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This dissertation empirically and theoretically investigates three interrelated issues of market anomalies in interest rates derivatives and foreign exchange rates. The first essay models the spot exchange rate as a decomposition of permanent and transitory components. Unlike extant analysis, the transitory component could be stationary or explosive. The second essay examines the market efficiency hypothesis in the foreign exchange markets and relates the rejection of forward rate unbiasedness hypothesis to the existence of risk premium not to the failure of rational expectation. The third essay examines the behavior of short-term riskless rate and models the risk free rate as a nonlinear trend stationary process. While addressing these issues, these essays account for: (1) finite sample bias; (2) Unit root and other nonstationary behaviors; (3) the role of nonlinear trend; and (4) the interrelations between different behaviors. Several new results have been gleaned from our analysis; we find that: (1) the spot exchange rates display a very slow mean aversion behavior, which implies the failure of the purchasing power parity; (2) there are positive autocorrelations across the long horizons overlapping returns increases overtime and then begin to decline at a very long horizon period; (3) the short-term riskless rate displays a nonlinear trend stationary process which is closer to driftless random walk behavior; (4) modifying the mean reverting shortterm interest rates models to a nonlinear trend stationary shows an extreme improvement and outperforms all suggested models; (5) the traditional tests for rational expectations and market efficiency in the foreign exchange markets are subject to size distortions; (6) we relate the rejection of market efficiency in the foreign exchange markets documented across most currencies to the existence of risk premium not to the rejection of rational expectation hypothesis.

Air pollution became a major concern in South Africa in the late 1980’s and regulatory requirements for the chemical process industries to reduce hazardous emissions have increased ever since. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) contribute significantly to the formation of ozone and photochemical oxidants and their associated impact on human health has become a major issue worldwide. Volatilisation is a significant process in determining the fate of organic compounds in the environment. In this study, volatilisation rate of VOCs (specifically benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylene) from a wastewater collection basin, also called the oily sewer basin (OSB) was measured using a flux chamber method and the VOCs were characterised. Theoretical models that can be used to estimate volatilisation rate were also studied. Meteorological data was collected to evaluate the effect of temperature, humidity and wind speed on volatilisation rate. This study showed that toluene and ethylbenzene have the highest volatilisation rate compared to benzene and o-xylene. It was found that system conditions and physicochemical properties of a compound have a significant effect on volatilisation. It was also identified that the measured concentrations of VOCs escaping from the OSB do comply with Occupational Health and Safety Act and Regulations 85 of 1993 standards. It was recommended that surfactants be used to inhibit volatilisation of VOCs

Thesis advisor: Fabio Ghironi / My doctoral dissertation studies the interaction between financial development, exchange rate regimes and productivity growth. The first chapter provides a microfounded, quantitative model that rationalizes recent empirical evidence by Aghion et al (2009), who find that fixed exchange rate regimes lead to higher long-run productivity growth in countries with low financial development, while the effect in financially developed countries is insignificant. The channel that explains this evidence in my model is the following: A fixed exchange rate regime leads to lower inflation when the money growth is otherwise high. In turn, lower inflation results in higher long-run productivity growth since financial intermediaries hold a fraction of deposits as reserves, whose return is lower than the market rate and, thus, is affected by inflation. The lower return paid on reserves drives a wedge between the return paid on deposits and the return paid on loans by reducing the former and increasing the latter. In turn, this reduces entry of new innovators in the economy and, consequently, productivity growth. I show that the negative effect of flexible exchange rate regimes on growth is larger for countries with lower levels of financial development because inflation and the fraction of deposits held as reserves are higher in these countries. In the second chapter, I perform panel-data analysis to find how much of the effect of exchange rate regimes on productivity growth, documented previously by Aghion et al. (2009), can be accounted for by the channel proposed in the first chapter of my dissertation. I use data for 83 countries over the period 1960-2000. The data comes from the Penn World Table, World Development Indicators, International Financial Statistics, and the Reinhart and Rogoff classification of exchange rate regimes. I use the GMM system estimator and regress productivity growth on financial development, a variable describing the exchange rate regime, growth controls, as well as bank reserve ratios. I find that when the interaction effect of inflation and financial development or the interaction of the reserve ratio and financial development are added to the regression used by Aghion et al. (2009), the exchange rate regime effect on productivity growth in less financially developed countries is no longer significant. This implies that the channel proposed in the first chapter of my dissertation can explain most of the initial empirical results. The third chapter explores the short-run effect of exchange rate regimes on the macroeconomic performance of a small open economy with endogenous productivity growth and underdeveloped financial markets when the home economy is subject to shocks. I use the model introduced in the first chapter, add nominal price rigidities, and calculate impulse responses, given a productivity shock and a shock to the foreign nominal interest rate. I also calculate second moments implied by the model and compare them to empirical second moments. The results show that after a positive exogenous productivity shock, productivity growth, output and consumption increase more under the flexible exchange rate regime. However, given an increase in the foreign nominal interest rate, productivity growth falls but the reduction in productivity growth is smaller under the fixed exchange rate regime. In addition, output and consumption fall after the shock, however, the reduction of consumption and output is higher under the fixed exchange rate regime. I also find that after both shocks analyzed here, welfare is higher under the fixed exchange rate regime. The model is also able to match some features of business cycles in developing countries. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

