Search

The purpose of this study is to examine the fractal dynamics of day ahead electricity prices by using parametric and semi parametric approaches for each time zone in a multi-time tariff setting in the framework of bidding strategies, market efficiency and persistence of exogenous shocks. We find that that electricity prices have long term correlation structure for the first and third time zones indicating that market participants bid hyperbolically and not at their marginal costs, market is not weak form efficient at these hours and exogenous shocks to change the mean level of prices will have permanent effect and be effective. On the other hand, for the second time zone we find that price series does not exhibit long term memory. This finding suggests the weak form efficiency of the market in these hours and that market participants bid at their marginal costs. Furthermore this indicates that exogenous shocks will have temporary effect on electricity prices in these hours. These findings constitute an important foundation for policy makers and market participants to develop appropriate electricity price forecasting tools, market monitoring indexes and to conduct ex-ante impact assessment. © 2015 Elsevier B.V.

In this study, we develop the Taylor rule and Taylor rule-based exchange rate models that consider wealth effects as represented by both asset prices and asset wealth. Using data for Australia, Sweden, the UK and the USA, we find that effects of asset prices and wealth on the Taylor rule vary depending on the country and on the form that wealth takes. Out-of-sample forecasting capacities of the wealth-augmented Taylor rule model and Taylor rule-based exchange rate model outperform conventional models and random walk theories for these countries. Javier Ordóñez gratefully acknowledges financial support from the UJI project P1-1B2014-17, the Generalitat Valenciana project PROMETEOII/2014/053 and the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness project ECO2014-58991-C3-2-R. We would like to thank three anonymous referees for their helpful comments and suggestions, the usual disclaimer applies.

This paper develops an economic analysis of commodity price dynamics and price volatility. The approach applies under general supply-demand conditions, including the role played by private and public inventory holders. Quantile autogression is used to estimate the evolving distribution of price. The usefulness of the method is illustrated in an application to two markets in China: a food market (rice) and a feed market (corn). Based on monthly data over the period 2000-2014, the econometric analysis shows how the price distributions (including skewness and kurtosis) vary across commodity markets. Using a Markov chain representation, the paper evaluates the dynamics of price volatility. It finds slow adjustments in the price distribution between short run and long run situations. The investigation also assesses the short run and long run effects of alternative economic policies on the price distributions. It finds that the Chinese price support programs have helped stabilize the domestic food market but not the feed market.

This paper investigates the evolution of electricity prices for domestic customers in the UK following the introduction of competition. The empirical analysis is based on a panel data set containing detailed information about electricity supply prices over the period 1999 to 2006. The analysis examines the pricing patterns and draws inferences concerning the benefits of incumbency and the gains from search. The econometric analysis of persistence and price dispersion provides rather limited support for the view that the market is becoming more competitive and also indicates that there remain significant potential benefits to consumers from searching alternative suppliers. Copyright 2010 Oxford University Press 2009 All rights reserved, Oxford University Press.

Can asset price bubbles be detected? This survey of econometric tests of asset price bubbles shows that, despite recent advances, econometric detection of asset price bubbles cannot be achieved with a satisfactory degree of certainty. For each paper that finds evidence of bubbles, there is another one that fits the data equally well without allowing for a bubble. We are still unable to distinguish bubbles from time-varying or regime-switching fundamentals, while many small sample econometrics problems of bubble tests remain unresolved. © 2008 The Author Journal compilation © 2008 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Within a standard framework à la Arrow-Debreu, we investigate the dynamics emerging from the interactions of heterogeneous households and firms that are adaptive price setters and financially constrained. We show that depending on the stringency of the financial constraints the model can settle in two very different regimes: one characterized by equilibrium, the other by disequilibrium and financial fragility. We then investigate how the structure of the production network affects the emergence of aggregate volatility from micro-level price and financial shocks, hence providing a dynamical counterpart to recent results of Acemoglu and al (2012)., Dans un cadre classique à la Arrow-Debreu, nous analysons la dynamique émergeant des interactions de consommateurs et d'entreprises hétérogènes qui sont contraints financièrement et qui mettent à jour leurs prix de manière adaptative. Nous montrons que selon l'intensité des contraintes financières, le modèle adopte deux régimes très différents : l'un d'équilibre, l'autre caractérisé par des phénomènes de déséquilibre et de fragilité financière. Nous analysons dans un second temps comment la structure du réseau de production influence l'émergence de la volatilité macro-économique à partir de chocs micro-économiques. Nous établissons ainsi une extension dynamique de résultats récents d'Acemoglu et co-auteurs.

