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In today's dynamic landscape of accounting, corporate finance, and business management, earnings management has assumed paramount importance. Transparent and reliable accounting information is crucial for accurate corporate performance forecasting and financial decision-making. This book uniquely discusses practical earnings management methods within the accounting and taxation realms. It is supported by extensive international evidence linking informativeness of financial reports to companies'financial decisions.Delving into the earnings management process, this book provides profound insights into how profits can be influenced through accounting choices and real business transactions. Real-life case studies will undoubtedly facilitate the understanding of accounting and taxation methods. Additionally, it unravels key elements of corporate finance puzzles related to the transparency of financial reports, including the macroeconomic environment, profit thresholds, cash management, audit quality, financing decisions, and financial health. With broad empirical evidence from various European countries, it multidimensionally explores the important link between the quality of information in financial statements and trade-offs behind financial decisions.The book serves as a valuable reference for international researchers in corporate finance, accounting, and corporate governance. It is also a powerful tool for business practitioners, including owners, lenders, auditors, regulatory and professional bodies, business partners, or other market participants. For those seeking the latest insights on earnings management, those producing or assessing accounting information, and those using financial reports in their research or business practice, this book is a must-read.Chapter 1 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Household Finance: An Introduction to Individual Financial Behavior speaks to both how people should and how people actually do make financial decisions, and how these financial decisions contribute to and detract from their well-being. Households must plan over long but finite horizons, have important nontraded assets, notably human capital; hold illiquid assets, particularly housing; face constraints on the ability to borrow; and are subject to complex taxation. Some households manage these goals and challenges independently, while still others delegate portfolio management. Household financial problems have many special features that differ from firms, investors, or the functioning of markets. Author Richard Deaves covers the broad range of choices and goals in household finance both in the normative sense (i.e., what is best) based on conventional financial theory and in the positive sense (i.e., what is actually done) based on observing actual behavior. While modern finance builds models of behavior and markets based on such strong assumptions as the rationality of decision-makers, behavioral finance is based on the view that sometimes people behave in a less-than-fully-rational fashion when making financial decisions. Deaves addresses important issues and puzzles in the field including financial illiteracy, whether education and advice can improve outcomes, intertemporal consumption optimization, consumption smoothing, optimal dynamic risk-taking, the stock market participation puzzle, the credit card debt puzzle, anomalous insurance decisions, mortgage choices, skewness preference, investments driven by availability and attention, local and home bias, the disposition effect, optimal pension design, and improving outcomes through nudging in a thoroughly international approach.

This book revolves around the concept of financial risk tolerance and its role in financial markets. Bridging different literatures and reviewing in detail the impact of European regulation on the evolution of risk tolerance assessment, this book discusses the intersection of scholarly research, practitioner experience and current and likely normative developments. In particular, the book focuses on the evolution of the debate on the suitability questionnaire – a key tool introduced with the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) and further developed with MiFID's successor - comparing it with empirical evidence on financial risk tolerance determinants, spanning from sociodemographic to behavioral components and life events. The book also looks at the future evolution of the normative framework post MiFID2 addressing in detail two key trends that are already affecting the way in which risk tolerance is dealt with in European financial markets – sustainable development and fintech and roboadvisory. The book includes an original survey run with financial market experts to assess the perceptions regarding these two trends and includes commentaries by a professional financial advisor on the key topics discussed.

This textbook introduces readers to the most relevant aspects of Investment Evaluation in the context of enterprise evaluation. It utilises a clear didactic concept and concisely presents representative cases, supported by calculations and their step-by-step, Excel-based solutions. In addition, the book analyses the respective benefits of the calculation models discussed from a management standpoint.

気鋭の経済学者が、社会生物学、進化心理学などを応用した金融の新理論「適応的市場仮説」を提唱。マーケット関係者、必読の書。

Pertinent to modern industry, administration, finance and society, the most pressing issue for firms today is how to reapproach the way we think and work in business. With topics ranging from improving productivity and coaxing economic growth after periods of market inactivity, Complex Decision-Making in Economy and Finance offers pragmatic solutions for dealing with the critical levels of disorder and chaos that have developed throughout the modern age. This book examines how to design complex products and systems, the benefits of collective intelligence and self-organization, and the best methods for handling risks in problematic environments. It also analyzes crises and how to manage them. This book is of benefit to companies and public bodies with regards to saving assets, reviving fortunes and laying the groundwork for robust, sustainable societal dividends. Examples, case studies, practical hints and guidelines illustrate the topics, particularly in finance.

