International Journal of Financial Engineering

Correlation graphs are introduced to delineate the levels observed in data and models for return and squared return correlations. A sample of 2048 representative pairs of equity assets is selected from a possible collection of $381,501$ pairs by quantization. Five copulas are estimated and simulated on these pairs of returns, the Gaussian, t-copula, Clayton, Gumbel and Frank. Additionally, the multivariate bilateral gamma (MBG) model that introduces dependence via common time changes is also fit and simulated. Results of fit statistics on returns, CoSkew and CoKurtosis pairs are reported. The general ordering of the models is MBG, t-copula, followed by the Gaussian, Frank, Gumbel and Clayton copulas.

In this paper, we propose an operator splitting method to valuate options on the inhomogeneous geometric Brownian motion. By exploiting the approximate dynamical symmetry of the pricing equation, we derive a simple closed-form approximate price formula for a European call option which resembles closely the Black–Scholes price formula for a European vanilla call option. Numerical tests show that the proposed method is able to provide very accurate estimates and tight bounds of the exact option prices. The method is very efficient and robust as well.

Margrabe formula is an extension of the famous Black–Scholes model extended to two correlated stocks. In the stochastic financial mathematics approach, the difficulty of addressing this valuation lies in the fact that the difference between two log-normal distributions is not log-normal. We avoided this approach in this work and valued the European type exchange option using the Liu process, a Brownian motion’s fuzzy counterpart. The work compares the proposed model values with the simulated values obtained by the Margrabe formula.

Fast Moving Consumers Goods (FMCG) sector is the fastest and the fourth largest sector of the Indian economy. This study attempts to identify the critical factors affecting the financing decisions of 15 FMCG companies using panel framework and tries to investigate whether the factors considered provide convincing explanation as per the capital structure models like peking order theory, trade-off theory and Agency theory developed over a period of time. The data are collected from CMIE Prowess database for the period 2008 to 2019. The variables considered are profitability, size, non-debt tax shield, tangibility, uniqueness, liquidity and origin. It is found that Pooled OLS is the appropriate model for explaining the factors influencing the short-term debt, long-term debt and total debt as the dependent variables. It is evident that the short-term debt of the company is influenced by profitability, non-debt tax shield and liquidity of the company; the long-term debt is influenced by profitability, tangibility and origin of the company; and the total debt is affected by profitability, size and liquidity of the company. The factors which are significant confirm to the expected behavior with respect to pecking order theory of capital structure.

This study examined that if efficient firms at their mature stage of life cycle may skip dividends. For doing so, this study investigated the direct and indirect impacts of firm efficiency on the dividends. To calculate the firm efficiency, data envelopment analysis (DEA) was used and for analyzing the data, logistic regression models were used. This study uses data of 1010 firm year observations of the firm’s listed Pakistani non-financial firms over the period 2011–2015. Findings of this study indicated that the probability to pay dividends is high in the firms having high level of efficiency. Likewise, probability to pay dividend is high in the mature firms as compared to the growth firms. However, efficient and mature firms may skip the dividends. These findings present an alternative view on the signaling and life cycle theories of dividends in that the mature firms having high efficiency which may not necessarily pay dividends in contradiction to the life cycle theory. Likewise, efficient firms may not necessarily pay dividends to signal their future growth prospects. Therefore, the future research may focus more on the role of firm efficiency while examining the dividend pay-out under the life cycle and signaling theories of dividends. This study is among the first studies to examine the direct impact of firm efficiency on probability to pay dividends by examining the interaction effect of firm efficiency and firm maturity on probability to pay dividends.

Complex insurance policies are valued by Economic Scenario Generators (ESG), stochastic simulations developed via Monte Carlo techniques that span the evolution of risk factors important for insurers (financial and technical) consistent with market data. The either pseudo or quasi-random number generators used in the model turn out to be important for the precision of the valuation of Asset/Liability models. I shall compare five different random number generators in a G$2++$ model in terms of market efficiency, by testing for the fulfilment of the martingale condition. The enhancement of existing methods is crucial in the field of computational insurance based on Monte Carlo techniques given that the number of simulations is perilously limited.

In this paper, we propose two financial-longevity risk-sharing methods based on an existing risk-linked annuity. Within a specific framework, we first propose the risk-sharing group self-annuitization (GSA), where different proportions of financial and longevity risks are shared between a group of annuitants and the insurer. Secondly, we propose the complete risk-sharing GSA. We implicitly define a set of annuity products which depend on the risk proportion borne by a group of annuitants. The defined set of annuities goes from the classical annuity to the GSA.