This paper examines whether there is a volatility transmission between oil prices and financial stress by means of the volatility spillover test. We employ WTI crude oil prices and Cleveland financial stress index for the period 1991-2014 and divide the sample into pre-crisis, in-crisis, and post-crisis periods due to the downward trend in oil price in 2008. The volatility model estimations indicate that oil prices and financial stress index are dominated by long-run volatility. The volatility spillover causality test supports evidence on risk transfer from oil prices to financial stress before the crisis and from financial stress to oil prices after the crisis. The impulse response analysis shows that the volatility transmission pattern has similar dynamics before and after the crisis and is characterized by higher and long-lived effects during the crisis. Our results have implications for both policy makers and investors, and for future work. (c) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

This paper develops a model framework and a corresponding empirical inference procedure for estimating long-run marginal cost in industries where production costs decline over time. In the context of the solar photovoltaic module industry, we rely on firm-level financial accounting data to estimate the long-run marginal cost of PV modules for the years 2008 -2013. During those years, the industry experienced both sharp price declines and significant expansions of manufacturing capacity. By comparing the trajectory of average sales prices with the long-run marginal cost estimates, we are in a position to quantify the extent to which actual price declines were attributable to excess capacity as opposed to reductions in production costs. While we find a significant effect attributable to excess capacity for some quarters in our sample period, the dynamics of this industry also points to a rate of cost reductions that is even faster than the 80% learning curve which has described the trajectory of average sales prices over the past three decades.

In the aftermath of the so-called Marginal Revolution of the last end of the nineteenth century, economic analysis split into two branches. The first one was made up of economists who took as the methodological starting-point of their analyses the static or stationary state of a barter economy and considered that this basic framework was likely to be extended in order to account for monetary and financial considerations, as well as dynamics. However, in such a setting, the introduction of money, bank-credit, or any factor of growth did not substantially alter the features that are associated with the rudimentary economy of static real exchange.

This paper studies an order-driven stock market where agents have heterogeneous estimates of the fundamental value of the risky asset. The agents are budget-constrained and follow a value-based trading strategy which buys or sells depending on whether the price of the asset is below or above its risk-adjusted fundamental value. This environment generates returns that are remarkably leptokurtic and fat-tailed. By extending the study over a grid of different parameters for the fundamentalist trading strategy, we exhibit the existence of monotone relationships between the bid–ask spread demanded by the agents and several statistics of the returns. We conjecture that this effect, coupled with positive dependence of the risk premium on the volatility, generates positive feedbacks that might explain volatility bursts.

In this study, non-parametric kernel estimation technique has been employed to estimate import and export price elasticities for six developed countries. Based on the estimates of these elasticities Marshall-Lerner condition has been examined. In general the condition is only partially satisfied in the sub-sample periods. The results also suggest that the condition is more likely to be satisfied under fixed exchange rate regime. © 2004 Taylor and Francis Ltd.

The empirical evidence suggests that openness decreases the effect of monetary policy on output, however the effect on prices is not statistically significant. In this study these predictions are tested over the open economy of Turkey for quarterly data from 1987:1 to 2001:1. This study assesses how the openness affects the effectiveness of monetary policy on output and prices.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: using time series econometrics, we first investigate the determinants of short-term foreign capital inflows for Turkey following its capital account liberalization in 1989. We next investigate the changing nature of the private investment function under post-capital account liberalization and deduce hypotheses on its correlation with capital inflows and the key macroeconomic prices, such as the exchange rate, the real rate of interest, and real wages. Our results suggest that financial capital inflows have a significant negative correlation with the industrial production index and trade openness, and are positively correlated with real currency appreciation. Fixed private investment was found to have an inconclusive relationship with financial capital inflows. Real wage costs were observed to carry a significant negative relationship with private investment, indicating that at a time of currency appreciation, investors had to rely on declining wage costs in order to keep their export competitiveness. Under the volatile and uncertain conditions of speculation-driven investment patterns, the downward flexibility of real wages has to be seen as a concomitant factor of the post-financial liberalization episodes.