This thesis analyses the relationship between the increasingly important sovereign CDS spreads and exchange rates, from a macroeconomic perspective. It attempts to address an existing gap in the empirical literature, which to date has paid limited attention to the role of exchange rates in influencing sovereign CDS spreads, and vice versa. In exploring the relationship between sovereign CDS markets and foreign exchange markets, I find relatively strong evidence of a causal relationship between these two variables. In a longer-term cointegrating relationship, I find that sovereign CDS spreads have different impacts (positive or negative) on exchange rates depending on the structural characteristics of the domestic export sectors of the countries studied. Turning to the second moment of exchange rates and sovereign CDS spreads, I examine the relationship between the volatility of sovereign CDS spreads and the volatility of exchange rates for developed economies (proxied by an index containing 10 Eurozone countries) and emerging economies (proxied by Brazil and Russia). My findings point to different mechanisms of transmission between sovereign CDS markets and foreign exchange markets with regard to developed and emerging economies: for developed economies, exchange rates affect sovereign CDS spreads through the volatility, whilst in emerging economies the exchange rates affect sovereign CDS spreads at the price level. To further analyse the determinants of sovereign CDS spreads, I incorporate additional macroeconomic fundamentals in addition to exchange rates into a model to explain sovereign CDS spreads. The results show that sovereign CDS spreads are indeed driven by most macroeconomic fundamentals. However, these results do not hold during periods of economic turmoil, in which the rising risk aversion of investors becomes a principal influence behind the sovereign CDS spreads. As changes in exchange rates are able to capture changes to risk aversion through trading in foreign exchange markets, the exchange rate retains its explanatory power to sovereign CDS spreads in ‘normal’ as well as ‘crisis’ conditions. Overall, the study provides strong support for the claim that exchange rates are an important determinant of sovereign CDS spreads, in addition to the interest rate which is highlighted in the literature review. The exchange rate – as an important fundamental indicator – can reflect the general domestic economic status, the relative international competitiveness of countries, as well as capture changes in risk aversion among investors. Therefore, using exchange rates to explain sovereign CDS spreads can help to account for both domestic and international dimensions of the ‘health’ of an economy as well as changes in investors’ attitudes.

Seminario para optar al título de Ingeniero Comercial, Mención Administración / En la primera etapa del presente estudio se indaga sobre la naturaleza y funcionamiento de Exemplars y Base Rate, dos de las principales herramientas comunicacionales que se emplean en la actualidad. Sin embargo el uso de dicho instrumental cuenta con su mayor grado de desarrollo en el área periodística, y de difusión de medios. De esta manera, la actual investigación busca extender al plano publicitario, algunas de las principales conclusiones que han sido obtenidas en el campo del periodismo, respecto de la utilización y procesamiento de Exemplars y Base Rate. Además, el estudio analiza con especial detalle las propiedades que estas herramientas tienen en materia de persuasión y de influencia en la opinión de las personas, así como también en el nivel de recordación e impacto emocional que son capaces de generar en éstas. Adentrándose un poco más en el tema de la persuasión, la investigación se orienta también a estudiar el rol que juega el Vividness Effect, como elemento clave de las facultades que un estímulo comunicacional posee para persuadir a una audiencia determinada. La sección experimental de este estudio fue desarrollada mediante encuestas, aplicadas a alumnos de Ingeniería Comercial de la Universidad de Chile, y cuyos principales resultados defienden las mayores propiedades persuasivas que los Exemplars poseen respecto de los Base Rate. De la misma forma se destacan los mejores resultados obtenidos por los Exemplars en materia de Recordación; y también en Impacto Emocional, al analizar las respuestas de Activación generadas en la muestra utilizada. Al mismo tiempo, no se obtuvieron resultados concluyentes acerca del efecto que el lineamiento cognitivo, tiene sobre el nivel de persuasión que la publicidad ejerce en las personas. Finalmente se entregan algunas sugerencias, explicando los aciertos y desaciertos de los resultados generados por esta investigación, y planteando temas de estudio complementarios al presente, para quienes deseen seguir indagando en áreas similares a la explorada.

