29 September 2010 - 9,30 am
Università Bocconi
Keynote speech: Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, ECB

Life annuities and pension products usually involve a number of ‘guarantees’, such as, e.g., minimum accumulation rates, minimum annual payments and minimum total payout. Packaging different types of guarantees is the feature of the so-called Variable Annuities. Basically, these products are unit-linked investment policies providing deferred annuity benefits. The guarantees, commonly referred to as GMxBs (namely, Guaranteed Minimum Benefits of type ‘x’), include minimum benefits both in case of death and survival.

This paper examines international differences in banks’ capital structure adjustments across a large panel of 94 countries over the period 1993 to 2007.

A significant contributing factor to the Financial Crisis of 2007 - 2009 was the apparent interconnectedness among hedge funds, banks, brokers, and insurance companies, which amplified shocks into systemic events

Before the 2007-2008 crisis, sophisticated investors massively originated and purchased default-prone assets. Their bet was hugely geared. We show that rational aggressive investors can take vast long levered positions in a defaultable asset via an investment-horizon effect in their optimal non-myopic portfolios.

In this paper, we investigate whether banks exploit safety net subsidies by engaging in merger and acquisition activities (M&As) and rationally increase their risk taking behaviour to the detriment of the soundness of the banking sector.

In this article, we investigate if ownership structure and board composition may have an impact on investors’ protection at firm level. In particular, we address the following research question: do ownership structure and board characteristics affect the level of investors’ protection (as measured by the amount of firm-specific information impounded in stock prices)?