A Pyrrhic Victory? Bank Bailouts and Sovereign Credit Risk

We show that nancial sector bailouts and sovereign credit risk are intimately linked. A bailout benets the economy by ameliorating the under-investment problem of the nancial sector. However, increasing taxation of the non-nancial sector to fund the bailout may be inecient since it weakens its incentive to invest, decreasing growth. Instead, the sovereign may choose to fund the bailout by diluting existing government bondholders, resulting in a deterioration of the sovereign's creditworthiness. This deterioration feeds back to the nancial sector, reducing the value of its guarantees and existing bond holdings as well as increasing its sensitivity to future sovereign shocks. We provide empirical evidence for this two-way feedback between nancial and sovereign credit risk using data on the credit default swaps (CDS) of the Eurozone countries and their banks for 2007-11. We show that the announcement of nancial sector bailouts was associated with an immediate, unprecedented widening of sovereign CDS spreads and narrowing of bank CDS spreads; however, post-bailouts there emerged a signi- cant co-movement between bank CDS and sovereign CDS, even after controlling for banks' equity performance, the latter being consistent with an eect of the quality of sovereign guarantees on bank credit risk

A Pyrrhic Victory? - Bank Bailouts and Sovereign Credit Risk

We show that financial sector bailouts and sovereign credit risk are intimately linked. A bailout benefits the economy by ameliorating the under-investment problem of the financial sector. However, increasing taxation of the non-financial sector to fund the bailout may be inefficient since it weakens its incentive to invest, decreasing growth. Instead, the sovereign may choose to fund the bailout by diluting existing government bondholders, resulting in a deterioration of the sovereign's creditworthiness. This deterioration feeds back onto the financial sector, reducing the value of its guarantees and existing bond holdings and increasing its sensitivity to future sovereign shocks. We provide empirical evidence for this two-way feedback between financial and sovereign credit risk using data on the credit default swaps (CDS) of the Eurozone countries for 2007-10. We show that the announcement of financial sector bailouts was associated with an immediate, unprecedented widening of sovereign CDS spreads and narrowing of bank CDS spreads; however, post-bailouts there emerged a significant co-movement between bank CDS and sovereign CDS, even after controlling for banks' equity performance, the latter being consistent with an effect of the quality of sovereign guarantees on bank credit risk.

Securitization without risk transfer

We analyze asset-backed commercial paper conduits which played a central role in the early phase of the financial crisis of 2007-09. We document that commercial banks set up conduits to securitize assets while insuring the newly securitized assets using credit guarantees. The credit guarantees were structured to reduce bank capital requirements, while providing recourse to bank balance sheets for outside investors. Consistent with such recourse, we find that banks with more exposure to conduits had lower stock returns at the start of the financial crisis; that during the first year of the crisis, asset-backed commercial paper spreads increased and issuance fell, especially for conduits with weaker credit guarantees and riskier banks; and that losses from conduits mostly remained with banks rather than outside investors. These results suggest that banks used this form of securitization to concentrate, rather than disperse, financial risks in the banking sector while reducing their capital requirements.

Fertility and early pregnancy outcomes after conservative treatment for cervical intraepithelial neoplasia

BACKGROUND: Cervical intra-epithelial neoplasia (CIN) typically occurs in young women of reproductive age. Although several studies have reported the impact that cervical conservative treatment may have on obstetric outcomes, there is much less evidence for fertility and early pregnancy outcomes. OBJECTIVES: To assess the effect of cervical treatment for CIN (excisional or ablative) on fertility and early pregnancy outcomes. SEARCH METHODS: We searched in January 2015 the following databases: the Cochrane Gynaecological Cancer Specialised Register, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL; The Cochrane Library, Issue 12, 2014), MEDLINE (up to November week 3, 2014) and EMBASE (up to week 52, 2014). SELECTION CRITERIA: We included all studies reporting on fertility and early pregnancy outcomes (less than 24 weeks of gestation) in women with a history of CIN treatment (excisional or ablative) as compared to women that had not received treatment. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Studies were classified according to the treatment method used and the fertility or early pregnancy endpoint. Pooled risk ratios (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated using a random-effects model and inter-study heterogeneity was assessed with I(2). Two review authors (MK, AM) independently assessed the eligibility of retrieved papers and risk of bias. The two review authors then compared their results and any disagreements were resolved by discussion. If still unresolved, a third review author (MA) was involved until consensus was reached. MAIN RESULTS: Fifteen studies (2,223,592 participants - 25,008 treated and 2,198,584 untreated) that fulfilled the inclusion criteria for this review were identified from the literature search. The meta-analysis demonstrated that treatment for CIN did not adversely affect the chances of conception. The overall pregnancy rate was higher for treated (43%) versus untreated women (38%; RR 1.29, 95% CI 1.02 to 1.64; 4 studies, 38,050 participants, very low quality), although the inter-study heterogeneity was considerable (P < 0.01). The pregnancy rates in treated and untreated women with an intention to conceive (88% versus 95%, RR 0.93, 95% CI 0.80 to 1.08; 2 studies, 70 participants, very low quality) and the number of women requiring more than 12 months to conceive (14% versus 9%, RR 1.45, 95% CI 0.89 to 2.37; 3 studies, 1348 participants, very low quality) were no different. Although the total miscarriage rate (4.6% versus 2.8%, RR 1.04, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.21; 10 studies, 39,504 participants, low quality) and first trimester miscarriage rate (9.8% versus 8.4%, RR 1.16, 95% CI 0.80 to 1.69, 4 studies, 1103 participants, low quality) was similar for treated and untreated women, CIN treatment was associated with an increased risk of second trimester miscarriage, (1.6% versus 0.4%, RR 2.60, 95% CI 1.45 to 4.67; 8 studies, 2,182,268 participants, low quality). The number of ectopic pregnancies (1.6% versus 0.8%, RR 1.89, 95% CI 1.50 to 2.39; 6 studies, 38,193 participants, low quality) and terminations (12.2% versus 7.4%, RR 1.71, 95% CI 1.31 to 2.22; 7 studies, 38,208 participants, low quality) were also higher in treated women.The results should be interpreted with caution. The included studies were often small with heterogenous design. Most of these studies were retrospective and of low or very low quality (GRADE assessment) and were therefore prone to bias. Subgroup analyses for the individual treatment methods and comparison groups and analysis to stratify for the cone length was not possible. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: This meta-analysis suggests that treatment for CIN does not adversely affect fertility, although treatment was associated with an increased risk of miscarriage in the second trimester. These results should be interpreted with caution as the included studies were non-randomised and many were of low or very low quality and therefore at high risk of bias. Research should explore mechanisms that may explain the increase in mid-trimester miscarriage risk and stratify this impact of treatment by the length of the cone and the treatment method used

