Red Cross Red Crescent - Make a donation-(updated)

Red Cross Red Crescent - Make a donation

At some level this is not the correct use of this blog, but on another level if it helps, I am willing to break the rules. So this is getting posted on all of my blogs and on the Website itself (later tonight).

After seeing the total destruction caused by the tsunami, I decided to end my week "vacation" and post a link for people to donate.

To say the

It's a Wonderful Life

Review: It's a Wonderful Life

I almost forgot, since it is Christmas time many of you will be watching one of my favorite movies of all time: It's a Wonderful Life.

As a teaching tip: the run on Savings and Loan in the movie makes an excellent point of discussion in Money and Banking classes and/or Financial Institutions classes.

If you have not seen the movie, look for it on Christams Eve and

Happy Holidays!!!!

Hi everyone.

I just wanted to wish you all a very very Merry Christmas and a Super happy and healthy New Year.

Thanks for all of the kind comments this past year and I look forward to seeing the site and the Blog grow even more in the coming year!

Again Happy Holidays!!

Jim

who will probably be posting more before Christmas, but no guarantees.

Updated IPO numbers from Jay Ritter--his so-called "Factoids"

In my book Jay Ritter is known as Mr. IPO. So when I saw that he updated his famous IPO database yesterday, I knew it would be the first entry today! So here you go:

Jay Ritter's updated 2004 IPO file
Among the many highlights:
188 firms went public in the US in 2004. The firms raised nearly $33 BillionThe firms left about $3.9 Billion (about 11.7%) "on the table"For the first time since 2000 a

Real Estate Derivatives

Real Estate Derivatives

I am excited about this one!!! The only thing I can say is what took so long?

A simple explanation of why derivatives exist is that they allow people (or firms) to transfer risk. That is, derivatives allow those who want to to assume more risk to speculate and those who want to reduce their risk to hedge.

Given that for most people the most valuable single asset that

Bad economics = bad tomatoes

I am somewhat hesitant to cross-post this, but it is such a great example of why I do not like government intervention that I think I will post it here as well.

A bit of background is necessary. My family owns 4 small grocery stores in Western New York State. As a means of helping out, I also publish a blog for the stores. This is a story from there:
I saw this on ABC News yesterday. What an

Congratulations to SSRN

From the desk of Michael C. Jensen: "SSRN is a collaborative of over 800 scholars worldwide who contribute their services"

I am sure many of you saw this already, but if not, I would like to add my congratulations and thanks to all who work on and help SSRN. But of course I would like to add special thanks to Michael Jensen and Wayne Marr. Their idea has really revolutionized the way research is

Islamic Investing

Consistently one of the most popular pages on FinanceProfessor.com is the Islamic Finance page. One reason I beleive is that so few people understand what Islamic Finance is.

From the executive summary on FinanceProfessor Islamic Finance page:
"Islamic Finance is based on interpretations from the Qua ran. Its two central tenants are no interest can be earned on loans and socially responsible

Tax year trading and wash sales--Grinblatt and Keloharju

With the end of the year rapidly approaching it is a good time to consider taking any tax losses that you can to lower this year's tax bite. And guess what? You will not be the only one doing this!

Grinblatt and Keloharju provide us an interesting look at tax year trading in the Finish Stock Market in their upcoming JFE article.

After showing that many researchers have hypothesized the

Cool site alert!!! Moneyscience.org

MoneyScience.org--What an absolutely cool site. I love it and so will you!
I found this site a few weeks ago when the founder Jacob Bettany emailed me. Wow. It is just a wealth of information! While it is advertised as a Quantitative Finance site, it has sections on everything from behavioral finance, to game theory, to jobs in Q-Fin, to a list of blogs, an interview with Joel Hasbrouck,to

Where do inefficiencies exist? Where imperfections exist!

Efficiency does not mean perfection!

This came up in class the other day, so I figured even though the Ofek, Richardson, and Whitelaw paper itself has been around for a while (it has been accepted but has yet to be published at the JFE), I would do a quick recap of the discussion and add the links to the actual paper in question.

We were speaking about market efficiency, and suggesting that if

Finally, finals are finished

Sorry for the absence of late. I got behind on about every front I can imagine. I was behind in correcting, in research, on sleep, on laundry, at the store, on you just about anything you name. So I took about a week off from the blog.

But yesterday was our December graduation ceremony and all grades have been submitted. In the research front, I THINK we (me and various co-authors) should

McKinsey Quarterly Interview on Corporate Governance

What a GREAT article! It is a McKinsey Quarterly Interview with Jack Creighton.

Yes, it is an interview and not based on a large database of firms, but that said, it is still EXCELLENT!

Some of the highlights:

"I'd require companies to have two different individuals playing the CEO and board chair roles. To put it simply, this is a question of internal control. You don't have the same person

The high price of subsidies--From the Buffalo News

What is wrong with government subsidies? A great deal!

Deciding what projects to invest in is hard work. And often times we do make mistakes, but time and time again the evidence shows that free markets make the best decisions. (In class terminology, markets make the best allocation decisions and funnel the money to its highest valued use.)

However, all too often politicians can not help but

Was it a Bubble?

A two-for-one deal! Send your paper to a conference and it is automatically considered for publication in the RFS!

Call For Papers: THE CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES OF RECENT FINANCIAL MARKET BUBBLES
August 12-13, 2005

ISDEX, an authoritative and widely cited internet stock index, rose from 100 in January 1996 to 1100 in February 2000 – an incredible increase of about 1000% in four years – only to

Cash is up, but so too are Buybacks and Dividends--CFO.com

CFO.com reports that cash holdings are up.
In a survey of more than 360 midsize and large nonfinancial companies, Treasury Strategies also found that more than half consider themselves net investors rather than net borrowers....In other words, they have more short-term investments than short-term debt outstanding.
On the plus side, it appears that managers are giving more of this cash back to

Covered shorts: the long and short of it

The New York Times has an interesting article on covered shorts. That is the tactic where you are both long and short the same stock.

This is what The Perry Corporation, a New York-based hedge fund seems to have done by buying shares in Mylan Pharaceuticls while simultaneously shorting shares (or more technically having Bear Stearns and Goldman Sachs short the shares).

So if the shares go up,

Personal Finance and variable annuities

One thing I wish we had at St. Bonaventure was a personal finance class. Maybe even not for credit, but I do think it would help many people after graduation. However, often there seems to be little demand for such a class and to offer it for credit is almost too much like training and not enough like "education".
My biggest advice with respect to personal can be summarized into a series of rules