The article takes a look at the issues of the market-oriented power sector reform and the experience that is of interest in the process of reforms in any country. Organizational models might, however, vary quite substantially in different countries in terms of basic characteristics. The article studies the difference between idealistic notions that underlie the existing market model and real economic relations that are directly connected to the technological features of the industry. It validates proposals for alternative energy market models and a management mechanism for the industry. © 2014 WIT Press. International Journal of Safety and Security Engineering;International Journal of Sustainable Development and Planning;WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment

This thesis studies the stochastic behavior of emission permit prices and its implications for related derivatives from a theoretical and an empirical perspective. It presents an equilibrium model for cap-and-trade systems, evaluates the empirical performance of reduced-form models for emission permit prices, and studies the effects of the yearly emissions announcement event on the European market for carbon emissions.

We analyze the speed of mean reversion (k) in the convenience yield and the spot price volatility for 7 US commodities between 1989-2012. In the hog market k is large, soybeans exhibit the lowest values. While for 5 of 7 commodities κ is lower in the more recent period (2005-2012) than in the pre energy period, soybeans and copper show the opposite behavior. A decreasing speed of k implies that the growth rate of the futures prices rises and thus the gap between the nearest and the farthest maturities increases. The estimated spot price volatilities increased for agricultural commodities.

This article measures the welfare gains from disinflation in Turkey during the 2000s. Estimated welfare gains exceed the real output gains, which is likely to arise from persisting allocative inefficiencies, pointing at the need for further structural and institutional reforms for the benefits of price stability to be utilized towards achieving sustainable development. © 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

The automotive industry is increasingly dependent on plastic materials whose price level and volatility have risen sharply over the past decade due to the assumed effect of fluctuations in crude oil prices, which is the key feedstock in the production of final products such as plastics. This thesis aims to provide econometric tools to analyze, understand, and manage the risk of price volatility of major plastics materials consumed in the automotive industry. Using the cointegration methodology, we show that long-term equilibrium relationship and short-term dynamics reveal the transmission mechanism of input prices changes from the upstream market to the prices of plastics materials on the downstream market. The significant cointegration relationships between petrochemical and crude oil prices justify the development of hedging strategies against inputs prices fluctuation and the estimation of error correction models that should produce better prices forecast., Le secteur automobile est de plus en plus dépendant aux matières plastiques dont le niveau et la volatilité des prix ont fortement augmenté au cours des dix dernières années, sous l’effet supposé des variations du prix du pétrole qui est le principal input nécessaire à leur fabrication. La thèse vise à fournir des outils économétriques permettant d’analyser et gérer le risque de variations des prix des principales matières plastiques utilisées dans l’industrie automobile. À l’aide des méthodologies de cointégration, nous montrons que les relations d’équilibre de long terme et les dynamiques de court terme mettent en évidence un mécanisme de transmission des variations des coûts de production sur le prix des plastiques situés en aval du processus productif. L’existence de relations de cointégration significatives entre les prix pétrochimiques et pétroliers justifie l’élaboration de stratégies de couverture contre les variations des coûts de production et l’estimation de modèles à correction d’erreur qui permettent d’affiner les prévisions des prix.

Since 2004 (Ethiopian Fiscal Year (EFY) 1997), Ethiopia has experienced strong and generally broad-based real economic growth of around 10.6 percent on average between then and 2011. Growth over the last nine years was far beyond the growth rates recorded in aggregate terms for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), which on average only reached 5.2 percent, less than half of Ethiopia's average real gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate during that period. Inspired by the East Asian experiences for a comparison of selected indicators and policies of Ethiopia and China/Korea), growth was induced through a mix of factors including agricultural modernization, the development of new export sectors, strong global commodity demand, and government-led development investments. The initial double digits growth rates have now manifested slightly lower but remain at high single-digit levels. The economy is expected to stabilize at around seven to eight percent in 2012, largely owing to improved performance in the agriculture sector. GDP growth is likely to stay around that margin up until 2016 (EFY 2008) driven by rising foreign investment and exports (Economist Intelligence Unit 2012). High inflation persists, but is on a slightly decreasing trend. Economic growth brought with it positive trends in reducing poverty, in both urban and rural areas. Ethiopia follows a strategy of increasing exports to facilitate growth. This is appropriate given the currently limited size of its domestic market and it is consistent with the development experience of some of the recently successful countries, particularly in East Asia. Export of goods growth is to a good extent driven by volume growth across a variety of product groups, which indicates that this growth is a result of recent efforts to increase and diversify the export base. Overall export and import developments result in a significantly increased trade deficit by 43 percent, up from US$5.5 billion in 2010/11 to US$7.9 billion.

