Why has the aggregate level of hedge fund alpha (risk-adjusted return) decreased over the last decade? By studying the distribution of individual hedge fund alphas, we find that the large right tail (the percentage of funds with positive alphas) that was once present has shrunk over time, while...

We show that the call-put implied volatility spread (IVS) outperforms many well-known predictors of the U.S. equity premium at return horizons up to six months over the period from 1996:1 to 2017:12. The predictive ability of the IVS is unrelated to the dividend yield and is useful in explaining...

Essay 1, Constrained Capacity and Equilibrium Forward Premia in Electricity Markets, develops a refinement of the equilibrium electricity pricing model in Bessembinder and Lemmon (2002). The refined model explicitly accounts for constrained capacity, an important feature in electricity markets....

I discuss three topics in this thesis. The first two concern topics centering on addition to the S&P 500 Index. In chapters two and three, I examine the price and liquidity effects (respectively) of additions to the S&P500 Index from January 1993 to December 2000. The results from chapter two...