Target volatility options (TVO) are a new class of derivatives whose payoff depends on some measure of volatility. These options allow investors to take a joint exposure to the evolution of the underlying asset, as well as to its realized volatility. For instance, a target volatility call can be...

With globalization and financial integration, there has been rapid growth of international lending and foreign direct investment (FDI). In view of this emerging trend, country risk analysis has become extremely important for the international creditors and investors. This paper briefly discusses...

With an ever-increasing amount of information related to the stock market or various investment avenues, misperception or no perception regarding mutual funds is becoming a norm for investors and marketers. To date no perception measuring scale has been developed for mutual fund investors, to...

Insurance companies can be exposed to climate-related physical risk through their operations and to transition risk through their $12 trillion of financial asset holdings. We assess the climate risk exposure of property and casualty (P&C) and life insurance companies in the U.S. We construct a...

This paper compares the informational content of judgmentally determined sovereign ratings produced by a private sector bank and by the rating agency Standard and Poor's, with ratings derived from econometric analysis of sovereign default. We show that downgrades in both the bank and the agency...