Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Systemic Risk Analysis and SIFIs Detection: A Proposal for a Complete Methodology

The paper starts reviewing the financial systemic risk mechanisms and how to measure this risk. Then, it proposes to develop an agent-based multi-layer network simulation suited to measure the systemic risk, in order to identify Systemically Important Financial Institutions (SIFIs), and to understand the best policies both to prevent the distress and to mitigate the contagion. The methodology will correctly model the direct network contagion channel (interconnectedness of balance sheet of financial institutions, including direct losses and liquidity hoarding), also integrating the indirect contagion channel (fire sales and bank runs), in order to reach the ground-breaking target of a full representation of the financial systemic risk.
The 1974 Budget Act's Impact on U.S. Spending and Debt: A Synthetic Control Study

The 1974 Budget Act marked a turning point in U.S. budgeting history. With the Act, Congress decisively asserted its fiscal power, becoming more independent from the President in developing the budget and appropriating funds. Lawmakers at the time believed that the status quo, wherein Congress approved the budget in a piecemeal fashion, improperly limited their authority. While rising deficits and debts put pressure on Washington to restrain them, the President’s most direct method for cutting spending – impoundment – caused the conflict between Congress and the President that boiled over and led to the Budget Act. In this paper, we set out to discover how this compromise, the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act (or 1974 Budget Act), ultimately impacted spending and debt. More specifically we use a synthetic control model to test the alternative – what would have happened without the Act? In short, we find that after 1974, public debt-to-GDP and public expenditures-to-GDP both increased, but less than what they would have without it. Section 2 outlines the Institutional framework, Section 3 describes the empirical methodology, Section 4 discusses the data sample and the empirical strategy Section 5 describes the results, Section 6 discusses broad implications for modern reformers, and the Appendix shows the placebo tests which give robustness to synthetic control analysis.
Gender, Control, and Crop Choice in Northern Mozambique

Women play an important role in the agricultural production process in developing countries, yet their role in making decisions about what to grow and the resulting implications for household welfare remain poorly understood. This paper studies women’s empowerment in northern Mozambique as it relates to agriculture, considering in particular the factors that lead to women’s managing the plots that they nominally control. Women control about 30 percent of the plots in the data but manage only about 70 percent of those plots. Using a unique panel dataset, the study finds that women are more likely to manage plots when households have historically had access to off-farm labor, typically completed by men. When women manage plots, they tend to grow crops with less complicated production techniques and are less likely to grow the area’s main cash crop. However, conditional on historical access to off farm labor, their farm incomes are the same as those among men.
A Note on Adaptive Group Lasso for Structural Break Time Series

Abstract Considering structural break autoregressive (SBAR) processes and following recent literature, the problem of estimating the unknown number of change-points is cast as a model selection problem. The adaptive group Lasso is used to select the number of change-points for which parameter estimation consistency, model selection consistency, and asymptotic normality are proven. It is shown in simulation experiments that adaptive group Lasso performs comparably to a state-of-the-art two-step group Lasso procedure with backward elimination and other leading-edge approaches. Moreover, comparing the forecasting performance of both group Lasso procedures in an empirical application to realized variance dynamics, adaptive group Lasso is found to date change-points with equal accuracy. Thus, in practice, adaptive group Lasso can provide an alternative way to consistently select change-points in related applications.
Rice carbon balance under elevated CO2

Summary • Season-long effects of elevated CO2 concentration ([CO2]) on the carbon balance of the rice (Oryza sativa) canopy are reported here. • The experiment was conducted in six sunlit, semiclosed growth chambers for an entire growing season. Rice plants (cv. Nipponbare) were grown at 350 µmol mol−1[CO2] (ambient) in three chambers, or at 650 µmol mol−1 (elevated) in the other three chambers. Canopy net photosynthesis and night-time respiration were determined in the chambers by mass balance. • Both canopy gross photosynthesis and total respiration, through the entire growing season, were increased by the CO2 enrichment. But CO2-induced variations in canopy carbon gain were mainly caused by changes in canopy photosynthesis. The enhancement of daily canopy gross photosynthesis by elevated [CO2] was 33.4% for the first 3 week, but it declined gradually and disappeared by heading. Enhancement of daily net carbon gain also decreased as rice plants grew. • These results show that the increase in rice biomass by elevated [CO2] results more from the increase in carbon gain at early rather than later stages of growth.
Mind the Conversion Risk: A Theoretical Assessment of Contingent Convertible Bonds

