Is intrinsic energy efficiency reflected in the pricing of office leases?

This paper investigates whether the intrinsic energy efficiency rating of an office building has a significant impact on its rental value. A sample of 817 transactions for offices with Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) in the UK is used to assess whether a pricing differential can be identified, depending on the energy rating. While previous analyses of this topic have typically relied on appraisal-based and/or asking rent data, the dataset used in this research contains actual contract rents as well as information on lease terms. The results indicate a significant rental premium for energy-efficient buildings. However, it is found that this premium appears to be mainly driven by the youngest cohort of state-of-the-art energy-efficient buildings. The results also show that tenants of more energy-efficient buildings tend to pay a lower service charge, but this link appears to be rather weak and limited to newer buildings. Hence, it is argued that the information contained in the EPC is still not fully taken into account in the UK commercial property market with the possible exception of both the highest and the lowest EPC ratings.

The significance of occupancy steadiness in residential consumer response to Time of Use pricing: Evidence from a stochastic adjustment model

The recent roll-out of smart metering technologies in several developed countries has intensified research on the impacts of Time-of-Use (TOU) pricing on consumption. This paper analyses a TOU dataset from the Province of Trento in Northern Italy using a stochastic adjustment model. Findings highlight the non-steadiness of the relationship between consumption and TOU price. Weather and active occupancy can partly explain future consumption in relation to price.

An experiment on spatial competition with endogenous pricing

Hotelling's (1929) principle of minimum differentiation and the alternative prediction that firms will maximally differentiate from their rivals in order to relax price competition have not been explicitly tested so far. We report results from experimental spatial duopolies designed to address this issue. The levels of product differentiation observed are systematically lower than predicted in equilibrium under risk neutrality and compatible with risk aversion. The observed prices are consistent with collusion attempts. Our main findings are robust to variations in three experimental conditions: automated vs. human market sharing rule for ties, individual vs. collective decision making, and even vs. odd number of locations.

Asymmetric output gap effects in Phillips Curve and mark-up pricing models: evidence for the US and the UK

A number of studies have found an asymmetric response of consumer price index inflation to the output gap in the US in simple Phillips curve models. We consider whether there are similar asymmetries in mark-up pricing models, that is, whether the mark-up over producers' costs also depends upon the sign of the (adjusted) output gap. The robustness of our findings to the price series is assessed, and also whether price-output responses in the UK are asymmetric.

On the evolution of monopoly pricing in Internet-assisted search markets

This study examines the evolution of prices in markets with Internet price-comparison search engines. The empirical study analyzes laboratory data of prices available to informed consumers, for two industry sizes and two conditions on the sample (complete and incomplete). Distributions are typically bimodal. One of the two modes of distribution, corresponding to monopoly pricing, tends to attract such pricing strategies increasingly over time. The second one, corresponding to interior pricing, follows a decreasing trend. Monopoly pricing can serve as a means of insurance against more competitive (but riskier) behavior. In fact, experimental subjects who initially earn low profits due to interior pricing are more likely to switch to monopoly pricing than subjects who experience good returns from the start.

Idiosyncratic volatility and the pricing of poorly-diversified portfolios

This article examines the role of idiosyncratic volatility in explaining the cross-sectional variation of size- and value-sorted portfolio returns. We show that the premium for bearing idiosyncratic volatility varies inversely with the number of stocks included in the portfolios. This conclusion is robust within various multifactor models based on size, value, past performance, liquidity and total volatility and also holds within an ICAPM specification of the risk–return relationship. Our findings thus indicate that investors demand an additional return for bearing the idiosyncratic volatility of poorly-diversified portfolios.

Margin squeeze: an above cost predatory pricing approach

We provide a new legal perspective for the antitrust analysis of margin squeeze conducts. Building on recent economic analysis, we explain why margin squeeze conducts should solely be evaluated under adjusted predatory pricing standards. The adjustment corresponds to an increase in the cost benchmark used in the predatory pricing test by including opportunity costs due to missed upstream sales. This can reduce both the risks of false-positives and false-negatives in margin squeeze cases. We justify this approach by explaining why classic arguments against above-cost predatory pricing typically do not hold in vertical structures where margin squeezes take place and by presenting case law evidence supporting this adjustment. Our approach can help to reconcile the divergent US and EU antitrust stances on margin squeeze.