This book is an exploration of the ubiquity of ambiguity in decision-making under uncertainty. It presents various essays on behavioral economics and behavioral finance that draw on the theory of Black Swans (Taleb 2010), which argues for a distinction between unprecedented events in our past and unpredictable events in our future. The defining property of Black Swan random events is that they are unpredictable, i.e., highly unlikely random events. In this text, Mandelbrot's (1972) operational definition of risky random unpredictable events is extended to Black Swan assets – assets for which the cumulative probability distribution or conditional probability distribution of random future asset returns is a power distribution. Ambiguous assets are assets for which the uncertainties of future returns are not risks. Consequently, there are two disjoint classes of Black Swan assets: Risky Black Swan assets and Ambiguous Black Swan assets, a new class of ambiguous assets withunpredictable random future outcomes. The text is divided into two parts, the first of which focuses on affective moods, introduces affective utility functions and discusses the ambiguity of Black Swans. The second part, which shifts the spotlight to affective equilibrium in asset markets, features chapters on affective portfolio analysis and Walrasian and Gorman Polar Form Equilibrium Inequalities. In order to gain the most from the book, readers should have completed the standard introductory graduate courses on microeconomics, behavioral finance, and convex optimization. The book is intended for advanced undergraduates, graduate students and post docs specializing in economic theory, experimental economics, finance, mathematics, computer science or data analysis.

A heartwarming series of stories and practical wisdom on entrepreneurship and wealth in the vein of Rich Dad, Poor Dad, written by a financially independent father for his ambitious son.Soon after he opened his vineyard for business many years ago, the Wealthy Gardener noticed a puzzling fact. Everyone wanted money, but only a few people managed to accumulate it. The reason, he realized, is that most people focus on short term gains instead of achieving lasting wealth.As he grew old and aware of his dwindling time on this Earth, the Wealthy Gardener began to share his hard-earned wisdom with the financially troubled in his community, patiently mentoring those who asked for his practical advice on the ways of prosperity.The parable of the Wealthy Gardener is far more than an admonishment to earn more or spend less; it is about timeless principles. As his lessons reveal, financial freedom is a means to power and control over our lives. Without money, we are subject to the demands and whims of others. With money, we are sheltered from the storm, and we can extend that shelter to our loved ones.Poised to become an intimate financial classic, The Wealthy Gardener will inspire readers to find their own noble purpose and relieve their money worries once and for all. No matter your income level, skillset, or unique economic disadvantages, the lessons in this book will show you the path forward. All you need is the will to work, the desire to succeed, and the motivation to learn.

Discover the ins and outs of designing predictive trading models Drawing on the expertise of WorldQuant's global network, this new edition of Finding Alphas: A Quantitative Approach to Building Trading Strategies contains significant changes and updates to the original material, with new and updated data and examples. Nine chapters have been added about alphas – models used to make predictions regarding the prices of financial instruments. The new chapters cover topics including alpha correlation, controlling biases, exchange-traded funds, event-driven investing, index alphas, intraday data in alpha research, intraday trading, machine learning, and the triple axis plan for identifying alphas. • Provides more references to the academic literature • Includes new, high-quality material • Organizes content in a practical and easy-to-follow manner • Adds new alpha examples with formulas and explanations If you're looking for the latest information on building trading strategies from a quantitative approach, this book has you covered.

Behavioral finance challenges the traditional assumption that individuals are rational by focusing on the cognitive and emotional aspects of finance, which draws on psychology, sociology, and biology to investigate true financial behavior. The financial sector requires sound understanding of market dynamics and strategic issues to meet future challenges in the field. Behavioral Finance and Decision-Making Models seeks to examine behavioral biases and their impact on investment decisions in order to develop better future plans and strategies in the financial sector. While highlighting topics including behavioral approach, financial regulation, and globalized sector, this book is intended for policymakers, technology developers, managers, government officials, academicians, researchers, and advanced-level students.