We develop a theoretical model to assess the merits of principal-write down contingent convertible (CoCo) bonds. The conversion risk is the key feature of CoCo bonds. Because of this conversion risk, CoCo bonds are hard to price and an equilibrium price does not necessarily exist. In our model, for such a price to exist, the bank needs to hold a minimum amount of equity and/or the expected return associated with its asset portfolio needs to be large enough. When an equilibrium price exists, it is a decreasing function in the amount of equity held by the bank. Well-capitalized banks can thus issue CoCo bonds at a lower price than least-capitalized banks. This is the reason why CoCo bonds are to be thought of more as a complement to equity than as a substitute. In addition, because of the conversion risk, self-fulfilling panics may occur in the CoCo bonds' market. We indeed define a game between CoCo bonds' holders and the Central Bank that allows us to exhibit situations where a panic occurs in the CoCo bonds' market. Using the global game technique, we show that the probability of crisis can be expressed as a function of the return associated with the asset portfolio of the bank. The probability of crisis is shown to be sensitive to the precision of the information available to CoCo bonds' holders. Taken together, our results call for cautiousness when assessing the relevance of regulatory requirements in CoCo bonds, especially concerning their systemic impact.
Digestion in vitro of Italian and perennial ryegrasses, red clover, white clover and lucerne

Herbage at various stages of growth from three field experiments, one with Italian ryegrass, one with perennial ryegrass and one with white clover, red clover and lucerne, was incubated for 0, 24 or 48 h in rumen liquor followed by 48 h in acid-pepsin. The proportion of cell content OM in herbage (measured by pepsin) declined with advancing stage of growth more quickly in the legumes than in Italian ryegrass. At a high level of digestibility the legumes had a higher proportion of cell content OM than Italian ryegrass, but the position tended to be reversed at a low level of digestibility. Decline in proportion of cell content and decline in digestibility of cell wall were both major contributors to the decline in digestibility of Italian ryegrass with advancing maturity, whereas in white clover the decline in proportion of cell content was entirely responsible for the decline in digestibility. Lucerne and red clover occupied intermediate positions. At an early vegetative stage rate of digestion appeared to be higher in Italian than in perennial ryegrass. Rate of digestion was higher in the legumes than in the ryegrasses, the difference being largest at an advanced stage of growth.
Abundance and primary production of filamentous green algae Zygogonium ericetorum in an extremely acid (pH 2.9) mining lake and its impact on alkalinity generation

SUMMARY 1. In extremely acid mining lakes, benthic filamentous green algae (Zygnemataceae, Chlorophyta) thrive as effective competitors for limited carbon (C). These algae could supply C for microbial-mediated benthic alkalinity generation. However, biomass, productivity and impact of the acidobiontic filamentous green algae at pH £3 have not previously been determined. 2. Periphytic filamentous green algae was mapped by harvesting their biomass from 85 1 · 1 m quadrats in mining lake Grunewalder Lauch. Zygogonium ericetorum colonised water depths between 1.6 and 10.5 m covering 88% of total area. Biomass peaked at 5-6 m depth. Total Zygogonium biomass amounted to 72.2 t dry weight for the whole lake (0.94 km 2 ), which corresponds to 16.1 t C and the accumulation of primary production from 2.2 years. 3. Growth of Zygogonium is moderately N, C and extremely P deficient, and seriously stressed by high rates of Fe deposition during summer. Consequently, net primary production (NPP) of Zygogonium, calculated from measured photosynthesis versus irradiance characteristics and calculated underwater irradiance (0.13 g C m )2 year )1 ) and in situ oxygen measurements (7.8 g C m )2 year )1 ), corresponds to only 0.3% and 18.1% of pelagic NPP. 4. Neither pelagic nor benthic Zygogonium primary production can supply enough C for efficient acidity removal. However, at rates of benthic NPP in summer of 21.4 mg C m )2 day )1 , Zygogonium contributed 26% of the C equivalents to remove acidity associated with ferric iron, contributing at least seasonally to efficient alkalinity generation.
Spillovers of US Unconventional Monetary Policy to Emerging and Advanced Countries

This study investigates the international spillover effects of US unconventional monetary policy — frequently called large-scale asset purchases or quantitative easing (QE) — on advanced and emerging market economies, using VAR models with high-frequency daily data. Blinder (2010) argues that the QE measures primarily aim to reduce US interest rate spreads such as term premiums and risk premiums. Considering this argument, we use two interest rate spreads as indicators of the QE policy: the mortgage spread and term spread. Empirical findings, based on data from 20 emerging and 20 advanced countries, reveal that US unconventional monetary policies significantly affect financial conditions in both emerging and advanced countries by altering the risk-taking behavior of investors, which suggests that the risk-taking channel plays an important role in transmitting the effects of these policies to the rest of the world. The extent of these effects depends on the type of QE measures. QE measures such as purchases of private-sector securities that lower the US mortgage spread exert stronger and more significant spillover effects on international financial markets than do measures that reduce the US term spread. Furthermore, the estimated financial spillovers vary substantially across countries, as well as between and within the two country groups, emerging markets and advanced countries.
Multitask Agents and Incentives: The Case of Teaching and Research for University Professors

