The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of the "limits of arbitrage" on securities mispricing. Specifically, I investigate the effect of the availability of substitutes and financial constraints on stock mispricing. In addition, this study investigates the difference in the limits of arbitrage, in the sense that it will lead to lower mispricing for these stocks, relative to non-S&P 500 stocks. I also examine if the lower mispricing can be attributed to their lower limits of arbitrage. Modern finance theory and efficient market hypothesis suggest that security prices, at equilibrium, should reflect their fundamental value. If the market price deviates from the intrinsic value, then a risk-free profit opportunity has emerged and arbitrageurs will eliminate mispricing and equilibrium is restored. This arbitrage process is characterized by large number of arbitrageurs which have infinite access to capital. However, a better description of reality is that there are few numbers of arbitrageurs to the extent that they are highly specialized; and they have limited access to capital. Under these condition arbitrage is no more a risk-free activity and can be limited by several factors such as arbitrage risk and transaction costs. Other factors that are discussed in the literature are availability of substitutes and financial constraints. The former arises as a result of the specialization of arbitrageurs in the market in which they operate, while the latter arises as a result of the separation between arbitrageurs and capital. In this dissertation, I develop a measure of the availability of substitutes that is based on the propensity scores obtained from propensity score matching technique. In addition, I use the absolute value of skewness of returns as a proxy of financial constraints. Previous studies used the limits of arbitrage framework to explain pricing puzzles such as the closed-end fund discounts. However, closed-end fund discounts are highly affected by uncertainty of managerial ability and agency problems. This study overcomes this problem by studying the effect of limits of arbitrage on publicly traded securities. The results show that there is a significant relationship between proxies of limits of arbitrage and firm specific mispricing. More importantly, empirical results indicate that stocks that have no close substitutes have higher mispricing. In addition, stocks that have high skewness show higher mispricing. Subsequent studies show that the S&P 500 stocks have different levels of liquidity, analysts’ coverage and volatility. These characteristics affect the ability of arbitrageurs to eliminate mispricing. Preliminary univariate tests show that S&P 500 stocks have, on average, lower mispricing and limits of arbitrage relative to non-S&P 500 stocks. In addition, the multivariate test shows that S&P 500 members have, on average, lower mispricing relative to non-S&P 500 stocks.

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Graduation date: 1971

Using crops for fuel generates concerns over competition with food uses. As Rajagopal et al (2009) asserts, “In 2008 the world entered a food crisis amid record-high commodity and energy prices that induced hunger and political unrest in developing countries, by export restrictions in top grain-producing countries”. This took place at the same time when biofuel production, reached its pinnacle in developed countries. This paper examines the effect that biofuel prices and or production has had on food prices in Brazil and U.S. by employing the panel cointegration and Dynamic Ordinary Least Squares (DOLS) method of analysis. In regressing food prices as a function of demand and supply factors, such as oil prices, biofuel prices, interest rates and biofuel production, the study found that the increase in biofuels production over the past eighteen years has had a significant impact on food prices. Over the period January 1995- December 2013, the study estimates that a one hundred percent increase in biofuels production across time and between countries results in the increase of food prices by 21,9%. The study therefore rejects the null hypothesis that states, biofuel production does not have a statistically significant negative impact on food prices in U.S. and Brazil. , and accepts the alternative that biofuel production does have a statistically significant negative impact on food prices in U.S. and Brazil. Other predictors of food prices that the study revealed as significant were oil and interest rates. Policy recommendations for other countries like South Africa are therefore, made based on the results obtained.

This dissertation examines the reaction of common stock prices to the announcement of changes in bond ratings by Moody's Bond Service, while having a control for differential information availability. The Institutional Brokers Estimate System (I/B/E/S) number of security analysts and coefficient of variation of earning per share (EPS) estimates are used as a proxy for information availability of the firms. Past studies differs in their conclusions as to whether the market has responded to announcement of bond rating changes. None of past studies have controlled for differential information availability. This study, using daily stock returns data and the event study methodology with the statistical test, finds that while the sample of rating downgrades exhibit significantly negative abnormal price effect during the announcement period, the magnitude of this effect is significantly higher for firms with low information availability. For the rating upgrades, the sample as a whole has no abnormal announcement period returns, but the sample of firms with lower information earns significantly positive abnormal returns. This study provides support for the hypothesis that the announcement effect of bond-rating changes is conditional on the information available about the firm.