This paper employs a pair-wise approach to examine regional integration in the US gasoline market. Using gasoline price data at the state level over a period of more than two decades, we find strong support for the view that the law of one price holds in regional markets, as more than 80% of bivariate price differentials turn out to be stationary. Furthermore, we uncover evidence that the speed at which prices converge to the long-run equilibrium depends upon the distance between states. Asymmetries are also present in this relationship. Our findings suggest that the more similar are states with respect to taxation, gas stations and refining capacity, the faster is the speed of adjustment towards the long-run equilibrium. © 2012 Elsevier B.V.

To execute a trade, participants in electronic equity markets may choose to submit limit orders or market orders across various exchanges where a stock is traded. This decision is influenced by characteristics of the order flows and queue sizes in each limit order book, as well as the structure of transaction fees and rebates across exchanges. We propose a quantitative framework for studying this order placement problem by formulating it as a convex optimization problem. This formulation allows the study of how the optimal order placement decision depends on the interplay between the state of order books, the fee structure, order flow properties and the aversion to execution risk. In the case of a single exchange, we derive an explicit solution for the optimal split between limit and market orders. For the general case of order placement across multiple exchanges, we propose a stochastic algorithm that computes the optimal routing policy and study the sensitivity of the solution to various parameters. Our algorithm does not require an explicit statistical model of order flow but exploits data on recent order fills across exchanges in the numerical implementation of the algorithm to acquire this information through a supervised learning procedure.

Empirical evidence shows that the pass-through of cost shocks to prices is very low, and delayed. This is in stark contrast with the standard framework of monopolistic competition used in macro models, which, absent nominal rigidities, implies complete pass-through of cost shocks to prices. This paper develops a model of pricing dynamics in business to business relationships where incomplete pass-through arises endogenously. The model is based on two assumptions. First, both retailers and wholesalers invest resources to form new, long-term, business relationships. Second, once a business relationship is formed, the prices and the quantities of the intermediate good exchanged are set in a bilateral bargaining between wholesalers and retailers. The repeated nature of the interactions between firms raises the question of whether wholesale prices are allocative. We show that wholesale prices still play an allocative role in the model, but this role is likely to be quite limited.

Interactions between food demand, biomass energy and forest preservation are driving both food prices and land-use changes, regionally and globally. This study presents a new model called Nexus Land-Use version 1.0 which describes these interactions through a generic representation of agricultural intensification mechanisms within agricultural lands. The Nexus Land-Use model equations combine biophysics and economics into a single coherent framework to calculate crop yields, food prices, and resulting pasture and cropland areas within 12 regions inter-connected with each other by international trade. The representation of cropland and livestock production systems in each region relies on three components: (i) a biomass production function derived from the crop yield response function to inputs such as industrial fertilisers; (ii) a detailed representation of the livestock production system subdivided into an intensive and an extensive component, and (iii) a spatially explicit distribution of potential (maximal) crop yields prescribed from the Lund-Postdam-Jena global vegetation model for managed Land (LPJmL). The economic principles governing decisions about land-use and intensification are adapted from the Ricardian rent theory, assuming cost minimisation for farmers. In contrast to the other land-use models linking economy and biophysics, crops are aggregated as a representative product in calories and intensification for the representative crop is a non-linear function of chemical inputs. The model equations and parameter values are first described in details. Then, idealised scenarios exploring the impact of forest preservation policies or rising energy price on agricultural intensification are described, and their impacts on pasture and cropland areas are investigated.

A stochastic model for the dynamics of a limit order book is evaluated and tested on empirical data. Arrival of limit, market and cancellation orders are described in terms of a Markovian queuing system with exponentially distributed occurrences. In this model, several key quantities can be analytically calculated, such as the distribution of times between price moves, price volatility and the probability of an upward price move, all conditional on the state of the order book. We show that the exponential distribution poorly fits the occurrences of order book events and further show that little resemblance exists between the analytical formulas in this model and the empirical data. The log-normal and Weibull distribution are suggested as replacements as they appear to fit the empirical data better.

This study examines the dynamic relationship between world oil prices and twenty four world agricultural commodity prices accounting for changes in the relative strength of US dollar in a panel setting. We employ panel cointegration and Granger causality methods for a panel of twenty four agricultural products based on monthly prices ranging from January 1980 to February 2010. The empirical results provide strong evidence on the impact of world oil price changes on agricultural commodity prices. Contrary to the findings of many studies in the literature that report neutrality of agricultural prices to oil price changes, we find strong support for the role of world oil prices on prices of several agricultural commodities. The positive impact of a weak dollar on agricultural prices is also confirmed. © 2011 Elsevier B.V.

