growth that leads to higher investment. According to the results, decision makings should be employed to achieve sustainable growth through higher productivity and substantially enlarging the economic base diversification in the futur

The Relationship between Economic Growth and Human Capital in Developing Countries

This paper investigates the causal relationship between education and GDP in developing countries by using panel unit root tests and panel cointegration analysis for the period 1970-2010. A three-variable model is formulated with capital formation as the third variable. The results show a strong causality from investment and economic growth to education in these countries. Yet, education does not have any significant effects on GDP and investment in short- and long-run. It means that it is the capital formation and GDP that drives education in mentioned countries, not vice versa. So the findings of this paper support the point of view that it is higher economic growth that leads to higher education proxy. It seems that as the number of enrollments raise, the quality of the education declines. Moreover, the formal education systems are not market oriented in these countries. This may be the reason why huge educational investments in these developing countries fail to generate higher growth. By promoting practice-oriented training for students particularly in technical disciplines and matching education system to the needs of the labor market, it will help create long-term jobs and improve the country’s future prospects

Time-Varying Optimal Hedge Ratio for Brent Oil Market

This paper examines the optimal hedging ratio (OHR) for the Brent Crude Oil Futures using daily data over the period 1990/17/8-2014/11/3. To estimate OHR, we employ multivariate BEKK MV-GARCH model. At last, the efficiency of this approach are compared with the constant OHR captured from OLS through Edrington's index

The relationship between money, government spending and inflation in the Iranian economy

Inflation is one of the important macroeconomic variables that has a close relationship with many of the real and monetary variables and has unfavorable effects such as loss of productivity, reduction of economic growth, and rise of economic inequality. Therefore, the reduction of inflation has always been the most important economic objective of policy makers. The main objective of this study is to examine the relationship between, inflation, money supply and government spending in Iran during the period 1959-2010. To that end, Bayesian econometric approach was used. The results of the Bayesian Model averaging method imply that the growth rate of money, economic growth rate, inflation rate, the logarithm of the ratio of liquidity to GDP, and growth in energy prices had a significant positive significant effect on inflation. Among these 3 variables, growth rate of money has the highest impact on inflation. The results showed that the growth rate of government spending, GDP growth rate and the exchange rate had no significant effect on the inflation. Therefore, the study recommends controlling the inflation through decline in liquidity growth rate, and energy prices

Ranking of Developing Countries Based on the Economic Freedom Index

In this paper we’ve ranked developing countries based on the Economic Freedom index. Therefore we are trying to do the analysis how this ranking is done using numerical taxonomic methodology. To do this, by estimating the effects of the determinants of FDI in 123 developing countries from 1997 to 2010, results showed that with regard to the degree of economic freedom or Economic openness, attract foreign direct investment in each country is different. In this study china, Equator, Liberia, Azerbaijan, Angola, Turkmenistan, Cape Verde, Kazakhstan, Panama, Vietnam, Bulgaria, Congo, Maldives, Bahrain, Cambodia, Jordan, Malaysia, Mongolia, Sudan, Trinidad, Belarus, Lesotho, Russian are the top 23 countries have been successful in attracting foreign direct investment thanks to appropriate economic and structures policies