Evidence on the Characteristics of Cross Sectional Variation in Stock Returns

Firm size and book-to-market ratios are both highly correlated with the returns of common stocks. Fama and French (1993) have argued that the association between these firm characteristics and their stock returns arises because size and book-to-market ratios are proxies for non-diversifiable factor risk. In contrast, the evidence in this paper indicates that the return premia on small capitalization and high book-to-market stocks does not arise because of the co-movements of these stocks with pervasive factors. It is the firm characteristics and not the covariance structure of returns that explain the cross-sectional variation in stock returns.

Market Reactions to Tangible and Intangible Information

We decompose stock returns into components attributable to tangible and intangible information. A firm's tangible return is the component of its return attributable to fundamental accounting-performance information, and its intangible return is the component which is orthogonal to this information. Our evidence indicates that intangible information reliably predicts future stock returns. However, in contrast to previous research, we find that tangible returns have no forecasting power. The premia associated with intangible information pose challenges for both traditional asset pricing models and models based on psychological factors.

More Randomness from the Same Data

Correlations that cannot be reproduced with local variables certify the generation of private randomness. Usually, the violation of a Bell inequality is used to quantify the amount of randomness produced. Here, we show how private randomness generated during a Bell test can be directly quantified from the observed correlations, without the need to process these data into an inequality. The frequency with which the different measurement settings are used during the Bell test can also be taken into account. This improved analysis turns out to be very relevant for Bell tests performed with a finite collection efficiency. In particular, applying our technique to the data of a recent experiment [Christensen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 130406 (2013)], we show that about twice as much randomness as previously reported can be potentially extracted from this setup.Comment: 6 pages + appendices, 4 figures, v3: version close to the published one. See also the related work arXiv:1309.393

Measuring genetic divergence of endemic seed beetles Acanthoscelides pullus through reproductive isolation

The legume genus Astragalus contains some of the highest levels of morphological diversity in plants and has the highest diversity accumulation known. In addition, Astragalus lineages possess toxic secondary compounds which are predicted to deter herbivory. Although the reasons behind the rapid speciation of this genus are uncertain, it is predicted that the specialist seed beetles that oviposit their eggs on the seeds of Astragalus decrease the fitness of this plant. Despite rapid speciation in the plant, the specialist seed beetle Acanthoscelides pullus is able to successfully live on approximately 25 known species of Astragalus which are generally geographically isolated. If coevolution is driving speciation in the beetles and plants, one prediction is that host association will be a better predictor of barriers to gene flow (e.g. migration rates or reproductive isolation) than geography. On the other hand, geographic isolation alone would only promote allopatric speciation in association with geographic distance through the evolution of reproductive barriers between population attributed genetic drift. In order to measure the relative role of host plant and geography in lineage diversification within Ac. pullus, reproductive isolation experiments were performed to see if geographically isolated populations of beetle or beetles reared from different host plants in the field are able to mate and lay viable eggs that develop into hybrid offspring. Preliminary data suggest that both may play a role in the evolution of reproductive isolation, as Ac. pullus displays reproductive isolation between isolated populations and between different host plants

The Catholic Case: The Index of Prohibited Books

Sometimes it takes a while for the word to get out, or for it to get in. It has been said that, in India in 1948 as the British were leaving, there were villages that had not yet heard that they had arrived. Similarly, there may be villages in Tibet that have not yet heard that the Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1959. Deep in Siberia in the mid 1930\u27s, there were communities of Old Believers who did not know of the October Revolution in 1917. Googooling the words, Index of Prohibited Books, resulted in more than a million references. A perusal of the first seven entries revealed that none took any note that the Roman Catholic Index of Prohibited Books had been terminated in 1966, forty years before 2006. Similarly, the same perusal does not reveal the reasons why the Catholic Church abandoned what to many outside the Church had seemed one of its negative defining features, nor the reasons why the Church has become one of the world\u27s greatest defenders of a freedom of religion that precludes the prohibiting, censoring, and banning of books

Book Review: Rediscovering God with Transcendental Argument: A Contemporary Interpretation of Monistic Kashmiri Saiva Philosophy

A review of Rediscovering God with Transcendental Argument: A Contemporary Interpretation of Monistic Kashmiri Saiva Philosophy by David Peter Lawrence

Angels and Gods: A (Radically) Orthodox Experiment

This is the third in a series of orthodox Catholic theological experiments that I am conducting within the theology of relationship of Catholic faith to other religions. Each experiment attempts to ask a positive, existential question of one of the world religions about the reality of one of their reality assertions. Catholic orthodox theologies have almost always answered these questions in the negative, but in my tentative and provisional judgment the negative answers may be unnecessary. To re-ask the questions using the “eyes of faith,”1 the full weight and depth of orthodoxy must be brought to bear, not as a defensive posture that protects the faith, but instead as an exercise in confident Catholic inclusivity that will see how far it can go, in other words, to explore how inclusive Catholicity and orthodoxy can get

Explaining the Cross-Section of Stock Returns in Japan: Factors or Characteristics?

Japanese stock returns are even more closely related to their book-to-market ratios than are their U.S. counterparts, and thus provide a good setting for testing whether the return premia associated with these characteristics arise because the characteristics are proxies for covariance with priced factors. Our tests, which replicate the Daniel and Titman (1997) tests on a Japanese sample, reject the Fama and French (1993) three-factor model but fails to reject the characteristic model.

The Asymmetry of ‘Creation’ and ‘Origination’: Contrasts within Comparative Theology

THE following essay is a contribution to comparative theology, particularly in its contrastive dimension. For a successful comparative theology, the two theologies or religious perspectives being compared and contrasted must be described accurately and equally in depth. Where Christian theology in its Catholic dimension is one pole of the comparison, it is important to make a distinction between doctrine and theology which I will do below. Issues of translation also immediately arise