Search Results
Showing results 1 to 10 of approximately 15.
(refine search)
Working Paper
An experimental examination of the house money effect in a multi-period setting
There is evidence that risk-taking behavior is influenced by prior monetary gains and losses. When endowed with house money, people become more risk taking. This paper is the first to report a house money effect in a dynamic, financial setting. Using an experimental method, the authors compare market outcomes across sessions that differ in the level of cash endowment (low and high). Their experimental results provide strong support for a house money effect. Traders' bids, price predictions, and market prices are influenced by the amount of money that is provided prior to trading. However, ...
Journal Article
Competitiveness and price setting in dealer markets
The behavior of securities dealers has been closely scrutinized in the 1990s. Recent investigations of the National Association of Securities Dealers and the Nasdaq market by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission suggest that market makers colluded to fix prices and widen bid-ask spreads in attempts to increase dealers' profits at investors' expense. At a minimum, market makers appear to have adopted a quoting convention that can be viewed as anticompetitive behavior. ; This article explores the Nasdaq pricing controversy in light of economic theory and ...
Working Paper
Bubbles in experimental asset markets: Irrational exuberance no more
The robustness of bubbles and crashes in markets for finitely lived assets is perplexing. This paper reports the results of experimental asset markets in which participants trade two assets. In some markets, price bubbles form. In these markets, traders will pay even higher prices for the asset with lottery characteristics, i.e., a claim on a large, unlikely payoff. However, institutional design has a significant impact on deviations in prices from fundamental values, particularly for an asset with lottery characteristics. Price run-ups and crashes are moderated when traders finance purchases ...
Working Paper
Immediate disclosure or secrecy? the release of information in experimental asset markets
The Federal Reserve has made significant changes in its predisposition to release information over time. This paper reports the results of experimental asset markets designed to investigate how the public disclosure of uncertain information affects market and individual outcomes. In one set of markets, no information is released at the beginning of each trading year. In two other sets, an imperfect pre-announcement of the state of nature is disclosed. The reliability of the pre-announcement (60 percent and 90 percent) varies across treatments. Halfway through each trading year, the state of ...
Working Paper
When the shoe is on the other foot: experimental evidence on evaluation disparities
Research provides evidence that the method chosen to elicit value has an important effect on a person?s valuation. We hypothesize that role has a crucial effect on decision makers? elicited values: Buyers prefer to pay less and sellers prefer to collect more. We conduct experimental sessions and replicate the disparity between willingness to pay and willingness to accept. We conduct additional sessions in which role is stripped away: Endowed decision makers provide values that are used to determine a price at which anonymous others transact. Importantly, decision makers? earnings in the ...
Journal Article
Emotion and financial markets
Psychologists and economists hold vastly different views about human behavior. Psychologists contend that economists' models bear little relation to actual behavior. This view is supported by a large body of psychological research that shows that emotional state can significantly affect decision making. ; Economists, on the other hand, argue that psychological studies have no theoretical basis and offer little empirical evidence about people's decision-making processes. The reigning financial economics paradigm-the efficient market hypothesis (EMH)-assumes that individuals make rational ...
Working Paper
Circuit breakers with uncertainty about the presence of informed agents: I know what you know . . . I think
This study conducts experimental asset markets to examine the effects of circuit breaker rules on market behavior when agents are uncertain about the presence of private information. Our results unequivocally indicate that circuit breakers fail to temper unwarranted price movements in periods without private information. Agents appear to mistakenly infer that others possess private information, causing price to move away from fundamental value. Allocative efficiencies in our markets are high across all regimes. Circuit breakers perform no useful function in our experimental asset markets.
Working Paper
An experimental study of circuit breakers: the effects of mandated market closures and temporary halts on market behavior
This paper analyzes the effect of circuit breakers on price behavior, trading volume, and profit-making ability in a market setting. We conduct nine experimental asset markets to compare behavior across three regulatory regimes: market closure, temporary halt, and no interruption. The presence of a circuit breaker rule does not affect the magnitude of the absolute deviation in price from fundamental value or trading profit. The primary driver of behavior is information asymmetry in the market. By comparison, trading activity is significantly affected by the presence of a circuit breaker. ...
Working Paper
Voluntary disclosure under imperfect competition: Experimental evidence
This study investigates disclosure behavior when a manager has incentives to influence the actions of a product market competitor in a Cournot duopoly. Theoretical research suggests that under various conditions the manager has incentives to withhold some signals and disclose others. Using an experimental economics method, we find support for partial information disclosure. Our results suggest that when the manager receives private information about industrywide cost, unfavorable (favorable) information is disclosed (withheld) and the competitor adjusts production accordingly. In contrast, ...
Working Paper
Bid-ask spreads in multiple dealer settings: Some experimental evidence
We report the results of an experiment designed to investigate the behavior of quoted spreads in multiple-dealer markets. We manipulate verbal communication (not allowed and allowed) and order preferencing (not allowed, allowed, and allowed with order-flow payment) between eighteen sessions. Without preferencing, spreads are wider when communication is allowed. With preferencing (and no order-flow payments), individuals do not have incentives to narrow the spread and a wide spread may be maintained without a collusive agreement. However, spreads narrow somewhat when individuals are given the ...