Business Commons^™

Estimating The Required Return In A World Of Heightened Uncertainty: Emphasizing The Equity Risk Premium, James L. Grant, James A. Albate, Chris Rowberry

Financial Services Forum Publications

Heightened uncertainty over the past five years--due to the bursting of the NASDAQ bubble, the recession of 2001, the September 11th attacks, accounting scandals, and the oil shocks of 2005--has brought new challenges for securities analysts and portfolio managers. This observation is particularly relevant for fundamental equity managers using price relative and/or discounted cash flow (DCF) models. While correctly worrying about values of cash flow input (dividends, free cash flow, economic earnings) to DCF models, portfolio managers must be especially aware of risk factors that impact the required return or discount rate, and relatedly, market valuation multiples. This discount rate …

Tactical Asset Allocation And Presidential Elections, James L. Grant, Emery A. Trahan

Financial Services Forum Publications

We analyze tactical asset allocation decisions around presidential elections using traditional methodology and then in the context of an efficient frontier analysis rather than the traditional stock-only or bond-only allocations in prior literature. To our knowledge, this is the first paper in the literature that addresses asset returns around presidential elections in a mean-variance efficient frontier framework. We find that the efficient frontier is sensitive to presidential time periods, with Democrats providing the best risk-reward opportunities over the long term, while Republicans provide better opportunities over the past quarter century.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act Of 2002 And Its Effects On American Business, Lara Bergen

Financial Services Forum Publications

In the wake of the 2001-2002 Arthur Andersen accounting scandal and collapse of Enron and WorldCom, the government, the investors and the American public demanded corporate reforms to prevent similar future occurrences. Viewed to be largely a result of failed or poor governance, insufficient disclosure practices, and a lack of satisfactory internal controls, in 2002 Congress passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act seeking to set standards and guarantee the accuracy of financial reports.

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (known as SARBOX or SOX) sought to address these concerns through making executives responsible for company accounting statements, redefining the relationships between corporations and their auditors, …

The Effect Of The Form Of Tax Incentives On Individuals’ Savings Decisions, Julia Brennan, David S. Hulse, Cynthia Vines

Financial Services Forum Publications

Congress and the media have both expressed concerns about Americans’ low savings rates. We address these concerns by investigating the extent to which the form of an investment’s tax preference affects individuals’ willingness to choose a tax-preferred vehicle over a less restrictive, but non-tax-preferred, investment. Specifically, we tested the extent to which subjects chose a traditional savings plan versus an investment resembling either a traditional IRA, Roth IRA, or government matching program. We find that subjects are not as sensitive to the form of the tax preference as they are to restrictions on their ability to withdraw funds. This suggests …

Non-Profit Hospitals Face Structural As Well As Financial Challenges: Lessons From Massachusetts, Eric W. Hayden

Financial Services Forum Publications

Like most non-profit hospitals, those of Massachusetts are facing serious financial challenges. While the immediate issue is the shortfall between revenues and expenses, the paper finds that their real problems are structural, evidenced by at least three systemic impediments -uncompensated care, over-utilization of teaching hospitals, and an increasingly unattractive environment for the practice of medicine. Other states whose non-profit hospitals face persistent financial difficulties may find it useful to consider whether structural impediments of the type facing Massachusetts undermine the operating performance of their own institutions.

Measuring Investor Sentiment In Equity Markets, Arindam Bandopadhyaya, Anne Leah Jones

Financial Services Forum Publications

Recently, investor sentiment has become the focus of many studies on asset pricing. Research has demonstrated that changes in investor sentiment may trigger changes in asset prices, and that investor sentiment may be an important component of the market pricing process. Some authors suggest that shifts in investor sentiment may in some instances better explain short-term movement in asset prices than any other set of fundamental factors. In this paper we develop an Equity Market Sentiment Index from publicly available data, and we then demonstrate how this measure can be used in a stock market setting by studying the price …

Bond And Stock Market Linkages: The Case Of Mexico And Brazil, Arindam Bandopadhyaya

Financial Services Forum Publications

This paper examines the Brady bond market of two largest Latin American economies, Mexico and Brazil. Results indicate that stripped yield of each market in the very near future is determined primarily by the past yields in the respective markets. However, over a longer-term horizon the interrelationships between the bond markets and the stock markets of the two countries become important. Future yields in the Mexican bond market are affected by the current returns in the Mexican stock market, and to a certain extent the yields in the Brazilian bond market. A significant portion of the future variation in the …