We investigate if unemployment fluctuations generate predictability in the cross-section of currency excess returns. To assess the predictability exerted by unemployment fluctuations, we sort currencies according to past growth in the unemployment rate. We find that an investment strategy which...

We investigate whether unemployment fluctuations generate predictability in the cross-section of currency excess returns. We find that currencies with lower growth in the unemployment rate appreciate while currencies with higher growth in the unemployment rate depreciate. As a result, an...

We study the impact of increasingly negative central bank policy rates on banks' propensity to become undercapitalized in a financial crisis ('SRisk'). We find that the risk impact of negative rates is moderate, and depends on banks' business models: Banks with diversified income streams are...

Risk-managed momentum allows investors to increase the Sharpe ratio of the momentum strategy and to reduce momentum crashes. Yet, the improvement in the performance comes at the price of often assuming a levered position on plain momentum. I show that leverage-constrained investors benefit from...

We study a large currency cross section using recently developed asset pricing methods. First, we show that the implied pricing kernel includes three latent factors: a strong U.S. `Dollar' level factor, and two weak, high Sharpe ratio `Carry' and `Momentum' slope factors. The evidence for an...

We investigate the comovement between sovereign and bank credit risk in the Euro area over the period 2008-2010. We construct two synthetic credit risk measures of the European sovereign and banking sectors that can be used for macro-prudential supervision. We estimate a Vector error-correction...

We investigate the performance and risk of currency hedge funds using a large and unique consolidated currency hedge fund dataset. We find that a substantial number of hedge funds generate returns that exceed foreign exchange risk premia obtained through carry trades. The best alpha-generating...