The primary purpose of this study is to test the validity of the trading range hypothesis as a basis for stock split decisions of Turkish companies. In the first part, the liquidity effects of stock splits on Turkish stocks are examined. Second, the optimal trading ranges for different-sized firms and firms with different investor bases are determined. Finally, the main empirical question of the study is analyzed by testing whether or not Turkish firms whose share prices rise above their optimal trading ranges are more likely to split their stock compared to firms whose share prices are at or below their optimal trading ranges. The empirical findings about the level of liquidity indicate that there is a slight decline in liquidity in the post-split periods. Analysis of the relationship between firm characteristics and share prices shows that firm size has a positive effect on share prices. The effect of investor base on share prices could not be identified. Finally, the estimation of the logit model utilized in the study to determine the probability of firms to split does not reveal any statistically significant result.

With the rapid increase in the usage of barrier options on the OTC markets, pricing and especially hedging of these exotic instruments became an important field of research. This paper aims to explain, apply and compare current methods used for pricing and hedging barrier options with a simulation approach. An overview of most popular methods for pricing and hedging is presented in the first part, followed by application of these pricing methods and comparing the performances of different dynamic and static hedging techniques in Black-Scholes environment by simulation in the second part. In the third part different models such as ARCH type and Stochastic Volatility are used with different jump terms to relax the assumptions of the Black-Scholes and examine the effects of these incomplete models on both pricing and performance of different hedging techniques. In the fourth part diffusion models such as Constant Variance Elasticity, Heston Stochastic Volatility and Merton Jump Diffusion are used to complete the picture.

In this thesis, we present two different approaches for the stochastic volatility and stochastic interest rate model with jump and analyze the performance of four alternative models. In the first approach, suggested by Scott, the closed form solution for prices on European call stock options are developed by deriving characteristic functions with the help of martingale methods. Here, we study the asset price process and give in detail the derivation of the European call option price process. The second approach, suggested by Bashki-Cao-Chen, describes the closed form solution of European call option by deriving the partial integro-differential equation. In this one we g ive the derivations of both asset price dynamics and the European call option price process. Finally, in the application part of the thesis, we examine the performance of four alternative models using General Electric Stock Option Data. These models are constructed by using the theoretical results of the second approach.

INFORMATION IN THE FINANCIAL NEWS: EFFECT OF MARKET COMMENTARY ON STOCK MARKET PERFORMANCE GIRAY, Aynur MBA, Department of Business Administration Supervisor: Dr. Seza Danisoglu September 2012, 72 pages This paper studies the effect of investment sentiment on asset prices. A sentiment proxy is calculated by performing content analysis on the Wall Street Journal&lsquo / s

INFORMATION IN THE FINANCIAL NEWS: EFFECT OF MARKET COMMENTARY ON STOCK MARKET PERFORMANCE GIRAY, Aynur MBA, Department of Business Administration Supervisor: Dr. Seza Danisoglu September 2012, 73 pages This paper studies the effect of investment sentiment on asset prices. A sentiment proxy is calculated by performing content analysis on the Wall Street Journal&lsquo / s

INFORMATION IN THE FINANCIAL NEWS: EFFECT OF MARKET COMMENTARY ON STOCK MARKET PERFORMANCE GIRAY, Aynur MBA, Department of Business Administration Supervisor: Dr. Seza Danisoglu September 2012, 73 pages This paper studies the effect of investment sentiment on asset prices. A sentiment proxy is calculated by performing content analysis on the Wall Street Journal&lsquo / s

This thesis questions the connection between knowledge and finance and advances an account that links both in a two-folded way. The first level departs from what separates the two opposite views or alternative explanations about the value of knowledge. The source and essence of the extra profits in information goods or commodities, such as digital media contents and software, featuring increasing returns to scale owing to their peculiar cost structure manifested by a high fixed cost and very low constant marginal cost, is what separates the two views about the value of knowledge. In light of the near-decomposability/modularity hypothesis, the extra profits in information commodities should arise from &#039 / information hiding,&#039 / which is intrinsic to nearly-decomposable systems or modular architecture because they are built on an ignorance on the parts in regard to the other parts and the whole of system. Such (hidden) design information that gives rise to parts or modules creates, at the same time, the future paths of action or (real) options, according to real-options perspective. When the two perspectives are combined, knowledge production, as distinct from subsequent knowledge commodity production, basically becomes an option creation process. Then, it becomes possible to argue that the concurrence of knowledge and finance is not a coincidence at all because the logics of accumulation is no different but almost identical, which is the second level of the two-folded account attempted in this study. The main contribution of this thesis is to build an account that links financialization to knowledge via the notion of modularity. Such an account sees financialization as a reflection and consequence of a value-driven permanent innovation economy developed under the &#039 / IT paradigm&#039 / in order to exploit a surplus peculiar and intrinsic to the modular structure that makes &#039 / information hiding&#039 / an integral part of such architectures since they are by definition built on an ignorance on the parts in regard to the other parts and the whole of system.

This study examines dynamic hedge policy of a company in a multi-period framework. The company begins to operate a project for a customer and it also has a subcontractor which completes an important part of the project by using an economic commodity. The customer will pay a fixed price to the company at the end of the project. Meanwhile, the company needs to pay the debt to the subcontractor and the amount of the debt depends on the spot price of the commodity at that time. The company is allowed to hedge for the commodity price fluctuations via future and option contracts. Since the company has a limited cash reserve as well as previously planned payments, it may face financial distress when the net cash balance decreases below zero. Consequently, the company maximizes the expected value of itself by minimizing the expected financial distress cost.

We present two option pricing models, both different from the classical Black-Scholes-Merton model. The first model, suggested by Heston, considers the case where the asset price volatility is stochastic. For this model we study the asset price process and give in detail the derivation of the European call option price process. The second model, suggested by Brody-Hughston-Macrina, describes the observation of certain information about the claim perturbed by a noise represented by a Brownian bridge. Here we also study in detail the properties of this noisy information process and give the derivations of both asset price dynamics and the European call option price process.

The essence of the interest rate modeling by using Heath-Jarrow-Morton framework is to find the drift condition of the instantaneous forward rate dynamics so that the entire term structure is arbitrage free. In this study, instantaneous forward interest rates are modeled using random fields and Markov Jump processes and the drift conditions of the forward rate dynamics are given. Moreover, the methodology presented in this study is extended to certain financial settings and instruments such as multi-country interest rate models, term structure of defaultable bond prices and forward measures. Also a general framework for bond prices via nuclear space valued semi-martingales is introduced.