This study focuses on the relationship between board vigilance and financial distress in non-financial firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX). The mediating role of leverage structure and moderating role of asset tangibility is also studied following Baron and Kenney’s approach. The study analyzed the data of 284 firms ranging from 2013 to 2017 by using ordinary least squares (OLS) and panel corrected standard errors (PCSE) regressions. The study revealed that the debt maturity structure mediates the relationship between board independence and financial distress and between CEO non-duality and financial distress but the capital structure did not mediate any of the stated relationships. Similarly, asset tangibility negatively moderated the relationship between debt maturity and financial distress. However, there was no such moderation detected between the relationship of capital structure and financial distress. The results remained consistent throughout the analysis with both regression techniques. These results suggest using more long-term debt in debt maturity structure to have control over financial distress and also to reduce the reliance on non-productive tangible assets in the asset structure of non-financial firms of Pakistan.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the bank specific determinants related to the performance of public and private sector banks in Pakistan. Using strongly balanced panel yearly data from 2010 to 2017, Pooled OLS, fixed effect, Random effect and Random Effect Mundlak Transformation (REMT) have been utilized to provide the empirical evidences in credit risk management in Pakistan. The identification of suitable explanatory variable that explains the banking profitability wisely is made possible by using the panel data techniques. In this study, impact of bank specific variables are: Return On Assets, Capital Ratio, Credit Risk, Credit deposit ratio, Liquidity Ratio, Interest expended to interest earned, bank size and ownership on the profitability of banks in Pakistan has been assessed using four different panel data techniques. Out of the four estimation strategies Random Effect with Mundlak (1978) transformation raises the overall variation of the baseline model to 63% that is explained by banking profitability. Ignoring the time-invariant characteristics in the model, credit deposit ratio and interest expanded to interest earned possess negative relationship with return on assets of banks. Size of the bank is positive and significant when with-in and between banks information is augmented in Radom effect method of estimation. However the size of banks may not affect the banking profitability by allowing correlation between unobservable heterogeneity using Random Effect with Mundlak (1978) transformation.

The aim of this paper is not only to determine and compare the nature of capital structure but also its effect on company performance of engineering industry of USA and Bangladesh. We utilize a panel data methodology based on a sample of 34 listed engineering companies of Bangladesh on Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) and a mixture of 34 (small, medium and large) engineering companies listed in NASDAQ in USA during the period of study from 2012 to 2019. Our empirical results indicate that the capital structure of engineering industry of USA and that of Bangladesh is different. Also, we demonstrate that capital structure has negative effect on company profitability of engineering industry of USA. Capital structure presents a negative effect on Earning per Share and Return on Assets (ROA) and positive influence on Return on Equity (ROE) and Tobin’s Q of engineering industry of Bangladesh. We conclude that the impact of capital structure on company’s profitability by only one sector and then compare the findings to know the real picture of the link. Investors, auditors, analysts and practitioners should consider many factors to examine the banking performance. Our results from this study may relate to Asian countries with similarities in engineering industry to that in Bangladesh.

What drives rural people to use financial services and products is a critical step in the journey towards financial inclusions. The financial service providers and policymakers have engaged with this challenge by seeking insights into the socio, economic, demographic and cultural factors that prompt people to be aware and learn about financial services and products, try them out, and use them over time. The determinants of financial literacy focus more sharply on the socio-economic demographic factors, and have used ordinary least square, multiple regression model. This model determines how various independent variables namely age, gender, income, religion, social groups, family size, marital status, educational level, occupation, etc. significantly influence financial literacy of the respondents.

The consequences of the Subprime Crisis have shown a serious deficiency in the financing structures of conventional and Islamic banks resulting from frequent resilience. Specifically, the paper argues that large banks that relied primarily on wholesale external funding, such as resources from other banks, money market funds and treasuries of multi-national companies, have been hit hard by the effects of the Crisis. Conversely, banks that relied mainly on deposits from companies or individuals have weathered the Crisis very well because of the interdependent relationships in the banking and foreign exchange markets. Although the two types have suffered the effects of the Crisis, previous comparative studies between the liquidities of conventional and Islamic banks have produced inconclusive results. This brings us to compare their liquidities during a financial stable period (2010–2018) and to provide a more accurate answer using a new original methodology. Based on two populations encompassing all the classical and Islamic banks in the concerned countries, we chose two samples. After a conditional selection of the observations and a filtering process, the sizes were reduced to the value of 63 banks in each sample. Therefore, we have found that Islamic banks are more liquid than their conventional counterparts.

This paper examines the impact of the ECB’s monetary policy on corporate borrowing costs. We use an event study method to assess and compare the effects of both conventional and unconventional monetary policy on Germany and French corporate bond market (credit spreads). The sample of our research consists of daily data collected during the period from 04 January 1999 to 27 February 2015. This period spans the pre-crisis which begins when the ECB has launched the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and became responsible for the monetary policy in the euro area. We find significantly negative relation between conventional surprise and corporate credit spreads. Moreover, we find that a raise in German non-financial credit spreads and French credit spreads domestic in response to the SMP announcement. The OMT lowers the German non-financial credit spreads, while it raises German bank credit spreads and French corporate credit spreads both domestic and bund for two sectors. Finally, the LTROs are associated with a raise in corporate credit spreads. Our findings are confirmed in robustness checks by changing the non-standard monetary policy announcements with monetary policy event dummies used as one variable.