Does macroeconomic uncertainty increase or decrease aggregate growth and asset prices? To address this question, we decompose aggregate uncertainty into ‘good' and ‘bad' volatility components, associated with positive and negative innovations to macroeconomic growth. We document that in line...

I analyze skill’s role in active management under general equilibrium with many assets and costly trading. More-skilled managers produce larger expected total investment profits, and their portfolio weights correlate more highly with assets' future returns. Becoming more skilled, however, can...

Common valuations pose an obstacle to trade and thus an existential threat to brokers, who profit from taxing trade. We write down a model in which a broker drives a wedge between valuations by deceiving gullible traders. Separate valuations facilitate arbitrage, and arbitrage generates...

Determining the causes of instability and contagion in financial networks is necessary to inform policy and avoid future financial collapse. In the American Economic Review, Elliott, Golub and Jackson proposed a simple model for capturing the dynamics of complex financial networks. In Elliott,...

This paper uses new data on the timing of sovereign defaults during 1869-1914 to quantify an informational channel of contagion via shared financial intermediaries. Concerns over reputation incentivized Britain's merchant banks to monitor, advise, and occasionally bail out sovereigns. Default...

We consider an economy in which investors believe dividend growth is predictable, when in reality it is not. We show that these beliefs lead to excess volatility and return predictability. We also show that these beliefs are rational in the face of evidence on dividend growth. We apply this...