Can Survival Prediction Be Improved By Merging Gene Expression Data Sets?

BACKGROUND:High-throughput gene expression profiling technologies generating a wealth of data, are increasingly used for characterization of tumor biopsies for clinical trials. By applying machine learning algorithms to such clinically documented data sets, one hopes to improve tumor diagnosis, prognosis, as well as prediction of treatment response. However, the limited number of patients enrolled in a single trial study limits the power of machine learning approaches due to over-fitting. One could partially overcome this limitation by merging data from different studies. Nevertheless, such data sets differ from each other with regard to technical biases, patient selection criteria and follow-up treatment. It is therefore not clear at all whether the advantage of increased sample size outweighs the disadvantage of higher heterogeneity of merged data sets. Here, we present a systematic study to answer this question specifically for breast cancer data sets. We use survival prediction based on Cox regression as an assay to measure the added value of merged data sets. RESULTS:Using time-dependent Receiver Operating Characteristic-Area Under the Curve (ROC-AUC) and hazard ratio as performance measures, we see in overall no significant improvement or deterioration of survival prediction with merged data sets as compared to individual data sets. This apparently was due to the fact that a few genes with strong prognostic power were not available on all microarray platforms and thus were not retained in the merged data sets. Surprisingly, we found that the overall best performance was achieved with a single-gene predictor consisting of CYB5D1. CONCLUSIONS:Merging did not deteriorate performance on average despite (a) The diversity of microarray platforms used. (b) The heterogeneity of patients cohorts. (c) The heterogeneity of breast cancer disease. (d) Substantial variation of time to death or relapse. (e) The reduced number of genes in the merged data sets. Predictors derived from the merged data sets were more robust, consistent and reproducible across microarray platforms. Moreover, merging data sets from different studies helps to better understand the biases of individual studies and can lead to the identification of strong survival factors like CYB5D1 expression

Study of ordered hadron chains with the ATLAS detector

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A search for resonances decaying into a Higgs boson and a new particle X in the XH→qqbb final state with the ATLAS detector

A search for heavy resonances decaying into a Higgs boson ($H$) and a new particle ($X$) is reported, utilizing 36.1 fb$^{-1}$ of proton-proton collision data at $\sqrt{s} =$ 13 TeV collected during 2015 and 2016 with the ATLAS detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The particle $X$ is assumed to decay to a pair of light quarks, and the fully hadronic final state $XH \rightarrow q\bar q'b\bar b$ is analysed. The search considers the regime of high $XH$ resonance masses, where the $X$ and $H$ bosons are both highly Lorentz-boosted and are each reconstructed using a single jet with large radius parameter. A two-dimensional phase space of $XH$ mass versus $X$ mass is scanned for evidence of a signal, over a range of $XH$ resonance mass values between 1 TeV and 4 TeV, and for $X$ particles with masses from 50 GeV to 1000 GeV. All search results are consistent with the expectations for the background due to Standard Model processes, and 95% CL upper limits are set, as a function of $XH$ and $X$ masses, on the production cross-section of the $XH\rightarrow q\bar q'b\bar b$ resonance

Search for dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks in √s = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks is presented. Final states containing third-generation quarks and miss- ing transverse momentum are considered. The analysis uses 36.1 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at √s = 13 TeV in 2015 and 2016. No significant excess of events above the estimated backgrounds is observed. The results are in- terpreted in the framework of simplified models of spin-0 dark-matter mediators. For colour- neutral spin-0 mediators produced in association with top quarks and decaying into a pair of dark-matter particles, mediator masses below 50 GeV are excluded assuming a dark-matter candidate mass of 1 GeV and unitary couplings. For scalar and pseudoscalar mediators produced in association with bottom quarks, the search sets limits on the production cross- section of 300 times the predicted rate for mediators with masses between 10 and 50 GeV and assuming a dark-matter mass of 1 GeV and unitary coupling. Constraints on colour- charged scalar simplified models are also presented. Assuming a dark-matter particle mass of 35 GeV, mediator particles with mass below 1.1 TeV are excluded for couplings yielding a dark-matter relic density consistent with measurements