This paper evaluates the behavioural responses of multitask agents to the provision of incentives skewed towards one task only. It studies the effects of significant research incentives for university professors on the way university faculty members allocate their efforts between teaching and research and on the way they select different types of universities. I first obtain different individual-level measures of teaching and research performance. Then, I estimate a difference in differences model, exploiting a natural experiment that took place at Bocconi University, which significantly strengthened incentives towards research. I find evidence that teaching and research efforts are substitute inputs in the professors' cost function: the impact of research incentives is positive on research activity and negative on teaching performance. The effects are driven by career concerns rather than by monetary incentives. Moreover, under the new incentive regime, lower ability researchers tend to leave universities and since teaching and research ability are positively correlated, this implies that bad teachers also tend to leave universities.
Political Corruption, Dodd-Frank Whistleblowing, and Corporate Investment

We examine how local political corruption affects corporate investment. We find firms in corrupted states produce significantly less investment. The effect of political corruption on investment is more pronounced in firms with higher investment friction, higher political visibility, and poor governance. The results are robust to using alternative investment measures, alternative corruption measures, and different regression specifications. More importantly, we find that the deterrent effect of corruption on investment lessens after the Dodd-Frank Whistleblower Provision. These findings indicate corruption impedes corporate investment, but the better policy can help firms reduce the decline in firms’ investment located in corrupted states.
Robustness of Productivity Estimates

Researchers interested in estimating productivity can choose from an array of methodologies, each with its strengths and weaknesses. We compare the robustness of five widely used techniques, two non-parametric and three parametric: in order, (a) index numbers, (b) data envelopment analysis (DEA), (c) stochastic frontiers, (d) instrumental variables (GMM) and (e) semi-parametric estimation. Using simulated samples of firms, we analyze the sensitivity of alternative methods to the way randomness is introduced in the data generating process. Three experiments are considered, introducing randomness via factor price heterogeneity, measurement error and differences in production technology respectively. When measurement error is small, index numbers are excellent for estimating productivity growth and are among the best for estimating productivity levels. DEA excels when technology is heterogeneous and returns to scale are not constant. When measurement or optimization errors are non-negligible, parametric approaches are preferred. Ranked by the persistence of the productivity differentials between firms (in decreasing order), one should prefer the stochastic frontiers, GMM, or semi-parametric estimation methods. The practical relevance of each experiment for applied researchers is discussed explicitly.
The Interbank Market after the Financial Turmoil: Squeezing Liquidity in a 'Lemons Market' or Asking Liquidity 'on Tap'

After August 2007 the plumbing system that supplied banks with wholesale funding, the interbank market, failed because toxic assets obstructed the pipes. Banks were forced to squeeze liquidity in a 'lemons market' or to ask for liquidity 'on tap' from central banks. This paper disentangles the two components of the three-month Euribor-Eonia swap spread, credit and liquidity risk and then evaluates the decomposition. The main finding is that credit risk increased before the key events of the crisis, while liquidity risk was mainly responsible for the subsequent increases in the Euribor spread and then reacted to the systemic responses of the central banks, especially in October 2008. Moreover, the level of the spread between May 2009 and February 2010 was influenced mainly by credit risk, suggesting that European banks were still in a 'lemons market' and relied on liquidity 'on tap'.
Escala diagramática para a quantificação do complexo de doenças foliares de final de ciclo em soja

The occurrence of late season leaf diseases in soybean (Glycine max) caused by the fungi Septoria glycines and Cercospora kikuchii are easily identified in field. However, there is a need for more precise information to quantify damage and yield losses. The lack of a standardized visual method may lead to inaccurate estimates of severity and innaccurate conclusions. With the purpose of elaborating a diagrammatic scale to assess these diseases, leaves with different levels of severity were collected in the field. The area of each leaf and its correspondent severity were determined, and following the "Stimulus Law by Weber-Fechner", a scale was elaborated with severity levels: 2.4, 15.2, 25.9, 40.5 and 66.6%. Validation was carried out by nine appraisers, without previous practice in assessing late season leaf diseases, who estimated the severity on 30 leaflets of soybean (Glycine max) with disease symptoms. The variance found among appraisers (0.84<R2<0.65), and accuracy (0.00<a<3.40; 0.90<b<1.29), did not constitute systematic mistakes in over or underestimating the severity of disease. The developed diagrammatic scale is, therefore, appropriate to quantify late soybean season disease severity
Stable Research Networks with Bargaining and Heterogeneous Costs

