Technical analysis, also known as "charting", has been a part of financial practice for many decades, yet little academic research has been devoted to a systematic evaluation of this discipline. One of the main obstacles is the highly subjective nature of technical analysis---the presence of...

We propose a dynamic equilibrium model of asset prices and trading volume with heterogeneous agents facing fixed transactions costs. We show that even small fixed costs can give rise to large 'no-trade' regions for each agent's optimal trading policy and a significant illiquidity discount in...

Technical analysis, also known as charting,' has been part of financial practice for many decades, but this discipline has not received the same level of academic scrutiny and acceptance as more traditional approaches such as fundamental analysis. One of the main obstacles is the highly...

We study market efficiency from a computational viewpoint. Borrowing from theoretical computer science, we define a market to be efficient with respect to resources S (e.g., time, memory) if no strategy using resources S can make a profit. As a first step, we consider memory-m strategies whose...

Andrew Lo introduces MIT's Laboratory for Financial Engineering and outlines its research programmes in capital markets, risk management and financial technology.

"We propose a broad measure of liquidity for the overall financial market by exploiting its connection with the amount of arbitrage capital in the market and the potential impact on price deviations in US Treasurys. When arbitrage capital is abundant, we expect the arbitrage forces to smooth out...