In this paper, we investigate the investment behaviour of institutional investors in terms of their shareholdings in 2,938 companies listed on the Tokyo and Osaka Stock Exchanges at the end of June 2002. By doing so, we provide one of the first detailed empirical analyses of the involvement of...

For central banks, the monitoring of financing conditions plays a pivotal role in assessing the actual transmission of monetary policy impulses to borrowers. This paper presents in detail some of the indicators and data used by the ECB to assess financing conditions in the euro area. It also...

Since the 1980s, important and progressive reforms have profoundly reshaped the structure of the Chinese banking system. Many empirical studies suggest that financial reform promoted bank competition in most mature and emerging economies. However, some earlier studies that adopted conventional...

Since the 1980s, important and progressive reforms have profoundly reshaped the structure of the Chinese banking system. Many empirical studies suggest that financial reform promoted bank competition in most mature and emerging economies. However, some earlier studies that adopted conventional...

This document presents a research method to analyze the access of small and medium farmers to the supermarket market, and the effect of such access on the producers' decisions and net incomes. The method was developed for and used in a study carried out in 2004 in three Central American countries.

This paper introduces social learning into irreversible investment theory through parameter uncertainty, and shows that social learning could reduce parameter uncertainty to facilitate irreversible investment technology adoption. The theoretic model is tested by using household level data from...

Supermarkets are rapidly penetrating urban food retail in Kenya and spreading well beyond their initial tiny market niche into the food markets of lower-income groups. Having penetrated processed and staple food markets much earlier and faster than fresh foods, they have recently begun to make...

The conventional wisdom that house prices are the present value of future rents ignores the fact that rents are not discretionary as in dividends on stocks. Housing price uncertainty can affect household property investment, which in turn affects rent. By extending the theory of investment under...

China has a dual-track interest-rate system: bank deposit and lending rates are regulated while money and bond rates are market-determined. The central bank also imposes an indicative target, which may not be binding at all times, for total credit in the banking system. We develop and calibrate...

This paper aims at an important gap in the literature, which has not modeled the effect of social learning in a real option context and examined uncertainty-reduction measures through social learning. This paper addresses the gap by modeling social learning as a way of reducing parameter...