Neste trabalho, objetivou-se caracterizar as madeiras comercializadas como pau-de-escora na cidade de Manaus, Amazonas. Esse produto é utilizado como apoio na construção de lajes. Com exceção dos grandes prédios de apartamentos, a maioria das construções e reformas residenciais ainda utiliza esse produto, inclusive em prédios públicos. As estimativas quantitativas de dimensão e as análises anatômicas macroscópicas foram realizadas em 450 "varas" de pau-de-escora apreendidas pelo Batalhão Ambiental-AM. Houve, ainda, aplicação de questionário junto aos estabelecimentos que as vendem, para avaliar a dinâmica do comércio deste produto. O comprimento médio encontrado foi de 3,74 ± 0,08 m (IC 95%) e o diâmetro médio foi de 4,48 ± 0,03 cm (IC 95%). As sete famílias mais abundantes encontradas foram: Fabaceae, Annonaceae, Sapotaceae, Lecythidaceae, Lauraceae, Burseraceae e Chrysobalanaceae. O preço médio geral encontrado em Manaus para a compra de pau-de-escora foi R$ 2,63 e o de venda foi de R$ 3,94. Em geral, o pau-de-escora consumido em Manaus é ilegal, da produção à comercialização. Há uma padronização quanto às dimensões nas quais esse produto é comercializado, assim como o preço, nas casas comerciais que vendem irregularmente o referido material. The objective was to characterize the wood product commercially known as pau-de-escora in Manaus, Amazonas. Pau-de-escora is a key foundation material to build concrete lining or storey in tower buildings. The use of pau-de-escora is very popular in Manaus even in public building construction. To carry out the analyses and the anatomical identification of the material, we used 450 pau-de-escora poles, which were apprehended by the Environmental Battalion of Amazonas Police Force. It was also carried out a social survey to better understand the dynamics of the trade of this product in Manaus. The length of the 450 poles averaged 3.74 ± 0.08 m (CI 95%) and diameter at the base averaged 4.48 ± 0.03 cm (CI 95%). These small differences related to the means indicate that the market requires a very clear dimension pattern for this wood product. The seven most abundant families encountered were: Fabaceae, Annonaceae, Sapotaceae, Lecythidaceae, Lauraceae, Burseraceae and Chrysobalanaceae. The selling price of pau-de-escora pole in Manaus averaged R$ 2.63, and the buying price averaged R$ 3.94. The custody chain of pau-de-escora is completely illegal not only in Brazil, perhaps worldwide because it is part of the natural regeneration ofprimary or recovery forests.

International audience; We propose a functional framework for studying agent-based dynamical models of exchange. The framework consists of a notation and of a number of elementary definitions. We argue that - in comparison to narrative descriptions - the framework has a number of advantages: (1) it allows one to express precisely the relationships between the classical notion of general equilibrium and agent-based models of exchange; (2) it supports computational descriptions of models of exchange which can be unambiguously implemented; (3) it assists the numerical investigation of such models by providing a specific set of elementary notions and computational primitives. These can be used to deduce model properties and to setup "crucial" numerical experiments for validating model implementations. In a companion paper, we apply the framework to specify and study a model of exchange in which multiple equilibrium prices coexist and prices evolve according to a simple trading scheme and to a generic genetic rule.

In the first part of this thesis, I address the classical problem of asset price dynamics based on a new theoretical framework developed for nonequilibrium physical systems. This problem is mainly relevant for two reasons. First, because understanding the true distribution of returns is important for asset allocation, risk management, and option pricing. Second, because in spite of all the effort in determining the origin of non-Gaussian returns no conclusive result has been achieved yet. The most important result of this part is the demostration that the non-Gaussian shape and stable scaling of the returns distribution are due to slow, but significant, fluctuations in volatility. Futhermore, this result suggests that stock price fluctuations are universal, and that return distributions can be described by one functional form. In the second part, I present an empirical study about the execution of large orders in two stock exchanges: the London Stock Exchange, and the Spanish Stock Exchange. This type of orders can cause a tremendous impact because they are larger than the available liquidity in the order book at a time. For this reason, they are split to minimize transaction costs. Market price impact is the basic factor of these costs, so an accurate description of its functional form is necessary to any optimal execution. The most important result in this part is the empirical determination of this functional form in two markets and the finding of a common behavior in both markets that can be summarized into a concave temporary impact, roughly described by a square root function of the hidden order size, and a price reversion after the completion of the hidden order making permanent impact equal to roughly half of the temporary impact.

