This article challenges the statement that “the only legally relevant function of a trademark is to impart information as to the source of the product.” Information about the source of the product undoubtedly helps the consumer choose the product she wants from a set of possible products....

An analysis of the Survey of Consumer Finance shows that wealthy investors have a higher return on their stocks than their poorer counterparts. Three key empirical facts emerge: (i) wealthy investors employ more productive search efforts, (ii) financial risk bearing and search efforts are...

We develop a parsimonious econometrics methodology to estimate individual's portfolio return process accounting for self-selection bias from portfolio adjustment; our approach is useful to assist investors learning own return process profile. We study three components to characterize investor's...

Since Markowitz (1959), we deal with the uncomfortable stylized fact called the diversification puzzle- most investors hold only few individual stocks in their portfolios, though the mean-variance portfolio selection model requires many stocks. This paper demonstrates that the ex post...

Studies of household stock market participation report low participation rates. The explanations cited are that the fixed costs associated with participation and high risk aversion discourage households from buying stocks. However, the low participation rate findings are unchallenged. We argue...

Since the work by Stigler on the economics of information in the early 1960s, economists have paid closer attention to the role of search for information. However, search methods are not considered in the theory of portfolio choice. We present a model of investor search behavior in order to...

We consider optimal consumption and portfolio investment problems of an investor who is interested in maximizing his utilities from consumption and terminal wealth subject to a random inflation in the consumption basket price over time. We consider two cases: (i) when the investor observes the...

This paper presents the computational model of consumer behaviour. We consider twosources of product specic consumer skill acquisition, termed here as learning how to consume:learning by consuming and consumer socialization. Consumers utilize these two sources inorder to derive higher valuations...

. A wide body of literature on economic theory is devoted to the analysis of industrial goods markets with the possibility of advertising influence on demand. However, these models do not view media as industry entities with their own strategic goals and objectives. On the other hand, the main...

This paper presents the computational model of consumer behaviour. We consider two sources of product specific consumer skill acquisition, termed here as learning how to consume: learning by consuming and consumer socialization. Consumers utilize these two sources in order to derive higher...