Income distribution has been a longstanding focus of social and economic interest, but never more so than in recent times. New metrics for disadvantage and spread enable a more precise differentiation of directional asymmetry and dispersion, drawing on an internal contextual perspective. The...

An assumption of symmetric asset returns, together with globally risk averse utility functions, is unappealing for fund managers and other activist investors, whose preferences switch between risk aversion on the downside and risk seeking on the upside. A performance return criterion is...

Using the contingent claim approach and market data on sovereign credit default swaps we assess the drivers of a country s risk perception. Deriving market-based asset values for a set of advanced economies we gain insights into the capital markets perspectives on sovereign creditworthiness. We...

We present a forecasting algorithm based on support vector regression emphasizing the practical benefits of wavelets for financial time series. We utilize an effective de-noising algorithm based on wavelets feasible under the assumption that a systematic pattern plus random noise generate the...

We use dynamic panel analysis to examine whether credit rating agencies achieve what they claim to achieve, namely, look into the future when assigning their ratings. We find that Moody's ratings help predict individual financial ratios over a horizon of up to five years. Ratings also predict a...