Uncertainty is a crucial issue for producers who must make input decisions without knowing prices and without perfect knowledge of realized output. In this context, price expectations strongly determine the production choices and market prices that result from market-clearing conditions. This study analyzed the role that price expectations play in price dynamics, developing a theoretical model of trade in varieties following Armington (1969) and augmented with yield and price uncertainty to highlight several main determinants of domestic producer prices, including exchange rates, proximity to world markets, input prices, natural disasters, and producers' expectations. An econometric estimation of the rice sector, using a panel of 13 developing Asian countries during 1965-2003, confirmed that expectations count, with a 1% increase in the expected price resulting in a 1.18% decrease in the market price. A simulation exercise based on these empirical results demonstrated that forecasting errors are large. Specifically, Asian rice farmers have a 50% chance of making prediction errors of 10% or more on the final market price. This high error rate suggests the need for developing ways of sharing information, such as radio programs dedicated to agricultural producers or the introduction of futures markets, to stabilize agricultural incomes.

Esta tese tem como objetivo principal aproximar a evidencia empirica existente sobre os agregados macroeconomicos com as novas evidencias empiricas baseadas nos micro dados de precos ao consumidor, tendo como base os modelos padroes de rigidez de preco utilizados na literatura de politica monetaria. Para isso, esta tese utiliza a base de dados individuais de precos ao consumidor no Brasil fornecida pela Fundacao Getulio Vargas. Especificamente, esta tese foca em tres temas principais: a existencia de variac˜oes temporararias de precos, a heterogeneidade na rigidez de precos entre firmas de um mesmo setor e o formato das func˜oes hazard. Os resultados mostram que: existe de fato uma correlac˜ao entre as variaveis referentes as mudancas temporararias de precos e os agregados macroeconomicos; a heterogeneidade na rigidez de precos entre firmas de um mesmo setor apresenta efeitos significativos sobre a dinamica dos agregados macroeconomicos; e por fim, o formato mais geral da func˜ao hazard proposta nesta tese possibilita novas dinamicas dos agregados macroeconomicos. This thesis has as its main goal to approximate the existing empirical evidence on macroeconomic aggregates with the new empirical evidences based on micro data on consumer prices, having as a baseline the standard sticky-price models used in the literature on monetary policy. In order to do that, this thesis makes use of a micro data on individual consumer prices in Brazil published by Getulio Vargas Foundation. Specifically, this thesis focus on three main issues: the existence of temporary price changes, the within-sector heterogeneity in price stickiness and the shape of hazard functions. The results show that: there exist a correlation between variables on temporary price changes and macroeconomic aggregates; the within-sector heterogeneity in price stickiness has significant effects on macroeconomic dynamics; and the more general specification of the shape of the hazard function that is proposed in this thesis leads to new dynamics for the macroeconomic aggregates.

The economic literature shows that entry regulation in taxicab markets brings about a dramatic increase in medallion prices or license values of taxicabs. However, there is no study estimating what the effect of regulation is exactly on real medallion prices. We develop a model to estimate the effect of entry restrictions in the Istanbul taxicab market over real medallion prices and inflation. Our findings contribute that entry regulation in taxicab markets increases medallion prices. Moreover, we find that entry regulation in Istanbul pressures inflation rates as well.

[EN] The concept of eco-efficiency can be defined with the "product value/environmental influence" ratio. Different models have been proposed to measure eco-efficiency. The main difference among them is the weighting system used to aggregate the environmental results. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) permits this aggregation without requiring a subjective judgment about the weights. In this study, we applied a DEA model to Spanish Mahón-Menorca cheese production to determine the most eco-efficient production techniques. To this end, 16 scenarios of Mahón-Menorca cheese production were built regarding technical (degree of automation) and cleaner production criteria. The environmental impacts were assessed by means of life cycle assessment. We carried out an economic assessment by determining the economic value added and the net income for each scenario. The results are referred to as 1 kilogram (kg) cheese ripened over 105 days. Through DEA, an eco-efficiency ratio between 0 and 1 was obtained. Three scenarios were found to be eco-efficient, with a high degree of automation (enclosed vat and molding and demolding machines) and accelerated cheese ripening. We used Monte Carlo simulation to carry out a sensitivity analysis to compare the influence of price changes on the eco-efficiency ratio. The results emphasize the consistency and stability of the eco-efficient scenarios. © 2011 by Yale University., We gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science, Project CTM2006-12328/TECNO, and from the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, Project PAID-05-06-6733. We are also grateful for the help of the Consell Regulador de la Denominacio d'Origen Mahon-Menorca, Alcaidus S. A. T., Cooperativa Insular Ganadera (Coinga), Hort de Sant Patrici, S. L., and Iberlact S. L.

