Since Black (1976), the source of the stock price volatility smirk has remained a controversy. The volatility smirk is a side effect of agency conflict. An important distinction is that the smirk occurs in the optimum, even after agency conflict has been resolved. The slope of the smirk is found...

See the article in <I>The North American Journal of Economics and Finance</I> (2013). Volume 26(C), pages 217-226.<P> Research papers in empirical finance and financial econometrics are among the most widely cited, downloaded and viewed articles in the discipline of Finance. The special issue presents...</p></i>

This paper applies the dichotomous theory of choice by Zou (2000a) tothe analysis of investmentstrategies and security markets. Issues concerning individualoptimality, (approximate) arbitrage,capital market equilibrium, and Pareto efficiency are studied undervarious market conditions. Among the...

This paper applies the dichotomous theory of choice by Zou (2000a) to the analysis of investment strategies and security markets. Issues concerning individual optimality, (approximate) arbitrage, capital market equilibrium, and Pareto efficiency are studied under various market conditions. <BR>...

This paper sheds light on the influence of exchange rate volatility on foreign direct investment (FDI), both at the theoretical and the empirical level. The novelty of the empirical analysis, which is based on a panel of 27 OECD countries over the period 1982-2002, is to provide evidence of a...

This paper examines the effect of competition on the irreversible investment decisions under uncertainty as a generalization of the real option approach. We examine this issue with reference to an industry where each firm has only one investment opportunity which is completely irreversible and...

We show that if an agent is uncertain about the precise form of his utility function, his actual relative risk aversion may depend on wealth even if he knows his utility function lies in the class of constant relative risk aversion (CRRA) utility functions. We illustrate the consequences of this...

This discussion paper has resulted in a publication in the <A href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487011001048">'Journal of Economic Psychology'</A> 32(6) 918-39.<P>This experimental study is concerned with the impact of the timing of the resolution of risk onpeople's willingness to take risks, with a special focus on the role of affect. While the...</p></a>

We show that if an agent is uncertain about the precise form of his utility function, his actual relative risk aversion may depend on wealth even if he knows his utility function lies in the class of constant relative risk aversion (CRRA) utility functions. We illustrate the consequences of this...

The paper shows that financial market equilibria need not exist if agents possess cumulative prospect theory preferences with piecewise-power value functions. The reason is an infiniteshort-selling problem. But even when a short-sell constraint is added, non-existence can occur due to...