Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögsk.

The relationship between the stock markets of the developed countries has been examined extensively in the literature. This paper examine the dynamic relationship between India and the major developed markets including USA, UK and Japan .Using daily stock market data from January 1997 to December 2002 and from January 2003 to December 2007,the study examine the stock price indices of India (BSE SENSEX), USA (Dow Jones Industrial Average), UK(FTSE-100) and Japan (Nikkei 225). The ordinary least square method is showing some relationship between the stock markets. A multiple equation series known as a vector autoregression is proposed for describing the dynamic behavior of the four stock markets. The result shows that the markets are interrelated at significant level and influences each other. All the markets influence India but recently the influence of USA market is comparatively high than other developed markets.

This study tests the size effect in the London Stock Exchange, using data for all nonfinancial listed firms from January 1985 to December 1995. The initial tests indicate that average stock returns are negatively related to firm size and that small firm portfolios earn returns in excess of the market risk. Further, the study tests whether the size effect is a proxy for variables such as the Book-to- Market Value and the Borrowing Ratio, as well as the impact of the dividend and the Bid- Ask spread on the return of the extreme size portfolios. The originality of this study is in the application of the Markov Chain Model to testing the Random Walk and Bubbles hypotheses, and the Vector Autoregression (VAR) framework for testing the relationship of macroeconomic variables with size portfolio returns.

Income inequality has been showing a steady increase for past decades and will be worsened in the future (Piketty, 2014). One of the most important factors to explain the worsening income inequality can be aging. Previous studies on aging focus on its impact on traditional issues such as health, retirement, and economic growth. This study finds the direct relationship between aging and income inequality using the vector autoregressive (VAR) model (Blanchard and Quah, 1989). The VAR model is useful to analyze the long-run response of aging on income inequality. The empirical results will verify the negative impact of aging on income inequality in the U.S. The governmental efforts to reduce the negative impact of aging on health care and pensions could delay the worsening income inequality.

This research simulates pre-retirement investment scenarios for agricultural producers. Thirty-two investment scenarios are examined, with each scenario differing with respect to retirement vehicle, investment strategy of the producer, and the use of a cash margin for reinvestment in the operation versus prepaying term debt (cash preference). The retirement vehicles included in this study are Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs), Simplified Employee Pension Plans (SEPs), and 401(k) plans. Investment strategies reflect the producer's preference for investing in conservative, balanced, or aggressive assets, or a combination of these assets. Further, these scenarios are examined for three methods of capitalization: Case I- an operation with a 50 percent debt/asset ratio; Case II - an operation with a 65 percent debt/asset ratio; Case III - an operation with a 65 percent debt/asset ratio with a majority of the farm land being leased. The analytical model simulates the annual cash flows of a commercial agricultural operation for each investment scenario over a 30-year period. Stochastic rates of return, generated using a vector-autoregressive (VAR) model, are incorporated into the simulation model. Each scenario is replicated 100 times using different vectors of stochastic rates of return. Results show investment in retirement vehicles does not significant reduce ending farm assets, regardless of investment strategy or cash preference of the producer. Use of retirement vehicles does have a significant positive impact on ending net worth for the producer. IRAs are not significant investment tools for producers (or spouses) who are participants in another qualified retirement plan. Investment strategy has a major impact on ending net worth. Aggressive and dynamic (aggressive to conservative as retirement approaches) investment strategies dominate conservative and balanced strategies. Use of cash margin to prepay debt has no advantage over reinvesting in the farm. Retirement vehicles greatly improve the probability of meeting estimated family living needs during retirement, and generate greater diversity and liquidity of the retirement portfolio. Further, retirement vehicles are more important for producer with highly-leveraged operations and for producers who lease a majority of their assets. / Ph. D.

