A model of self-enforcing stochastic monitoring with investment and production is developed. The optimal contract leads to debt-like and equity-like claims on the firm that are held by symmetrically informed outside investors and rationalizes the separation of these claims in order to...

In the United States and other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, the expected returns on stocks, adjusted for volatility, are much higher in recessions than in expansions. We consider feasible trading strategies that buy or sell shortly after business cycle...

We analyze optimal fiscal and monetary policy in an economy with distortionary labor income taxes, nominal rigidities, nominal debt of various maturities and short-selling constraints. Optimal policy prescribes the almost exclusive use of long term debt. Such debt mitigates the distortions...