From 1992 to 2011, average R2 increased from 0.17 to 0.47. During this period, passive financial institutions also grew their ownership from 30 to 50% of the market. Passive investors do not perform fundamental research nor trade around firm-specific news, thus reducing the firm-specific...

Hedging market downturns without sacrificing upside has long been sought by investors. If VIX was directly investable, adding it as a hedge to the S&P 500 would result in significantly improved performance over the equity only portfolio. However, tradable VIX products do not provide the hedge or...

While insurers manage underwriting risk with various methods including reinsurance, insurers increasingly manage asset risk with options, futures, and other derivatives. Previous research shows that buyers of portfolio insurance pay considerably for downside protection. We add to this literature...