A Fast and Frugal Finance: Bridging Contemporary Behavioural Finance and Ecological Rationality adds psychological reality to classical financial reasoning. It shows how financial professionals can reach better and quicker decisions using the'fast and frugal'framework for decision-making, adding dramatically to time and outcome efficiency, while also retaining accuracy. The book provides the reader with an adaptive toolbox of heuristic tools and classification systems to aid real-world decisions. Throughout, financial applications are presented alongside real-world examples to help readers solve established problems in finance, including stock buying and selling decisions, when faced with not only risk but fundamental uncertainty. The book concludes by describing potential solutions to financial problems in the forefront of contemporary debates, and calls for taking psychological insights seriously. - Demonstrates how well-constructed'fast and frugal'models can outperform standard models in time and outcome efficiency - Focuses on how financial decisions are made in reality, using heuristics, rather than how such decisions should be made - Discusses how cognition and the decision-making context interact in producing'fast and frugal'choices that follow ecological rationality - Explores the development of decision-making trees in finance to aid in decision-making

A much-needed practical guide, particularly suited for readers with engineering or science backgrounds, that provides the financial decision-making skills needed in the business world†‹ For engineers with little or no business background this book provides the financial decision-making skills necessary for a management career. Based on materials used by students in a Masters of Engineering and Management program at Case Western Reserve University and informed by both classroom and industry experience, this essential guide can be used in courses or independent study. The chapters introduce and integrate key concepts relevant to basic management, accounting, and finance that will enhance the critical thinking and confidence necessary for success as a chief technology officer or in any business career.

This volume highlights recent applications of multiple-criteria decision-making (MCDM) models in the field of finance. Covering a wide range of MCDM approaches, including multiobjective optimization, goal programming, value-based models, outranking techniques, and fuzzy models, it provides researchers and practitioners with a set of MCDM methodologies and empirical results in areas such as portfolio management, investment appraisal, banking, and corporate finance, among others. The book addresses issues related to problem structuring and modeling, solution techniques, comparative analyses, as well as combinations of MCDM models with other analytical methodologies.

A new, evolutionary explanation of markets and investor behaviorHalf of all Americans have money in the stock market, yet economists can't agree on whether investors and markets are rational and efficient, as modern financial theory assumes, or irrational and inefficient, as behavioral economists believe—and as financial bubbles, crashes, and crises suggest. This is one of the biggest debates in economics and the value or futility of investment management and financial regulation hang on the outcome. In this groundbreaking book, Andrew Lo cuts through this debate with a new framework, the Adaptive Markets Hypothesis, in which rationality and irrationality coexist.Drawing on psychology, evolutionary biology, neuroscience, artificial intelligence, and other fields, Adaptive Markets shows that the theory of market efficiency isn't wrong but merely incomplete. When markets are unstable, investors react instinctively, creating inefficiencies for others to exploit. Lo's new paradigm explains how financial evolution shapes behavior and markets at the speed of thought—a fact revealed by swings between stability and crisis, profit and loss, and innovation and regulation.A fascinating intellectual journey filled with compelling stories, Adaptive Markets starts with the origins of market efficiency and its failures, turns to the foundations of investor behavior, and concludes with practical implications—including how hedge funds have become the Galápagos Islands of finance, what really happened in the 2008 meltdown, and how we might avoid future crises.An ambitious new answer to fundamental questions in economics, Adaptive Markets is essential reading for anyone who wants to know how markets really work.

The book conclusively solves problems associated with the control and estimation of nonlinear and chaotic dynamics in financial systems when these are described in the form of nonlinear ordinary differential equations. It then addresses problems associated with the control and estimation of financial systems governed by partial differential equations (e.g. the Black–Scholes partial differential equation (PDE) and its variants). Lastly it an offers optimal solution to the problem of statistical validation of computational models and tools used to support financial engineers in decision making.The application of state-space models in financial engineering means that the heuristics and empirical methods currently in use in decision-making procedures for finance can be eliminated. It also allows methods of fault-free performance and optimality in the management of assets and capitals and methods assuring stability in the functioning of financial systems to be established.Coveringthe following key areas of financial engineering: (i) control and stabilization of financial systems dynamics, (ii) state estimation and forecasting, and (iii) statistical validation of decision-making tools, the book can be used for teaching undergraduate or postgraduate courses in financial engineering. It is also a useful resource for the engineering and computer science community

The book focuses on a set of cutting-edge research techniques, highlighting the potential of soft computing tools in the analysis of economic and financial phenomena and in providing support for the decision-making process. In the first part the textbook presents a comprehensive and self-contained introduction to the field of self-organizing maps, elastic maps and social network analysis tools and provides necessary background material on the topic, including a discussion of more recent developments in the field. In the second part the focus is on practical applications, with particular attention paid to budgeting problems, market simulations, and decision-making processes, and on how such problems can be effectively managed by developing proper methods to automatically detect certain patterns. The book offers a valuable resource for both students and practitioners with an introductory-level college math background.

