Liquidity is a measure of the ease with which an asset can be converted into cash. In a perfectly liquid market, conversion is instantaneous and does not incur costs. Amihud and Mendelson (1986:224) proposed that illiquidity increases the expected return on an investment (liquidity premium) and simultaneously lengthens the holding period. These two effects are known respectively as the “spread-return relationship” and the “clientele effect” and have theoretical as well as practical implications. From a theoretical perspective it may help to explain the gap between the capital asset pricing model (which assumes that markets are perfectly liquid) and the associated empirical evidence; which thus far has been rather poor. From a practical perspective, liquidity will influence stakeholders’ decisions and market competitiveness (Amihud&Mendelson, 1991:61-64). The relevant stakeholders are governments, stock exchange regulators, corporations, investors and financial intermediaries. Emerging economies such as the South African economy typically have less liquid markets than the developed world. While this may be attractive for investors looking for higher returns, Amihud and Mendelson (1991:61) are of the opinion that liquid markets are more generally favoured by investors. Constantinides (1986:842-858), also proposes a model for liquidity, but found the liquidity premium to be of lesser importance than that proposed by Amihud and Mendelson (1986:223-231) but also supports the suggestion that investors will favour liquid markets. Although it is by no means a perfect proxy, a security’s bid-ask spread has been found to be an attractive and effective measure of liquidity. It has been found to correlate with beta as well as market capitalisation and several other variables commonly used in capital markets research. Because of this correlation the effect of the bid-ask spread cannot be studied in isolation when regression techniques are employed (Ramanathan, 1998:166). This is particularly problematic because empirical evidence for beta, which is arguably the most important independent variable in financial cross sectional relationships, is weak. Beta has to be estimated and so it is not clear if real markets do not support CAPM theory or if beta cannot be estimated with the required accuracy. All of the common independent variables used in empirical capital markets research are correlated to beta, and for this reason it cannot be established if these variables have a real effect or if they are simply serving as a proxy for the difference between the real and the estimated beta. Various strategies have been proposed to increase the accuracy of beta estimation and these are discussed in detail in this research. Successes with these strategies have been mixed. A second problem encountered in the empirical research base relating to the CAPM is that in the theory the cross-sectional relationship is between expected market return (which cannot be observed due to the vast number of real investments beyond those listed on exchanges) and beta, whereas empirical research makes use of actual return on a market proxy and beta. In order for the actual return to approach the expected return, empirical studies have to be conducted over extended periods. Accurate data for such periods are generally lacking and severe macro-economic changes such as wars, may also affect rational economic behaviour. It has to be kept in mind that the entire CAPM theory flows from the simple assumption that investors aim to achieve the highest return per unit of risk, and so a rejection of beta is a rejection of rational investor behaviour. Liquidity however, addresses one of the assumptions of CAPM, namely that markets are perfectly liquid; which obviously is not met in real markets and so CAPM models expanded for liquidity should be a reasonably fundamental starting point for all empirical capital markets research. The current empirical evidence for the spread-return relationship is inconclusive. While some researchers have found a significant relationship, others have questioned the ability of the methodology to differentiate a true relationship from the ‘proxy for errors in the estimated beta’ problem. Deductions (as explained in section 4.3) that have been made from the research of Marshall and Young (2003:176-186) in particular, provide strong evidence that at least some of the relationship is due to the ‘errors in estimated beta’ problem. Little empirical work has been done on the clientele effect. Atkins and Dyl (1997:318-321) found a significant relationship between holding period and bid-ask spread, although their approach was somewhat unorthodox in the sense that portfolio formation was not done and the effect of beta was not tested. This study tests empirically both the spread-return relationship and the clientele effect on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange over the period stretching from January 2002 to June 2007. The methodology of Fama and Macbeth (1973:614-617) as well as the aggregated beta of Dimson (1979:203-204) were mainly used, with some modifications as suggested by other researchers. With regard to the spread-return relationship, the findings of this study do not support theoretical expectations. This may be due to the short time period that was used as well as the difficulty in estimating beta. To the contrary, very significant evidence for the clientele effect was found, with little to no influence from market capitalisation and beta, which is as expected. Further investigation into the spread-return relationship is required. If a liquidity premium is not present, foreign investors will favour liquid developed markets above the JSE. This implies that efforts of exchange regulators and the government to decrease illiquidity will lead to foreign portfolio investment inflow into the South African economy. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Graduate School of Management / unrestricted

