There has always been competition among hedge funds, mutual funds, and other types of investors to perform better than index, meaning, creating alpha. How can you create alpha? Are there any patterns to follow? Any trends? There are many questions one may ask in order to find patterns that are creating. The purpose of this study is to see how CEO departures affect equity value in the short- medium- and long term and its comparison to indices. This study has collected data from a majority of publicly traded Nordiccompanies with a market capitalisation of over 10 billion Swedish crowns. The collected data has been collected within the last 20 years (2003-2023) with market-adjusted return, market capitalisation, volume, and CEO tenure being the prominent variables analysed.As CEOs have the operative responsibility of a company, they thereby are at the top of the company and effectively guide the company towards its goals. The changes in CEOs could thereby be of interest to investors as there is potential for larger structural changes when a new CEO is appointed. Applying this to its equity value, there is potential formispricing. Using mainly Fama’s and Malkiel’s research on the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) and Random Walk as the theoretical framework there are different ways in which equity price could move. EMH states that all markets are efficient by the equity representing all available information. Random Walk instead states that equity price moves randomly and cannot be predicted in accordance with historical movements. The empirical results showed that there were no statistically significant findings in our employed regression analysis. However, on average, the descriptive statistics show thatthe market-adjusted return for a company with a CEO departure is negative compared to its comparable index. The intraday MAR highly deviate from 1 day until 1 quarter and thereafter the deviation becomes less. The conclusion could be drawn that EMH might be contradicted in the short term but holds long term. It is also difficult to deny the theory of random walks in equities.

The subprime mortgage crisis (SMC) is an ongoing housing and nancial crisis that was triggered by a marked increase in mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures in the U.S. It has had major adverse consequences for banks and nancial markets around the globe since it became apparent in 2007. In our research, we examine an originator's (OR's) nonlinear stochastic optimal control problem related to choices regarding deposit inflow rates and marketable securities allocation. Here, the primary aim is to minimize liquidity risk, more speci cally, funding and credit crunch risk. In this regard, we consider two reference processes, namely, the deposit reference process and the residential mortgage loan (RML) reference process. This enables us to specify optimal deposit inflows as well as optimal marketable securities allocation by using actuarial cost methods to establish an ideal level of subprime RML extension. In our research, relationships are established in order to construct a stochastic continuous-time banking model to determine a solution for this optimal control problem which is driven by geometric Brownian motion. In this regard, the main issues to be addressed in this dissertation are discussed in Chapters 2 and 3. In Chapter 2, we investigate uncertain banking behavior. In this regard, we consider continuous-time stochastic models for OR's assets, liabilities, capital, balance sheet as well as its reference processes and give a description of their dynamics for each stochastic model as well as the dynamics of OR's stylized balance sheet. In this chapter, we consider RML and deposit reference processes which will serve as leading indicators in order to establish a desirable level of subprime RMLs to be extended at the end of the risk horizon. Chapter 3 states the main results that pertain to the role of stochastic optimal control in OR's risk management in Theorem 2.5.1 and Corollary 2.5.2. Prior to the stochastic control problem, we discuss an OR's risk factors, the stochastic dynamics of marketable securities as well as the RML nancing spread method regarding an OR. Optimal portfolio choices are made regarding deposit and marketable securities inflow rates given by Theorem 3.4.1 in order to obtain the ideal RML extension level. We construct the stochastic continuoustime model to determine a solution for this optimal control problem to obtain the optimal marketable securities allocation and deposit inflow rate to ensure OR's stability and security. According to this, a spread method of RML financing is imposed with an existence condition given by Lemma 3.3.2. A numerical example is given in Section 3.5 to illustrates the main issues raised in our research. / Thesis (M.Sc. (Applied Mathematics))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.

The subprime mortgage crisis (SMC) is an ongoing housing and nancial crisis that was triggered by a marked increase in mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures in the U.S. It has had major adverse consequences for banks and nancial markets around the globe since it became apparent in 2007. In our research, we examine an originator's (OR's) nonlinear stochastic optimal control problem related to choices regarding deposit inflow rates and marketable securities allocation. Here, the primary aim is to minimize liquidity risk, more speci cally, funding and credit crunch risk. In this regard, we consider two reference processes, namely, the deposit reference process and the residential mortgage loan (RML) reference process. This enables us to specify optimal deposit inflows as well as optimal marketable securities allocation by using actuarial cost methods to establish an ideal level of subprime RML extension. In our research, relationships are established in order to construct a stochastic continuous-time banking model to determine a solution for this optimal control problem which is driven by geometric Brownian motion. In this regard, the main issues to be addressed in this dissertation are discussed in Chapters 2 and 3. In Chapter 2, we investigate uncertain banking behavior. In this regard, we consider continuous-time stochastic models for OR's assets, liabilities, capital, balance sheet as well as its reference processes and give a description of their dynamics for each stochastic model as well as the dynamics of OR's stylized balance sheet. In this chapter, we consider RML and deposit reference processes which will serve as leading indicators in order to establish a desirable level of subprime RMLs to be extended at the end of the risk horizon. Chapter 3 states the main results that pertain to the role of stochastic optimal control in OR's risk management in Theorem 2.5.1 and Corollary 2.5.2. Prior to the stochastic control problem, we discuss an OR's risk factors, the stochastic dynamics of marketable securities as well as the RML nancing spread method regarding an OR. Optimal portfolio choices are made regarding deposit and marketable securities inflow rates given by Theorem 3.4.1 in order to obtain the ideal RML extension level. We construct the stochastic continuoustime model to determine a solution for this optimal control problem to obtain the optimal marketable securities allocation and deposit inflow rate to ensure OR's stability and security. According to this, a spread method of RML financing is imposed with an existence condition given by Lemma 3.3.2. A numerical example is given in Section 3.5 to illustrates the main issues raised in our research. / Thesis (M.Sc. (Applied Mathematics))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.