This study reviews the causes and evolution of the financial crisis and surveys some of the recent literature on this topic. It documents how bank regulation became essentially ineffective due to the rise of “quasi-banks,” that is, large financial intermediaries that perform banking...

This study examines common stock prices around ex-dividend dates. Such price data usually contain a mixture of observations -- some with and some without arbitragers and/or dividend capturers active. Our theory predicts that such mixing will result in a nonlinear relation between percentage...

We find that on average an announcement of rising unemployment is 'good news' for stocks during economic expansions and 'bad news' during economic contractions. Thus stock prices usually increase on news of rising unemployment, since the economy is usually in an expansion phase. We provide an...

We find that on average an announcement of rising unemployment is quot;good newsquot; for stocks during economic expansions and quot;bad newsquot; during economic contractions. Unemployment news bundles three types of primitive information relevant for valuing stocks: information about future...