Lietuvos akcijų rinkos pasiūlos ir paklausos srautų analizei buvo pasirinktos 9 akcijos. Jas, pagal įvykusių sandorių skaičių ir vertę, galima suskirstyti į tris grupes: nelikvidžios, pusiau likvidžios ir likvidžios akcijos. Šių akcijų, viešai skelbiami rinkos gylio ir įvykusių sandorių, duomenys buvo imami iš Vilniaus vertybinių popierių biržos internetinio puslapio http://www.baltic.omxgroup.com/ nuo 2008 02 25 iki 2008 04 18. Darbe buvo skaičiuojami paprastas (inside bid-ask spread), efektyvus (effective spread) ir užfiksuotas kainų skirtumai. Roll matas skaičiuojamas remiantis akcijų įvykusių sandorių kainomis, kurių skirtumų stacionarumas ištirtas RA-kriterijumi (reverse arrangement test). Kaip ir buvo galima tikėtis, parodyta, kad pasirinktų akcijų rinka yra neefektyvi. Dėl šios priežasties, kiekvienai akcijai apskaičiuotas Roll matas yra labai grubus. Naudojant C++ programavimo kalbą, buvo sukurta programinė įranga: • Duomenų skaitymui iš interneto; • Duomenų bazės kūrimui, apdorojimui ir redagavimui; • Duomenų analizei. / Nine types of stock were chosen to analyse quoted bid-ask spread of Vilnius Stock Exchange. According to the value and number of transactions of the stock, it can be divided into three groups: non-liquid, half-liquid and liquid stock. Public market depth information and data of trade was taken from Vilnius Stock Exchange website http://www.baltic.omxgroup.com/ during the period from 25th February 2008 to 18th April 2008. In my work I have analysed inside bid-ask spread, effective spread and fixed prices. Roll measure was measured using trade prices of stock; stationarity of differences of trade prices were examined using reverse arrangement test. As had been expected, I came to conclusion that the stock market for chosen stocks is informationally inefficient. Due to this reason the Roll measure is not correct. By using C++ programming language the following programming tools were created: • Data reading from internet tool; • Data collection and correction tool; • Data analysis tool.

Univ., Diss.--Frankfurt/Main, 2004. / Literaturangaben.

Universiẗat, Diss.--Karlsruhe, 2001.