This book is devoted to recent developments and applications of multiple criteria decision aid tools in the field of finance, insurance and investment. It illustrates recent methods and procedures designed to solve problems related to finance, insurance and portfolio selection formulated through a mathematical programming framework and for which a large number of conflicting and incommensurable objectives (criteria, attributes) is simultaneously optimized. The book introduces researchers and practitioners to recent theoretical and methodological developments in multi-attributes portfolio selection, multiple criteria analysis in finance, insurance and investment. It is based on selected and invited papers presented and discussed at the 2013 International Conference on Multidimensional Finance, Insurance and Investment (ICMFII'13), held at the College of Business Administration at the University of Bahrain from 25th to 27th November 2013 with the co-sponsorship of the International Society on Multiple Criteria Decision Making and the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences - MCDM section.

Design more successful trading systems with this practical guide to identifying alphas Finding Alphas seeks to teach you how to do one thing and do it well: design alphas. Written by experienced practitioners from WorldQuant, including its founder and CEO Igor Tulchinsky, this book provides detailed insight into the alchemic art of generating trading signals, and gives you access to the tools you need to practice and explore. Equally applicable across regions, this practical guide provides you with methods for uncovering the hidden signals in your data. A collection of essays provides diverse viewpoints to show the similarities, as well as unique approaches, to alpha design, covering a wide variety of topics, ranging from abstract theory to concrete technical aspects. You'll learn the dos and don'ts of information research, fundamental analysis, statistical arbitrage, alpha diversity, and more, and then delve into more advanced areas and more complex designs. The companion website, www.worldquantchallenge.com, features alpha examples with formulas and explanations. Further, this book also provides practical guidance for using WorldQuant's online simulation tool WebSim® to get hands-on practice in alpha design. Alpha is an algorithm which trades financial securities. This book shows you the ins and outs of alpha design, with key insight from experienced practitioners. Learn the seven habits of highly effective quants Understand the key technical aspects of alpha design Use WebSim® to experiment and create more successful alphas Finding Alphas is the detailed, informative guide you need to start designing robust, successful alphas.

We weigh every significant decision based on how it will affect our future. But when it comes to figuring that out, we mostly make the process up as we go along. While financial professional Peter Neuwirth can't help you actually predict the future, he can offer a simple, systematic way to make much better guesses about it—and so make better decisions.Neuwirth offers an accessible, step-by-step guide to using the powerful concept of Present Value—which allows you to determine the value today of something that might happen in the future—to evaluate all of the outcomes that might arise from choosing one path as opposed to another. Using examples that anyone can relate to, Neuwirth walks you through the process. Your old refrigerator doesn't work as well as it used to—should you buy a new one right away or muddle through for a while? You're offered a great discount on a service you don't need at the moment but eventually will—buy the service now or wait? With just a little math and some common sense, you can compare future costs and benefits with present costs and benefits and make “apples to apples” comparisons. This book will be indispensable for anyone who has ever had to figure out whether to stick with an awful job or follow his or her bliss, fix that old car or buy a new one, increase 401(k) contributions or keep the same take-home pay, and a thousand other decisions.

From small law offices to federal agencies, all entities within the justice system are governed by complicated economic factors and face daily financial decision-making. A complement to Strategic Finance for Criminal Justice Organizations, this volume considers the justice system from a variety of economic and financial perspectives and introduces

This book seeks to answer “why, when and how are real options used in strategic technology venturing?” This work tests for the role of real options in decision making involving three types of firms in decreasing order of technology-dependence – technology-driven (TD) (where the profit is fully dependent on new technology creation and leveraging), technology-based (TB) (where the profit is enabled and supported by technology) and technology-neutral (TN) (where the profit is almost independent of technology). It also deals with strategic and non-strategic types of decisions driven by real options.This analysis shows that an environment presenting co-opetitive (simultaneous competition and collaboration) conditions triggers the use of real options (why), that serve to transform the position, posture and propensity of businesses to innovate and thus they co-evolve (when) into more effective and efficient forms of businesses (co-specialization) (how). The authors demonstrate that embracing risk and uncertainty can increase levels and probability of new venture formation. However, their simulation also shows that it should be adapted to the risk profile of the firm and that timing is also a factor to be considered. Although engaging the concepts of real options, this analysis does not focus on a specific investment valuation methodology, but highlights the relationship between knowledge and risk and rather addresses the management of mindsets, as moving towards a systematic conceptualization of real options represents a different paradigm in decision making.

