Dynamic Count Models of Financial Contagion with Applications to Global Banking and Currency Crises. An international model of contagion and interconnectedness is developed and applied using annual time series on banking and currency crises in developed and emerging countries. The model represents a new class of multivariate dynamic count models that allows for important dynamical interactions to capture the transmission of financial crises across national and international asset markets. The p ....Dynamic Count Models of Financial Contagion with Applications to Global Banking and Currency Crises. An international model of contagion and interconnectedness is developed and applied using annual time series on banking and currency crises in developed and emerging countries. The model represents a new class of multivariate dynamic count models that allows for important dynamical interactions to capture the transmission of financial crises across national and international asset markets. The properties of the models are investigated as well as the development of new estimation methods based on simulation techniques. An important implication of the approach is that it can be used as an early warning signal of future crises, thereby providing an input into the design of future policy on crisis management.Read moreRead less
Detecting financial contagion using high frequency data. Financial crises spread extraordinarily quickly. However, existing tools for measuring this spread use relatively low frequency data. This project develops tools for measuring and detecting periods of stress and the effects of financial contagion in financial markets, using high frequency data based on recorded transaction prices.
Asset Market Interconnectedness and Exotic Options: The Mean Impact Surface. The project intends to develop models to price financial risk more accurately during periods of financial stress and increasing global interconnectedness. Specifically, it plans to develop a new class of latent factor models with time-varying loadings to model the interconnectedness of global financial markets during periods of financial stress. A key feature of the proposed model is the role of second-order conditional ....Asset Market Interconnectedness and Exotic Options: The Mean Impact Surface. The project intends to develop models to price financial risk more accurately during periods of financial stress and increasing global interconnectedness. Specifically, it plans to develop a new class of latent factor models with time-varying loadings to model the interconnectedness of global financial markets during periods of financial stress. A key feature of the proposed model is the role of second-order conditional moments of the underlying innovation processes in modelling asset return dynamics. The proposed model is characterised by higher order nonlinear structures which are captured graphically by the mean impact surface. The project also plans to develop a new class of tests to detect higher order dependencies among asset returns in the presence of time-varying volatility, and to investigate the implications for constructing portfolios with exotic options to hedge risk during financial crises.Read moreRead less
Computational methods for solving modern asset pricing models. This project aims to solve a broad range of asset pricing models. Movements in asset prices affect private investors, public sector finances, wealth distribution and business activity levels. Economists have tried to build better models of asset prices, moving away from hyper-rationality and towards realistic features including heterogeneity, habit persistence and bounded rationality. These models’ additional complexity makes them di ....Computational methods for solving modern asset pricing models. This project aims to solve a broad range of asset pricing models. Movements in asset prices affect private investors, public sector finances, wealth distribution and business activity levels. Economists have tried to build better models of asset prices, moving away from hyper-rationality and towards realistic features including heterogeneity, habit persistence and bounded rationality. These models’ additional complexity makes them difficult to solve or to apply to real world problems. The project will use modern hardware and computational tools, insights from economics literature and numerical analysis to provide a set of solution methods for such asset pricing models. This is expected to improve policy analysis and decision making under uncertainty.Read moreRead less
Commodity cycles. The implications of resource demand by emerging markets are issues policy makers need to understand. This project address these by focusing on currency, equity and commodity linkages, the financial market and macroeconomic effects of currency collapse, and the role of emerging markets in mitigating/amplifying economic shock transmission.
Pooling econometric models for prediction and decision making. The project develops methods for combining econometric models with the goal of improving prediction. It applies these methods to macroeconomic models used to improve monetary policy and to asset return models used to improve financial risk management.
Understanding and Modelling Weather Derivatives in Australia for the Purpose of their Accurate Pricing: a Statistical and Econometric Investigation. Australia suffers some of the most adverse and extreme weather globally. Its government and industries, especially agriculture and electricity, stand to benefit from improved understanding of weather derivatives and capability to price them accurately. Tailored to Australian weather scenarios, weather derivatives will be tools to manage local risk f ....Understanding and Modelling Weather Derivatives in Australia for the Purpose of their Accurate Pricing: a Statistical and Econometric Investigation. Australia suffers some of the most adverse and extreme weather globally. Its government and industries, especially agriculture and electricity, stand to benefit from improved understanding of weather derivatives and capability to price them accurately. Tailored to Australian weather scenarios, weather derivatives will be tools to manage local risk factors, and increase global competitiveness by hedging against competitors' good weather-related advantage. The US weather derivative market, capitalised at over US$7.5b, began just 7 years ago; there is no organised Australian market. This project's smart techniques for improving pricing accuracy will support the development and vigorous growth of a local market.Read moreRead less
Change Detection in Causal Relationships and Measurement of Systemic Risk. Empirical measures of interconnectedness between financial institutions based on tests of Granger causality are currently used in detecting systemic risk. However, researchers need to define periods of calm and stress exogenously in order to implement these tests appropriately. This project aims to develop a new procedure to identify changes in causal relationships and the timing of these changes. The new approach has the ....Change Detection in Causal Relationships and Measurement of Systemic Risk. Empirical measures of interconnectedness between financial institutions based on tests of Granger causality are currently used in detecting systemic risk. However, researchers need to define periods of calm and stress exogenously in order to implement these tests appropriately. This project aims to develop a new procedure to identify changes in causal relationships and the timing of these changes. The new approach has the potential to be a significant improvement in the real-time identification of emerging turmoil in financial markets and provide an improved method for the detection of systemic risk. The new test procedure will be implemented using data for financial and non-financial institutions across Europe, the US and Australia.Read moreRead less
Modelling a portfolio of financial assets: structure, estimation, testing and forecasting. Information regarding financial returns and risk is essential for optimal portfolio selection and asset management. Returns and risk have typically been analysed for individual assets. The project provides a theoretical solution to the important practical problem of modelling a portfolio of financial assets in realistic situations. The significance of the research is the development of a new approach to an ....Modelling a portfolio of financial assets: structure, estimation, testing and forecasting. Information regarding financial returns and risk is essential for optimal portfolio selection and asset management. Returns and risk have typically been analysed for individual assets. The project provides a theoretical solution to the important practical problem of modelling a portfolio of financial assets in realistic situations. The significance of the research is the development of a new approach to analyse a portfolio of returns and risk, and the determination of its applicability using numerical simulation techniques. The expected outcomes are an optimal practical method for analysing a portfolio of assets, a scientific monograph, and publications in leading international journals.Read moreRead less
Modelling multivariate financial time series using copulas. What are the chances that the losses in the market value of investments exceed the anticipated levels? Given that one country's financial market collapsed, what are the chances that it would lead to financial crises in other countries? These questions often arise in risk management and international finance. This project takes a significant step forward from the existing literature to develop new flexible and innovative methods to an ....Modelling multivariate financial time series using copulas. What are the chances that the losses in the market value of investments exceed the anticipated levels? Given that one country's financial market collapsed, what are the chances that it would lead to financial crises in other countries? These questions often arise in risk management and international finance. This project takes a significant step forward from the existing literature to develop new flexible and innovative methods to answer the foregoing type of questions. Further, this project proposes new measures of market risks that are suitable for communicating to the broader public as well as the experts.Read moreRead less