Submitted by Ana Lúcia Silva (lucinhaps@uol.com.br) on 2011-08-01T19:14:26Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tese ana-lúcia.versão final.docx: 1254993 bytes, checksum: 3c56a43adf0c3460adff4afe8351a474 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Gisele Isaura Hannickel (gisele.hannickel@fgv.br) on 2011-08-01T19:42:16Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 tese ana-lúcia.versão final.docx: 1254993 bytes, checksum: 3c56a43adf0c3460adff4afe8351a474 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Gisele Isaura Hannickel (gisele.hannickel@fgv.br) on 2011-08-01T19:44:40Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 tese ana-lúcia.versão final.docx: 1254993 bytes, checksum: 3c56a43adf0c3460adff4afe8351a474 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2011-08-02T11:08:41Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 tese ana-lúcia.versão final.docx: 1254993 bytes, checksum: 3c56a43adf0c3460adff4afe8351a474 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-07-01 / A tese tem como objetivo discutir a liquidez do mercado secundário de títulos da dívida pública no Brasil. Em três ensaios, defende que problemas de organização do mercado prejudicam a ampliação da liquidez e que a formação de preços nesse mercado acompanha as taxas do mercado futuro de depósitos interfinanceiros – DI futuro, e não o contrário, como esperado, já que a presença de títulos de elevada liquidez no mercado à vista é que deveria desenvolver o mercado futuro. O primeiro ensaio mede e estima os determinantes do bid-ask spread cotado (indicador de liquidez) para cada vértice de taxa de juros, tendo como referência os vencimentos dos títulos pré-fixados em cabeça de semestre: LTNs (LTN-13 e LTN-11) e NTNFs- (NTNF-17, NTNF-14). Mercados com menores spreads são mais líquidos, mercados com spreads maiores são menos líquidos. Os modelos empíricos foram estimados por meio de análises de séries de tempo. O trabalho utiliza o cálculo do bid-ask cotado para medir a liquidez dos títulos em análise, medido pela diferença entre o ask price e o bid price de fechamento do mercado. A estimação dos determinantes da liquidez de mercado foi realizada com base no método dos mínimos quadrados ordinários (MQO). O modelo testa se maturidade e volume de negócio determinam o bid-ask spread dos títulos. Mercados com menores spreads são mais líquidos do que mercados com maiores spreads. Os resultados mostram que a mediana e a média do bid-ask spread cotado crescem com a maturidade dos títulos. Os sinais dos parâmetros das regressões confirmam para a maioria dos vértices dos vértices analisados neste trabalho a hipótese inicial de que o bid-ask spread aumenta com a elevação maturidade e diminui com maior volume negociado, confirmando a hipótese de baixa liquidez dos títulos públicos no mercado secundário brasileiro. O segundo ensaio analisa uma singularidade relevante do mercado brasileiro: a dependência da formação dos preços e da taxa de juros no mercado secundário de títulos públicos (LTN e NTNF) em relação ao DI futuro. As variáveis utilizadas foram o bid-ask spread cotado e o volume negociado no mercado de títulos públicos e de DI futuro. O ensaio utiliza tanto o método de Granger (1969), que tem como suposto que as informações relevantes para a previsão das variáveis estão contidas exclusivamente nos dados das séries temporais destas mesmas variáveis, quanto o modelo de Geweke (1982) para testar a causalidade, simultaneidade e dependência linear entre as duas séries no tempo. Os resultados confirmam a hipótese inicial de que bid-ask spread e volume de títulos públicos possuem forte dependência do bid-ask spread e do volume para contratos de DI futuro de mesmo vencimento, dependência devida à causalidade do mercado de DI futuro para o mercado de títulos públicos para a maioria dos vértices analisados nesse trabalho, indicando que a taxa CDI é benchmark para a precificação dos títulos públicos. Uma possível explicação está nos fatores de microestrutura, que fazem com que esse mercado seja o mais conveniente para negociar risco de liquidez e de mercado. O terceiro ensaio discute as implicações do desenho institucional sobre a liquidez do mercado secundário de títulos públicos - mecanismos e regras de negociação, desenho dos títulos e base de investidores. Essas regras afetam a formação dos preços no mercado, definem as trocas, a dimensão da assimetria de informação e os custos de transação e do processo de negociação. Pela sua relevância, a organização do mercado de títulos públicos tem sido objeto de reformas em diversos países. O terceiro ensaio é finalizado com a análise das medidas adotadas no Brasil e de seus resultados.