In the first part of this thesis, I address the classical problem of asset price dynamics based on a new theoretical framework developed for nonequilibrium physical systems. This problem is mainly relevant for two reasons. First, because understanding the true distribution of returns is important for asset allocation, risk management, and option pricing. Second, because in spite of all the effort in determining the origin of non-Gaussian returns no conclusive result has been achieved yet. The most important result of this part is the demostration that the non-Gaussian shape and stable scaling of the returns distribution are due to slow, but significant, fluctuations in volatility. Futhermore, this result suggests that stock price fluctuations are universal, and that return distributions can be described by one functional form. In the second part, I present an empirical study about the execution of large orders in two stock exchanges: the London Stock Exchange, and the Spanish Stock Exchange. This type of orders can cause a tremendous impact because they are larger than the available liquidity in the order book at a time. For this reason, they are split to minimize transaction costs. Market price impact is the basic factor of these costs, so an accurate description of its functional form is necessary to any optimal execution. The most important result in this part is the empirical determination of this functional form in two markets and the finding of a common behavior in both markets that can be summarized into a concave temporary impact, roughly described by a square root function of the hidden order size, and a price reversion after the completion of the hidden order making permanent impact equal to roughly half of the temporary impact.

CERNA WORKING PAPER SERIES 2010-19; This paper analyses the distributional effects of alternative scenarios of carbon taxes on car fuels using disaggregated French panel data from 2003 to 2006. It incorporates household price responsiveness that differs across income groups into a consumer surplus measure of tax burden. Carbon taxation is regressive before revenue recycling. However, taking into account the benefits from congestion reduction induced by the tax mitigates regressivity. We show also that recycling additional revenues from the carbon tax either in equal amounts to each household or according to household size makes poorest households better off.

Oil prices are thought to have direct effect on agricultural prices followed by an indirect effect through the exchange rate. This paper examines the short- and long-run interdependence between world oil prices, lira-dollar exchange rate, and individual agricultural commodity prices (wheat, maize, cotton, soybeans, and sunflower) in Turkey. To this end, the Toda-Yamamoto causality approach and generalized impulse-response analysis for identification of the long- and short-run interrelationships are applied to the monthly data spanning from January 1994 to March 2010. The impulse-response analysis suggests the Turkish agricultural prices do not significantly react to oil price and exchange rate shocks in the short-run. The long-run causality analysis reveals that the changes in oil prices and appreciation/depreciation of the Turkish lira are not transmitted to agricultural commodity prices in Turkey. Hence, our results support neutrality of agricultural commodity markets in Turkey to both direct and indirect effects of oil price changes. © 2010 Elsevier B.V.

The work of Friedrich Von Hayek contains several testable predictions about the nature of market processes. Vernon Smith termed the most important one the "Hayek hypothesis:" equilibrium prices and the gains from trade can be achieved in the presence of diffuse, decentralized information, and in the absence of price-taking behavior and centralized market direction. Vernon Smith tested this by surveying data on laboratory experimental markets and found strong support. We repeat this exercise using field experimental market data. Using field experiments allows us to test several other predictions. Generally speaking, we find support for Hayek's theories.

Lao PDR economic growth continues to be strong in 2010, against the backdrop of a fragile global recovery yet dynamic regional demand. Growth is projected at 8.5 percent in 2010, from 7.5 percent in 2009. The resources sector is projected to contribute about 4 percentage points of economic growth, of which electricity, water and gas about 3.2 percentage points. This update reports mainly on recent economic developments and medium-term outlook for the country.

This paper considers the relation between immigration and prices for a large number of cities across the world over the period from 1990 to 2006. Aggregate immigration ratios are shown to have a negative impact on international relative prices. The evidence is consistent with demand-side and supply-side considerations both being relevant for the price-reducing effect of immigration, with the latter offering a more likely explanation at annual frequencies during this period. Our findings regarding the inverse relation of immigration and prices and the channels via which this operates across international cities, are broadly consistent wih Lach (2007) and Cortes (2008) who investigate the same relation within Israel and for the US respectively.