Class of 2006 Abstract / Objectives: To describe the current response rate of pharmacists to mailed surveys and to identify the factors that influence pharmacist response rates. A number of hypotheses have been presented. Design: A systematic literature review. Methods: Included articles were evaluated for variables of interest using a data extraction form. Variables included length of survey, use of incentive, proximity, use of announcement, the anonymity of the survey, use of a reminder, and presence of return postage. Results: A total of 76 articles were identified of which 54 met inclusion criteria. The mean response rate for the survey was 45.8 percent. The effect on response rate was evaluated in regard to survey length, the inclusion of an incentive, and the geographical origination of the survey. The change in response rate for each single increase in the number of questions in a survey changed the response rate by 0.001 percent. Response rate for surveys without an incentive provided was 44.6 percent (SD = 0.168), while the response rate for those with an incentive was 50.7 percent (p > 0.277). Twenty seven surveys were deemed to seek responses from pharmacists in a close proximity to the organization sending out the survey (e.g., within the same state or region). Twenty-seven did not focus on a specific state or region. The mean response rates were 45.5 percent and 46.1 percent, respectively (p=0.882). There was no statistical significance in any of the other variables examined. Conclusions: This review of literature addressing pharmacist response rate to mailed surveys revealed that pharmacists’ response to surveys is not significantly affected by survey length, inclusion of an incentive, or survey origin.

The diploma thesis examines the implicit pension debt in the fifteen EU countries. The Holzmann et al. (2011) methodology is applied to show the impact of population ageing on the pension systems in the EU. The implicit pension debts demonstrate the considerable hidden debt burden in the all fifteen countries. The implicit pension debts range in the interval from 47 % of GDP for the Czech Republic to 906 % for Greece. Nine of the analyzed countries record the implicit pension debts in the interval 100 - 300 % of GDP. The sensitivity analysis and the comparison with other studies confirm our findings. The thesis points out sizeable imbalances among the particular countries, genders and age cohorts.

This thesis studies the factors driving the movement of Myanmar’s reference exchange rate against the dollar during its managed-float currency regime from 2012 to 2018. Time series and event study analysis are used to assess how reforms have affected the value of the Myanmar Kyat. The exchange rate policies and movements of nearby Asian currencies over the same sample period are also considered to determine whether the depreciation of the Myanmar Kyat parallels that of the others (Chinese Renminbi, Vietnamese Dong, Thai Baht, Cambodian Riel, and Singaporean dollar). The results show that the Myanmar Kyat is significantly influenced by US inflation and the Myanmar’s 2015 general elections, and that the Kyat is indirectly influenced by the Renminbi and the USD, through the currencies’ effects on the Dong. Comparing the M2/GDP and stock market capitalization to GDP ratios showed that Myanmar’s market lags behind its Asian counterparts. However, the government treasury bond market launched in September 2016 and the stock exchange launched in December 2015 offer hope for secondary trading and a deepening of the financial sector in the future.

The self-interstitial defect is commonly regarded as important in regulating diffusion in silicon. A review of the literature reveals that the scientific bases for invoking the self-interstitial defect are weak, while an alternate defect, the vacancy cluster, has been largely ignored. One argument which has been used to establish dominance of the self-interstitial defect over vacancies is based upon attempts to model gold diffusion. Possible behavior of vacancies are considered, and the past analysis is found to be inconclusive. Another argument which has been presented as evidence for presence of silicon self-interstitials is based on observations of type "A" swirl defects. These defects are amenable to interpretation in terms of solidification theory, without need to invoke the interstitial point defect. Two experiments were designed to demonstrate influence of heat treatments upon gold diffusion in electronic grade silicon crystal when the heat treatment was performed prior to gold deposition. Results are interpreted in terms of Ostwald ripening of vacancy clusters retained in the crystal from high temperature processing. / Graduation date: 1996