The use of computers to execute trades, often with very low latency, has increased over time, resulting in a variety of computer algorithms executing electronically targeted trading strategies at high speed. We describe the evolution of increasingly fast automated trading over the past decade...

The institutional brokerage industry faces an ever-increasing pressure to lower trading costs, which has already driven down average commissions and shifted volume toward low-cost execution venues. However, traditional full-service brokers that bundle execution with services remain a force and...

The study investigates competition in the market for NASDAQ stocks during a recent period in US equity markets history when three major Electronic Communication Networks (ECNs)--Archipelago, Island, and Instinet--are identifiable in the Trade and Quote (TAQ) database. We show that the ECNs...

We find dividends do matter to shareholders, but more in declining markets than advancing ones. Dividend-paying stocks outperform non-dividend-paying stocks by 1 to 2% more per month in declining markets than in advancing markets. These results are economically and statistically significant and...

This paper deals with ‘investment timing’, or how to make decisions on long-term investments to mitigate catastrophic risk where the risk is driven by trends and seasonality, and interest rates vary stochastically over time. Our model combines real options theory, extreme value theory and...