This paper reviews the economic literature on the role of fees in patent systems. Two main research questions are usually addressed: the impact of patent fees on the behavior of applicants and the question of optimal fees. Studies in the former group confirm that a range of fees affect the behavior of applicants and suggest that a patent is an inelastic good. Studies in the latter group provide grounds for both low and high application (or pre-grant) fees and renewal (or post-grant) fees, depending on the structural context and on the policy objectives. The paper also presents new stylized facts on patent fees of thirty patent offices worldwide. It is shown that application fees are generally lower than renewal fees, and renewal fees increase more than proportionally with patent age (to the notable exception of Switzerland and the U.S.)., info:eu-repo/semantics/published

This article investigates the impact of the introduction of the euro on the interactions across the New York, London, Frankfurt and Paris stock markets. After controlling for possible returns and volatility spillovers, we focus on the correlations of shocks using the framework of Dynamic Conditional Correlations (DCC). Daily pseudo-closing prices (recorded at 16:00 London time) are used to avoid conflating correlation and spillover effects. Statistical break tests confirm that the introduction of the euro significantly affects the cross-market correlations. Although dynamic correlations of shocks between all market pairs increase, the correlation in the post-euro period is highest between Frankfurt and Paris, indicating increased integration of these markets. Other findings include the presence of spillover effects from foreign markets for both returns and volatilities, with asymmetries in volatilities and conditional correlations such that negative shocks have larger effects than positive ones.

This paper has examined the spatial integration, price dynamics, and pricing behavior of wheat markets in Ethiopia using 72 months retail price series (July 2001-June 2007) and cross-section data of structural determinants of spatial integration. Dynamic measures of spatial integration including long-run multipliers, speed of spatial price adjustment, and composite index were estimated to measure the magnitude, speed, and extent of spatial linkages and to identify the relative importance and pricing conduct in these markets. The common assertion that Addis Ababa is a central market dictating commodity price formation process in Ethiopia was disproved. Nazreth wheat market was found to be the center of price discovery in the country by dictating price formation in supply markets. The three hypothesized oligopolistic pricing behavior of wheat markets— spatial price discrimination, instantaneous and cooperative pricing, and perfect price matching — were tested. The two hypotheses that wheat markets exercise spatial price discrimination and cooperative pricing were rejected. However, the hypothesis of spatial price discrimination was accepted for some markets trading with Addis Ababa and Nazreth. This is verified to be the result of price discrimination exercised in Addis Ababa and the response of supply markets against the conduct in the destination markets. Supply markets with alternative market outlets were trying to establish short-run market independence depending on the pricing conduct prevalent in the destination markets while those without alternative market outlets were victims of the pricing behavior. This is an indication of inefficient pricing system prevalent in the wheat marketing system. Structural determinants of spatial market integration including inter-market road distance, road density, dissimilarity in per capita wheat production, and dissimilarity in population density were estimated and tested for their possible effect on the level, speed and extent of market integration to identify alternative market development interventions. Except for population density, all the selected factors of market integration were found to significantly determine market integration in Ethiopia. The spatial integration of Ethiopian wheat markets was found to be generally low in magnitude and sluggish in speed because of lack of flexibility and responsiveness of the marketing system.

The appearance of a Brownian term in the price dynamics on a stock market was interpreted in [De Meyer, Moussa-Saley (2003)] as a consequence of the informational asymmetries between agents. To take benefit of their private information without revealing it to fast, the informed agents have to introduce a noise on their actions, and all these noises introduced in the day after day transactions for strategic reasons will aggregate in a Brownian Motion. We prove in the present paper that this kind of argument leads not only to the appearance of the Brownian motion, but it also narrows the class of the price dynamics: the price process will be, as defined in this paper, a continuous martingale of maximal variation. This class of dynamics contains in particular Black and Scholes' as well as Bachelier's dynamics. The main result in this paper is that this class is quite universal and independent of a particular model: the informed agent can choose the speed of revelation of his private information. He determines in this way the posterior martingale L, where L_{q} is the expected value of an asset at stage q given the information of the uninformed agents. The payoff of the informed agent at stage q can typically be expressed as a 1-homogeneous function M of L_{q+1}-L_{q}. In a game with n stages, the informed agent will therefore chose the martingale L? that maximizes the M-variation. Under a mere continuity hypothesis on M, we prove in this paper that L? will converge to a continuous martingale of maximal variation. This limit is independent of M.