We develop real-time proxies of retail corporate sales from multiple sources, including ~50 million mobile devices. These measures contain information from both the earnings quarter ("within quarter") and the period between that quarter's end and the earnings announcement date ("post quarter")....

We use data on Indian stock portfolios to show that return heterogeneity is the primary contributor to increasing inequality of wealth held in risky assets by Indian individual investors. Return heterogeneity increases equity wealth inequality through two main channels, both of which are related...

We build a cross-sectional factor model for investors' direct stock holdings, by analogy with standard time-series factor models for stock returns. We estimate the model using data from almost 10 million retail accounts in the Indian stock market. We find that stock characteristics such as firm...

We incorporate a general model of frictions into the bunching-based elasticity estimator. This model relies on fewer parameters than the conventional approach, replacing bunching window bounds with a single "lumpiness parameter," while matching rich observed bunching patterns such as...

We explore the interaction between exchange rates, institutional investor currency flows and exchange-rate fundamentals. We find that these flows are highly correlated with contemporaneous and lagged exchange rate changes, and that they carry information for future excess currency returns. This...

We explore the interaction between exchange rates, institutional investor currency flows and exchange-rate fundamentals. We find that these flows are highly correlated with contemporaneous and lagged exchange rate changes, and that they carry information for future excess currency returns. This...

We examine the forecasting power of international portfolio flows for local equity markets and attempt to attribute it to either better information about fundamentals on the part of international investors, or to price pressure. Price pressure is a potential explanation because flows have...

This paper builds on Froot and Stein (1998) in developing a framework for analyzing the risk allocation, capital budgeting, and capital structure decisions facing insurers and reinsurers. The model incorporates three key features: i) value-maximizing insurers and reinsurers face product-market...

This paper examines the market for catastrophe event risk i.e., financial claims that are linked to losses associated with natural hazards, such as hurricanes and earthquakes. Risk management theory suggests protection by insurers and other corporations against the largest cat events is most...