General diffusion processes (GDP), or Ito's processes, are potential candidates for the modeling of asset prices, interest rates and other financial quantities to cope with empirical evidence. This thesis considers the applications of general diffusions in finance and potential extensions. In particular, we focus on financial problems involving (optimal) stopping times. A typical example is the valuation of American options. We investigate the use of Laplace-Carson transform (LCT) in valuing American options, and discuss its strengthen and weaknesses. Homotopy analysis from topology is then introduced to derive closed-form American option pricing formulas under GDP. Another example is taken from optimal dividend policies with bankruptcy procedures, which is closely related to excursion time and occupation time of a general diffusion. With the aid of Fourier transform, we further extend the analysis to the case of multi-dimensional GDP by considering the currency option pricing with mean reversion and multi-scale stochastic volatility. / Zhao, Jing. / Adviser: Hoi-Ying Wong. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 72-04, Section: B, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 97-105). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

When pricing American-style options on d assets by Monte Carlo methods, one usually stores the simulated asset prices at all time steps on all paths in order to determine when to exercise the options. If N time steps and M paths are used; then the storage requirement is d · M · N. In this thesis, we give two simulation methods to price multi-asset American-style options, where the storage requirement only grows like (d + 1)M + N. The only additional computational cost is that we have to generate each random number twice instead of once. For machines with limited memory, we can now use larger values of M and N to improve the accuracy in pricing the options. / by Wong Chi Yan. / Adviser: Raymond H. Chan. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-03, Section: B, page: 1708. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 79-82). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / School code: 1307.

In the first part of thesis, we investigated the influence and explanatory power of aggregate insider trading activities on momentum trading strategies in US stock markets. We find that aggregate insider trading activities have ability in predicting cross-sectional returns and can strengthen the naive momentum effects. The risk factors such as size and book-to-market ratio cannot explain the strong momentum effects in our refined momentum strategies. We further extend the time horizon to as long as 3 years and find that the reversal patterns. We interpret our findings as follows: The continuous overreaction causes the mediate term (3- to 12 months) momentum effects and overly pricing. In long-term horizon, these overly priced stocks will be corrected with the time passing. The correction of overly pricing causes long-term reversals. / In the second part of the thesis, we studied relationships between the efficiency of external market and the capital allocation processes in internal market by investigating the performance of red chips traded in Hong Kong. Because of its special role between China and international capital market, it is difficult for international investors to monitor how red chips allocated their Hong Kong raised capital in China. The evidences show that red chips made poor investments in the past decades. However, the external market failed to reflect the unprofitable investment made by the management groups in the internal market. At least, our evidences show that the red chips made diversified but unprofitable investments in aggregate level in the past decade. / Jihong Xiang. / "December 2001." / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 63-01, Section: A, page: 0306. / Supervisors: Jia He; Duan Li. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (p.102-113). / Available also through the Internet via ProQuest dissertations and theses under title: Are markets efficient? Evidences from stock markets in United States of America and Hong Kong. / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest dissertations and theses, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / School code: 1307.

Wong, Kin Lung Keith. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 127-131). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Thesis/Assessment Committee --- p.iii / Acknowledgement --- p.iv / Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 2 --- Background Studies --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1 --- Ultra-high Frequency Data Handling with Database Server --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Use of Database Server --- p.5 / Chapter 2.2 --- Ultra-high Frequency Data Treatments --- p.7 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Cleaning of Data --- p.7 / Chapter 2.2.2 --- Matching of a Trade and Its Standing Quote --- p.13 / Chapter 2.3 --- Tick-by-tick Price Modeling --- p.15 / Chapter 2.3.1 --- Multivariate Linear Models --- p.15 / Chapter 2.3.2 --- Duration and Volume Handling --- p.16 / Chapter 2.3.3 --- VAR Model Selection Techniques --- p.20 / Chapter 2.3.4 --- Seasonality Handling --- p.24 / Chapter 3 --- Problem Definition and Framework --- p.27 / Chapter 3.1 --- Engle and Patton's Model --- p.27 / Chapter 3.2 --- Preparation of data --- p.31 / Chapter 3.3 --- Methods to Estimate Diurnal Adjustment Param- eters --- p.38 / Chapter 3.4 --- Transformation of the Model to Fit in VARX soft- wares --- p.40 / Chapter 3.5 --- Modification of the Model --- p.47 / Chapter 3.6 --- Estimating and Forecasting the Exogenous Vari- ables --- p.52 / Chapter 3.6.1 --- Modelling BUYt and SELLt --- p.52 / Chapter 3.6.2 --- Modelling DURt and VOLt --- p.53 / Chapter 3.6.3 --- Modelling k(t) --- p.56 / Chapter 3.6.4 --- Forecasting the Cross Terms and the Sum of Buys and Sells --- p.62 / Chapter 3.7 --- Forecasting with the Main Model --- p.64 / Chapter 4 --- Experimental Evaluation --- p.67 / Chapter 5 --- Conclusion --- p.73 / Chapter A --- Source and Data Information --- p.76 / Chapter B --- Model Estimation Results for (3.13) --- p.80 / Chapter C --- Model Forecasting Results for (3.13) and (3.2) --- p.102 / Bibliography --- p.127