International trade is one of the leading discussions taken not only in South Africa but worldwide on daily basis. The importance of international trade is that one country can be able to assist the other country to meet its needs. The level of economic growth is important in any country not only in South Africa. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of foreign trade on economic growth in South Africa. The findings of this study will demonstrate the light about positive and negative effects of international trade on economic growth. The empirical analysis is conducted by using a time series data from 199001 - 201302 quarterly obtained from South African Reserve Bank (SARB) and Organisation of Economic Co-operation Development (OECD). The study follows a Cointegrated vector autoregression (CVAR) which contains the following: Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) and Phillips-Perron (PP) tests for stationarity. The model is also taken through the Johansen cointegration test and Vector error correction model (VECM). VECM approach will be followed if cointegration amongst the variables has been established. The findings of the study are that all variables have unit root. The cointegration model emphasizes the long run equilibrium relationship between dependent and independent variables. The empirical results for the Johansen cointegration test reject the null hypothesis of no cointegration and suggest the presence of a long term relationship among all the variables. Empirical investigation reveals that three variables such as inflation rate , export and exchange rates are positively related to GOP while other one variable such as import is negatively related to GOP. The conclusion drawn from this work is that there is a correlation amongst GOP and its independent variable. This dissertation recommends that The South African government must start strengthening the competiveness of export by making sure that it is always balanced with the import. / Thesis (M.Sc. (Economics) North-West University, Mafikeng Campus, 2013

Forecasting is used for decision making and unreliable predictions can instill a false sense of condence. Traditional time series modelling is astatistical art form rather than a science and errors can occur due to lim-itations of human judgment. In minimizing the risk of falsely specifyinga process the practitioner can make use of machine learning models. Inan eort to nd out if there's a benet in using models that require lesshuman judgment, the machine learning models Random Forest and Neural Network have been used to model a VAR(1) time series. In addition,the classical time series models AR(1), AR(2), VAR(1) and VAR(2) havebeen used as comparative foundation. The Random Forest and NeuralNetwork are trained and ultimately the models are used to make pre-dictions evaluated by RMSE. All models yield scattered forecast resultsexcept for the Random Forest that steadily yields comparatively precisepredictions. The study shows that there is denitive benet in using Random Forests to eliminate the risk of falsely specifying a process and do infact provide better results than a correctly specied model.

This thesis sets out to explain the relationship between fiscal spending and economic growth. The relationship is established using a panel vector autoregression model estimated by GMM, using GDP growth and government spending on a panel of 30 OECD countries. The model used is tested with slight variations in specification which are concluded to be important in the finalized results. By altering the specification used in the model this thesis produces relatively different sizes on the multiplier effect both in the short run and in the long run effect. The size of the multiplier effect produced by this thesis is varying between 0.437 on the low side and 2.224 on the high side depending on a few alterations in model specification. Similarly, the long run multiplier effect is measured as 1.873 on the low side and 8.263 on the high side. The mean duration of the multiplier effect is estimated to be approximately 3 years.

The reliability of monetary policy as an economic stabilisation tool depends on the understanding of the empirical effects of policy intervention on macroeconomic aggregates. Since investigating the interdependencies between macroeconomic variables necessarily involves studying their interactions over time, time series analysis is an important tool. This thesis sets out to examine the presence and effects of nonstationarity in the form of a structural break in a basic VAR of four endogenous variables. Specifically, the transmission of a monetary policy shock on the macroeconomic aggregate of 11 Euro Area countries is estimated for the period 1999–2017, employing variables based on previous studies. A Quandt-Andrews breakpoint test is used to identify the break date, and a comparison is made between the periods. This study finds support for the presence of a break in the regression estimate from the breakpoint test, although the reults from the IRFs cannot be shown to be statistically significant, nor to be bias-free.

Since the Euro has founded in 1999, the Asian Currency has become an important issue. The most important prerequisite for adopting common currency for the countries in the area is the synchronization of business cycle. This paper analyses the degree and responses of business cycles for Asian countries when they face to the common shocks. The empirical findings from this paper can be summarized as follows. First, the shocks of Japanese economy are more important to Asian countries than the shocks from the United States, except for Thailand and Indonesia. Second, Malaysia and the Philippine are substantially influenced by the Thailand. Therefore, the Asian economy is evidently forming its regional (or bloc) economy continually. The findings from this paper are in the same line with the result from Hazel (2001), who concludes the business cycles of Japan and Korea are commoved. The degree of synchronization of business cycles for Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippine are quite high as well.