Submitted by Helder Antoniazzi (helderua@gmail.com) on 2013-09-11T00:46:59Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao 10-set-13.pdf: 970680 bytes, checksum: 19edacf9a47e77bc9b873b8e4fac35ed (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Suzinei Teles Garcia Garcia (suzinei.garcia@fgv.br) on 2013-09-11T13:35:54Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao 10-set-13.pdf: 970680 bytes, checksum: 19edacf9a47e77bc9b873b8e4fac35ed (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2013-09-11T13:49:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao 10-set-13.pdf: 970680 bytes, checksum: 19edacf9a47e77bc9b873b8e4fac35ed (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-08-21 / The present study analyzes the influence of share's market makers on liquidity, validating a proxy that is able to measure transactions costs into secondary market. Since 1984, important papers face the challenge of measuring liquidity and recently a general review was done to compare different measures, finding the most accurate ones. This article intends to revisit these measures and select a metric most suitable to Brazilian market. Once the proxy is chosen, will be then evaluated the relevance of the market maker in determining transaction costs through a modified version of econometric equation from Sanvicente (2012). Lastly, the great contribution of the article is to identify whether the companies should hire a market maker for their stocks, in order to reduce the costs of trading in its shares. / O trabalho tem por objetivo validar a influência dos formadores de mercado de ações sobre a liquidez, uma proxy capaz de medir os custos de transação no mercado secundário de ações. O desafio de medir corretamente a liquidez teve trabalhos relevantes desde 1984, e recentemente foi alvo de uma revisão geral que comparou diversas medidas e encontrou alguns ganhadores. A proposta do presente trabalho é a de revisitar estas medidas e selecionar a métrica mais adequada ao mercado Brasileiro. Escolhida a proxy mais significativa, será então avaliada a relevância do formador de mercado na determinação dos custos de transação por meio de uma versão modificada da equação econométrica de Sanvicente (2012). Por fim, este trabalho será relevante para identificar se as empresas devem contratar formadores de mercado para suas ações, com o fim de reduzirem os custos da negociação de suas ações.

This thesis is among the first market microstructure studies of an index futures market with designated market makers in the academic literature. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate intraday patterns of key variables, the relative size of the components of the quoted bid-ask spread, and the order decisions of uninformed traders, in a continuous dealer market for index futures with market makers. Overall, our findings aim to contribute to a better understanding of the roles of market makers and public customers in price formation. Intraday patterns of financial market variables such as trade price, volume, trade size, quoted spreads, depth, and volatility separately for designated market makers and public customers are examined. The lack of relevant and appropriate data in futures markets, as evidenced by Hasbrouck (2003) and Kurov (2005), has inhibited the growth of market microstructure in futures markets. Individual orders, quotes, trader identification, and transactions from June 2003 to December 2004, for FTSEurofirst 80 and 100 index futures are used in the study. Inclusion of the parties to order execution distinguishes this data set from most other futures microstructure sources. As this thesis is the first known academic study of the extant market microstructure of the FTSEurofirst index futures, the institutional aspects of the trading process for the FTSEurofirst index futures are also explored. An alternative method for estimating three cost components as a proportion of the bid-ask spread is developed. A framework is developed for the order decision process of an uninformed trader for the first time in a futures market with market makers. The results of this thesis may have implications for other financial markets and the field of market microstructure.

Abstract In this paper, we examine the relation among different information asymmetry measures in Taiwan Stock Exchange and exploit the ability of the microstructure measures to measure asymmetric information. We also investigate the role of information asymmetry measures in affecting stock returns. With a random sample of 180 firms, we find that the market microstructure measure is significantly correlated with most of the corporate finance measures that should shed lights on the level of information asymmetry in advance. We also find that the analysts’ forecast measures have no relation with the microstructure measure. One main result is that the adverse selection risk does affect the stock returns. For the whole sample period, the adverse selection component has a significant impact on the stock returns and dominates all other variables except for the number of analysts following. Other significant measures include the volatility, firm size, leverage, and market to book ratio of equity. Although these information asymmetry measures act as competent determinants in the whole- period regression, they do not have consistent performance across quarters. The inconsistent result suggests that these measures may have diverse performance with regard to different periods.