This handbook in two parts covers key topics of the theory of financial decision making. Some of the papers discuss real applications or case studies as well. There are a number of new papers that have never been published before especially in Part II.Part I is concerned with Decision Making Under Uncertainty. This includes subsections on Arbitrage, Utility Theory, Risk Aversion and Static Portfolio Theory, and Stochastic Dominance. Part II is concerned with Dynamic Modeling that is the transition for static decision making to multiperiod decision making. The analysis starts with Risk Measures and then discusses Dynamic Portfolio Theory, Tactical Asset Allocation and Asset-Liability Management Using Utility and Goal Based Consumption-Investment Decision Models.A comprehensive set of problems both computational and review and mind expanding with many unsolved problems are in an accompanying problems book. The handbook plus the book of problems form a very strong set of materials for PhD and Masters courses both as the main or as supplementary text in finance theory, financial decision making and portfolio theory. For researchers, it is a valuable resource being an up to date treatment of topics in the classic books on these topics by Johnathan Ingersoll in 1988, and William Ziemba and Raymond Vickson in 1975 (updated 2nd edition published in 2006).

Le decisioni finanziarie prese nella vita reale, di investimento e di sottoscrizione di polizze assicurative, come anche le nostre scelte previdenziali, sono assunte in base sia alla ragione sia alle emozioni. Ma esiste un metodo per misurare la tolleranza al rischio? Quando valutiamo la nostra tolleranza al rischio, esprimiamo un giudizio attendibile o distorto? Domande importanti per verificare se gli strumenti impiegati nella realtà operativa per tutelare i risparmiatori si fondano su un approccio corretto. Il libro risponde a questi interrogativi utilizzando per la prima volta esperimenti psico-fisiologici, uniti a rilevazioni economiche classiche, che hanno riguardato anche trader on line, gestori di fondi e promotori finanziari.

An authoritative graduate textbook on information choice, an exciting frontier of research in economics and financeMost theories in economics and finance predict what people will do, given what they know about the world around them. But what do people know about their environments? The study of information choice seeks to answer this question, explaining why economic players know what they know—and how the information they have affects collective outcomes. Instead of assuming what people do or don't know, information choice asks what people would choose to know. Then it predicts what, given that information, they would choose to do. In this textbook, Laura Veldkamp introduces graduate students in economics and finance to this important new research.The book illustrates how information choice is used to answer questions in monetary economics, portfolio choice theory, business cycle theory, international finance, asset pricing, and other areas. It shows how to build and test applied theory models with information frictions. And it covers recent work on topics such as rational inattention, information markets, and strategic games with heterogeneous information.Illustrates how information choice is used to answer questions in monetary economics, portfolio choice theory, business cycle theory, international finance, asset pricing, and other areasTeaches how to build and test applied theory models with information frictionsCovers recent research on topics such as rational inattention, information markets, and strategic games with heterogeneous information

An understanding of risk and how to deal with it is an essential part of modern economics. Whether liability litigation for pharmaceutical firms or an individual's having insufficient wealth to retire, risk is something that can be recognized, quantified, analyzed, treated--and incorporated into our decision-making processes. This book represents a concise summary of basic multiperiod decision-making under risk. Its detailed coverage of a broad range of topics is ideally suited for use in advanced undergraduate and introductory graduate courses either as a self-contained text, or the introductory chapters combined with a selection of later chapters can represent core reading in courses on macroeconomics, insurance, portfolio choice, or asset pricing. The authors start with the fundamentals of risk measurement and risk aversion. They then apply these concepts to insurance decisions and portfolio choice in a one-period model. After examining these decisions in their one-period setting, they devote most of the book to a multiperiod context, which adds the long-term perspective most risk management analyses require. Each chapter concludes with a discussion of the relevant literature and a set of problems. The book presents a thoroughly accessible introduction to risk, bridging the gap between the traditionally separate economics and finance literatures.