The association between individuals with the same background is usually easier, but this may switch if complementary skills are necessary to complete a collaboration. Considering a world where agents are of one of the two possible types, we study the pairwise stability of stationary networks in which agents bargain in an infinite-horizon game à la Manea. Heterogeneity of agents leads to heterogeneous costs of linking and developing collaborations. Our key results include that, when complementarities between types are strong enough, bipartite components like odd lines, stars and star-like trees can become stable if no link connects two players of the same type.
Crowdfunding Platforms as Super-Catalysts in an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

Research into Crowdfunding (CF) rarely uses a holistic view on the positioning of relevant actors and their activities. We are looking at how crowdfunding platforms (CFP) as focal actors exert influence to create and delineate the field and apply an ecosystem perspective by studying structure (focus on activities) as well as affiliation (focus on actors) in multiple case-studies of platforms and ventures. The following major themes have been extracted from the data: Signalling, Isomorphism, Tools and Instruments, Investor Relations in Cascaded Funding Strategies and Agenda Setting. It is demonstrated how obstructive hurdles and service-gaps are targeted by CFPs to realize the implied value proposition of crowdfunding. As an outcome, we conceptualize and label a finegrained set of value propositions for CFPs and discuss the broader role of financial intermediaries. With this we provide value for policy makers, platforms and entrepreneurs and contribute to the literature on entrepreneurial ecosystems and tech-innovations.
Cattle Cycles

U.S. beef cattle stocks are among the most periodic economic time series. A theory of cattle cycles is constructed on the basis of breeding stock inventory decisions. The low fertility rate of cows and substantial lags and future feedback between fertility and consumption decisions cause the demographic structure of the herd to respond cyclically to exogenous shocks in demand and production costs. Known demographic parameters of cattle imply sharp numerical benchmarks for the resulting dynamic system and closely compare with independent econometric time-series estimates over the 1875-1990 period. The model fits extremely well.
Effects of barley grain processing method (steam-processed vs. dry-rolled) on intake and growth performance of dairy calves

Abstract This study was conducted to determine the effects of barley processing method on the performance of pre-weaned dairy calves. The experiment comprised 12 bull calves which were offered either dry-rolled (DR) or dry-rolled plus steam-processed (DRSP) barley. During the pre-weaning period (from 14 to 56 days of age) the dry matter and energy intakes of the DRSP calves were higher than those of the DR calves (p<0.1). During weaning (56–70 days) and on average over the whole experiment (14–70 days) there were no differences in intake. The weight gain of the DRSP calves was 32% higher than that of the DR calves during the pre-weaning period (p<0.05). During weaning the DR calves grew 33% faster than the DRSP calves (p<0.1). There was no difference in gain on average over the whole experiment. This study indicates no need for steam-processing of barley offered to dairy calves.
The Impact of Public Debt on Investment: Evidence from Nigeria

In view of the upward trend in the debt profile of Nigeria and the corresponding increase in the volume of investment as well as the recent decline in foreign direct investment inflow in Nigeria, this study investigated the impact of the components of public debts on the various forms of investment in Nigeria both in the short-run and the long-run using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) framework over the period, 1981-2016. The empirical results showed that domestic debt improves both private and public investment in the short-run and long-run that is, domestic debt crowds-in both private and public investment but it does not attract FDI. The results also showed that external debt crowds-in private investment both in the short-run and the long-run; crowds-out public investment; and does not influence FDI. Moreover, the impact of external debts on all forms of investment in Nigeria is greater than domestic debts. In addition, the results revealed that real GDP is a determinant of private investment while interest rate is a driver of all forms of investment in Nigeria. The study, therefore, recommended that policy makers formulate and implement appropriate policies that will ensure that public debts are put to optimal use to further stimulate investment and that embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds be adequately checked to ensure that public debt are not diverted for personal gain. Finally, interest rate should be appropriately adjusted to serve as incentives for current and prospective investors.
Subsidized Domestic Fuel Prices and Global Oil Price Shocks: Evidence From Sri Lanka

This paper analyses the impact of the three oil price shocks, oil supply shocks, aggregate demand shocks, oil-specific demand shock Kilian (2009) and the residual shocks on the fuel prices of the small, oil importing economy of Sri Lanka. Findings suggest that, domestic Petrol prices are more responsive to global oil price shocks and residual shocks compared to domestic Diesel prices. Moreover, the price of Diesel in Sri Lanka is less responsive compared to the global average Diesel price following oil price shocks and residual shocks. We also analyze the impact of oil price shocks on the cost to the government of defending the price of Petrol/Diesel domestically amid fluctuations in the price of crude oil. Findings suggest that the cost of fuel increases following shocks to global oil prices. However, residual shocks reduces the cost to the government.