中文摘要 對於資本市場來說是外國公司的買賣價差的三個成分：逆選擇成分、交易成本成分及存貨成本成分相對於本國公司的買賣價差三成分構成有可能不同。 此篇論文中比較相同股票在不同市場所發行股票，其買賣價差三成分。根據本篇實證結果，相同一支股票在美國NYSE或是NASDAQ的逆選擇成分顯著的高於在TSEC發行的逆選擇成分，這暗指著資本市場中有很多不一樣的地方值得探討，像是流通貨幣的不同、或是法規治令的不同以及取得非公開資訊的難易程度也不同。另外，根據之前的研究的顯示，買單接著買單、賣單接著賣單的機率趨勢也很強，我們也發現了這種現象在TSEC很明顯，根據此篇論文的結論，這大部分的原因很可能是因為TSEC有「限價」規定的緣故。 / Abstract The three components, adverse selection component, order processing component and inventory holding cost, of companies which regarded as foreign companies in terms of the capital market are different from those in domestic capital market. In this paper, the adverse selection components of the stocks we choose in NYSE or NASDAQ are significant higher than those in TSEC. It implies the differences of capital markets, such as currency ,regulation and easy or not obtaining the private information of the company. Furthermore, similar to previous studies, there are strong tendencies for buys follow buys and sells follow sells. We find that the most part of proportion of order persistence derives from price limit in TSEC.

投資型商品連動於特定資產，保險人除了面臨原有的核保風險，更需承擔部分的財務風險。傳統保險商品的純保費價格等於其預期損失，而投資型商品的保險給付依據投資標的波動，保險人的預期損失不易估算，傳統精算的評價方法不完全適用於投資型商品。保證最低給付的給付結構使得投資型商品其有選擇權的特質，Brennan與Schwartz(1976)首先利用選擇權定價理論探討附有保證最低給付投資型商品之價值與避險策略，爾後亦有許多文獻以此方向加以著墨，但選擇權定價理論是基於市場為完全市場的假設，保險市場為不完全市場，以完全市場假設之理論評定保險商品之價值實不合理。本為假設保險人面臨的風險為核保風險及財務風險，財務市場為完全市場，保險人可以藉由市場上的各種金融商品建構避險組合規避財務風險；而預期死亡人數與實際死亡人數所產生的核保誤差，保險人無法利用避險組合完全地規避，因此保險市場為不完全市場。 在不完全市場中請求權的價值牽涉投資者主觀的風險偏好，不存在唯一的平賭測度，請求權的價格也不唯一，最適避險策略依請求權的價格調整，所以投資型保險商品的價格不再等於其公平價值，真正的成交價格應落於買賣價差之中。本文引用Mercurio(1996)的結果，利用二次效用函數，以極大化保險人期末財富之效用為目標，建構生存險的合理價格範圍。以二元樹模型描述股票的波動，分別模擬五年、十年及十五年投資型生存險之價差範圍，保險人的風險規避程度、保單期限以及保證金額的高低將影響商品價差範圍的大小。 關鍵字：不完全市場、效用函數，買賣價差、最適避險策略 / Investment-linked life (LIL) insurance policies integrate the attributes from the mutual fund by introducing the investment options to the policyholders and life insurance through the benefit payments shielding the unexpected events of the insured. Since the execution of the implied options depends on the policyholder's health status. Actuarial equivalent principal and non-arbitrage pricing theory are used in evaluating the prices for LIL insurance policies. Brennan and Schwartz (1976) initially employ the option pricing theory in examining the pricing and hedging strategy for LIL insurance policies with minimum guarantees. Most published literatures are focusing on this issue adopting the B-S methodology. Since the values of the LIL policies cannot be replicated uniquely through the self-financing strategies due to underwriting risks of the insurance market. Insurance market does not satisfy the completeness assumptions, Due to lack of a unique martingale measure under market incompleteness, the utility assumption of the policyholder is involved in the pricing issue. Insurance pricing must consider the risk attitude of the investors in the market. Hence the cost the LIL insurance policies are not necessarily equal to the fair market prices. The market value should fall within the range of the bid and ask prices. In this study, we follow the approach in Mercurio (1996) by adopting the quadratic utility function and compute the reasonable range of the prices based on maximizing the terminal health utility function. Binary tree method is used in modeling the asset dynamics. Then the numerical computations are performed using endowment LIL insurance policies with 5, 10 and 15 years of duration. Based on the results, we find that the risk attitude of the policyholder, the policy duration and minimum amounts of the guarantees significantly affect the bid-ask price spread of LIL insurance policies. Keywords: market incompleteness; utility function; bid-ask spread; optimal hedging strategy.