إن أهم وأخطر ثلاثة أسئلة يمكن أن يطرحها أي شخص يتعامل ـ أو يتهيأ للتعامل ـ مع البورصة على نفسه، ولا يجد مفرًّا من التماس الإجابة عنها بكل الطرق والوسائل، هي: ما الإستراتيجيات المثلى التي تحقِّق النجاح في السوق على الدوام، وما الوسائل والآليات التي تحدِّد اتجاه مؤشر السوق حاليًّا، وكيف يمكن الاستفادة من كل هذه المعلومات في تحقيق النجاح المنشود وتطويره والحفاظ عليه؟. ومن هنا، تأتي أهمية هذا الكتاب الذي يعرض الإجابات النموذجية لهذه الأسئلة بالنسبة لكل مَن يخطِّطون للتعامل مع البورصة أو المبتدئين أو حتى المحترفين؛ حيث يستعرض الإستراتيجيات المثلى للتعامل مع البورصة، بصورة شاملة وبطريقة يسهل فهمها، من خلال شرح وتحليل بعض التجارب العملية بغرض رصد تأثير مجموعة من الإستراتيجيات الجديدة التي لم يسبق نشرها من قبل على كفاءة الأعمال والأسواق على حدٍّ سواء. ولذلك، يمكن عن طريق اتباع تلك الإستراتيجيات واقتفاء أثرها ـ وما أيسر ذلك بفضل هذا الكتاب ـ إتاحة فرصة مواتية وموفَّقة أمام أي شخص يرغب في القيام بمضاربات ناجحة في كافة الأسواق، وعلى كافة المستويات الزمنية التي يختارها بحرية تامة. «يشرح بيير م. دويبنر الإستراتيجيات المثلى للمضاربة في البورصة، وكل ما يرتبط بها من معارف ومهارات وخبرات من أجل ضمان التطبيق الأمثل لتلك الإستراتيجيات على نحو شديد الشبه بما يجري في التجارب العملية الحقيقية. ولذلك، نوصي تمامًا بالأخذ بما جاء فيه وتنفيذه. »

This book sheds light on the emotional side of risk taking behaviour using an innovative cross-disciplinary approach, mixing financial competences with psychology and affective neuroscience. In doing so, it shows the implications for market participants and regulators in terms of transparency and communication between intermediaries and customers.

An updated guide to risk analysis and modeling Although risk was once seen as something that was both unpredictable and uncontrollable, the evolution of risk analysis tools and theories has changed the way we look at this important business element. In the Second Edition of Analyzing and Modeling Risk, expert Dr. Johnathan Mun provides up-to-date coverage of risk analysis as it is applied within the realms of business risk analysis and offers an intuitive feel of what risk looks like, as well as the different ways of quantifying it. This Second Edition provides professionals in all industries a more comprehensive guide on such key concepts as risk and return, the fundamentals of model building, Monte Carlo simulation, forecasting, time-series and regression analysis, optimization, real options, and more. Includes new examples, questions, and exercises as well as updates using Excel 2007 Book supported by author's proprietary risk analysis software found on the companion CD-ROM Offers both a qualitative and quantitative description of risk Filled with in-depth insights and practical advice, this reliable resource covers all of the essential tools and techniques that risk managers need to successfully conduct risk analysis. Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

Finance is in the midst of a paradigm shift, from a neoclassical based framework to a psychologically based framework. Behavioral finance is the application of psychology to financial decision making and financial markets. Behavioralizing finance is the process of replacing neoclassical assumptions with behavioral counterparts. This volume surveys the literature in behavioral finance, and identifies both its strengths and weaknesses. In doing so, it identifies possible directions for behavioralizing the frameworks used to study beliefs, preferences, portfolio selection, asset pricing, corporate finance, and financial market regulation. The intent is to provide a structured approach to behavioral finance in respect to underlying psychological concepts, formal framework, testable hypotheses, and empirical findings. A key theme of the volume is that the future of finance will combine realistic assumptions from behavioral finance and rigorous analysis from neoclassical finance.

