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  • (2007) Pal, Satyajit
    Thesis
    The Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) has had significant impact on the theory and practice of investments. However technical trading rules have continued to be used by practioners and have been the focus of many academic studies which have focused on equity, foreign exchange and futures markets. The scarcity of research into technical trading models for fixed income markets is astonishing considering the significant size and consequent investor importance of fixed income markets relative to other financial markets and the extensive application of technical trading models by market participants. This is one of the few studies that develops a technical trading model applicable to fixed income markets. Black (1986) defined Efficient Markets as a market where deviations from fundamental values were short lived and small in magnitude. Fundamental asset values are hard to calculate, but we are able to identify fundamental values for a set of Government Bonds on the principle that yield relativities between such bonds are quite stable except for 'deliberate' changes in trading behaviour. We find that the deviations from fundamental value are short lived and small in magnitude. We exploit deviations from fundamental value by Butterfly Trading strategies; Normal Butterfly trades earning returns from movements in yield curve slope and curvature and Arbitrage Butterfly trades earning returns from yield curve curvature only. After considering transaction costs, we achieve annualised returns of 120bps from our Normal Butterfly trades and 72 bps from our Arbitrage Butterfly trades. Consistent with the risk-return relationship for financial instruments, we find that the returns and the volatility of returns for Normal Butterfly trades are higher than the returns and volatility of returns for Arbitrage Butterfly trades. Normal Butterfly trades are exposed to yield curve slope changes whereas Arbitrage Butterfly trades are not, resulting in higher risk and higher returns for Normal Butterfly trades. This finding is consistent with the results obtained by Fabozzi, Martellini and Priaulet (2005).

  • (2007) Le, Hanh T.
    Thesis
    This thesis introduces the application of discrete Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to corporate governance research. Given the presence of many discrete variables in typical governance studies, I argue that this method is superior to standard PCA that has been employed by others working in the area. Using a dataset of 244 companies listed on the London Stock Exchange in the year 2002-2003, I find that Pearson's correlations underestimate the strength of association between two variables, when at least one of them is discrete. Accordingly, standard PCA performed on the Pearson correlation matrix results in biased estimates. Applying discrete PCA on the polychoric correlation matrix, I extract from 28 corporate governance variables 10 significant factors. These factors represent 8 main aspects of the governance system, namely auditor reputation, large shareholder influence, size of board committees, social responsibility, risk optimisation, director independence level, female representation and institutional ownership. Finally, I investigate the relationship between corporate governance and a firm's long-run share market performance, with the former being the factors extracted. Consistent with Demsetz' (1983) argument, I document limited explanatory power for these governance factors.

  • (2008) Hotham, John Patrick
    Thesis
    The Basel Committee has released a consultative document (Basel (2003)) on the management and supervision of interest rate risk (IRR). This document outlines a standardised model to calculate a duration-based proxy for IRR in depository institution balance sheets. We utilise this methodology to define an IRR measure which we denote BIRRM (Basel Interest Rate Risk Measure). It is the change in the value of a financial institution produced by a 200 basis-point increase in interest rates at all maturities, relative to Tier I and Tier II capital. This study has three primary objectives. Firstly, we utilise BIRRM to provide an overview of IRR exposure of Australian Credit Unions and Building Societies (CUBS) over the period September 1997 to September 2007. Secondly, we seek an understanding of the relationship between BIRRM and measures of CUBS' interest rate sensitivity over a period of rising interest rates (December 1998 to September 2000) and another period of falling rates (September 2000 to December 2001). Finally, we seek an understanding of the economic factors that influence IRR exposure decisions of CUBS by modelling the determinants of CUBS' IRR exposure. We find that IRR exposure of CUBS is relatively low and, on average, CUBS are exposed to falling interest rates. We also find significant relationships between BIRRM and measures of CUBS' interest rates sensitivity consistent with a priori expectations, supporting the use of the Basel Committee's measure of IRR in identifying CUBS with large IRR exposures. The models examining the determinants of CUBS' IRR have relatively low explanatory power. There are however significant relationships between a number of factors and CUBS' exposure to changing rates.