'Adler's argument is illuminating and reveals that, when it comes to investing, we should always have second thoughts about our first impressions.'--Publisher's Weekly WHY YOUR INSTINCTS CAN BE YOUR #1 ENEMY–AND HOW TO DEFEAT THEM! “David Adler's Snap Judgment is a well-written, entertaining review of human action in risky situations, including stock market behavior and other risk-facing situations. In particular, Adler recounts the conclusions of many practitioners and behavioral finance scholars who have studied such matters. This book is well worth reading, both for its practical advice for the novice and its wealth of illustrations for the pro.” – Harry Markowitz, Nobel Laureate in Economics and father of modern portfolio theory “David Adler has done a great public service by translating a dazzling array of research in economics and finance into practical terms that anyone can understand and profit from. This book should be required reading for every investor.” – Andrew W. Lo, Professor of Finance, MIT Sloan School of Management “Investing and managing your money on the basis of emotion, instincts, and intuition is a road straight to the poorhouse. This book teaches you why–and how to rid yourself of the irrational impulses that torment your portfolio.” – Peter Navarro, bestselling author of If It's Raining in Brazil, Buy Starbucks and The Coming China Wars “Adler's book makes a compelling case, illustrated through engaging examples, that the mind and the purse are well served by the triumph of analytic intelligence over intuition.” – Gary Loveman, Chairman, President, & CEO, Harrah's Entertainment, Inc.

Through theory and case studies, this book details how uncertainty and flexibility can be evaluated to assist in making better investment decisions in companies. It delivers an excellent balance of theory and practice in the area of investment decision making, demonstrates how financial and real options are related, and describes the theoretical underpinnings of both. The author presents case studies from diverse industries, including life sciences, pharmaceuticals, commodities, energy, technology, manufacturing, and financial services. He also looks at how organizations can become successful using a holistic framework that integrates uncertainty and flexibility.

Drawing on the latest scientific research, Jason Zweig shows what happens in your brain when you think about money and tells investors how to take practical, simple steps to avoid common mistakes and become more successful.What happens inside our brains when we think about money? Quite a lot, actually, and some of it isn't good for our financial health. In Your Money and Your Brain, Jason Zweig explains why smart people make stupid financial decisions—and what they can do to avoid these mistakes. Zweig, a veteran financial journalist, draws on the latest research in neuroeconomics, a fascinating new discipline that combines psychology, neuroscience, and economics to better understand financial decision making. He shows why we often misunderstand risk and why we tend to be overconfident about our investment decisions. Your Money and Your Brain offers some radical new insights into investing and shows investors how to take control of the battlefield between reason and emotion. Your Money and Your Brain is as entertaining as it is enlightening. In the course of his research, Zweig visited leading neuroscience laboratories and subjected himself to numerous experiments. He blends anecdotes from these experiences with stories about investing mistakes, including confessions of stupidity from some highly successful people. Then he draws lessons and offers original practical steps that investors can take to make wiser decisions. Anyone who has ever looked back on a financial decision and said, “How could I have been so stupid?” will benefit from reading this book.

This completely revised and updated edition of Applied Risk Analysis includes new case studies in modeling risk and uncertainty as well as a new risk analysis CD-ROM prepared by Dr. Mun. On the CD-ROM you'll find his Risk Simulator and Real Options Super Lattice Solver software as well as many useful spreadsheet models.'Johnathan Mun's book is a sparkling jewel in my finance library. Mun demonstrates a deep understanding of the underlying mathematical theory in his ability to reduce complex concepts to lucid explanations and applications. For this reason, he's my favorite writer in this field.'—Janet Tavakoli, President, Tavakoli Structured Finance, Inc. and author of Collateralized Debt Obligations and Structured Finance'A must-read for product portfolio managers... it captures the risk exposure of strategic investments, and provides management with estimates of potential outcomes and options for risk mitigation.'—Rafael E. Gutierrez, Executive Director of Strategic Marketing and Planning, Seagate Technology, Inc.'Once again, Dr. Mun has created a'must-have, must-read'book for anyone interested in the practical application of risk analysis. Other books speak in academic generalities, or focus on one area of risk application. [This book] gets to the heart of the matter with applications for every area of risk analysis. You have a real option to buy almost any book?you should exercise your option and get this one!'—Glenn Kautt, MBA, CFP, EA, President and Chairman, The Monitor Group, Inc. Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.