Electricity derivatives pricing with forward-looking information

In order to increase overall transparency on key operational information, power transmission system operators publish an increasing amount of fundamental data, including forecasts of electricity demand and available capacity. We employ a fundamental model for electricity prices which lends itself well to integrating such forecasts, while retaining ease of implementation and tractability to allow for analytic derivatives pricing formulae. In an extensive futures pricing study, the pricing performance of our model is shown to further improve based on the inclusion of electricity demand and capacity forecasts, thus confirming the general importance of forward-looking information for electricity derivatives pricing. However, we also find that the usefulness of integrating forecast data into the pricing approach is primarily limited to those periods during which electricity prices are highly sensitive to demand or available capacity, whereas the impact is less visible when fuel prices are the primary underlying driver to prices instead.

Pricing and competition in the Swedish retail market for electricity

Sweden, together with Norway, Finland and Denmark, have created a multi-national electricity market called NordPool. In this market, producers and retailers of electricity can buy and sell electricity, and the retailers then offers this electricity to end consumers such as households and industries. Previous studies have shown that pricing at the NordPool market is functioning quite well, but no other study has to my knowledge studied if pricing in the retail market to consumers in Sweden is well functioning. If the market is well functioning, with competition and low transaction costs when changing electricity retailer, we would expect that a homogeneous good such as electricity would be sold at the approximately same price, and that price changes would be highly correlated, in this market. Thus, the aim of this study is to test whether the price of Vattenfall, the largest energy firm in the Swedish market, is highly correlated to the price of other firms in the Swedish retail market for electricity. Descriptive statistics indicate that the price offered by Vattenfall is quite similar to the price of other firms in the market. In addition, regression analysis show that the correlation between the price of Vattenfall and other firms is as high as 0.98.

Cálculo do subsídio implícito a agricultura, proveniente da política de preços mínimos, utilizando a teoria de "option pricing"

O objetivo desse trabalho é calcular o subsídio implícito aos produtores de arroz agulhinha, feijão preto, milho e soja, proveniente da política de preços mínimos, através da avaliação dos prêmios das opções de venda que correspondem à política de preços mínimos para essas commodities.

Tests of conditional asset pricing models in the brazilian stock market

In this paper, we test a version of the conditional CAPM with respect to a local market portfolio, proxied by the Brazilian stock index during the period 1976-1992. We also test a conditional APT modeI by using the difference between the 3-day rate (Cdb) and the overnight rate as a second factor in addition to the market portfolio in order to capture the large inflation risk present during this period. The conditional CAPM and APT models are estimated by the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) and tested on a set of size portfolios created from individual securities exchanged on the Brazilian markets. The inclusion of this second factor proves to be important for the appropriate pricing of the portfolios.

Arbitrage Pricing Theory (APT) e variáveis macroeconômicas: um estudo empírico sobre o mercado acionário brasileiro

Este trabalho utiliza retornos mensais de 10 portfólios de ações negociadas na Bovespa entre 1987 e 1997, a fim de testar a validade empírica do modelo APT. Foram criadas variáveis macroeconômicas como fatores de variância comum aos diversos portfólios. Além destes fatores serem estatisticamente significantes para explicar a relação entre os retornos dos diversos portfólios de uma maneira geral, foram encontradas evidências no sentido de validar o APT.

Estimating the term structure of volatility and fixed income derivative pricing

Estimating the parameters of the instantaneous spot interest rate process is of crucial importance for pricing fixed income derivative securities. This paper presents an estimation for the parameters of the Gaussian interest rate model for pricing fixed income derivatives based on the term structure of volatility. We estimate the term structure of volatility for US treasury rates for the period 1983 - 1995, based on a history of yield curves. We estimate both conditional and first differences term structures of volatility and subsequently estimate the implied parameters of the Gaussian model with non-linear least squares estimation. Results for bond options illustrate the effects of differing parameters in pricing.

A stochastic discount factor approach to asset pricing using panel data

Using the Pricing Equation, in a panel-data framework, we construct a novel consistent estimator of the stochastic discount factor (SDF) mimicking portfolio which relies on the fact that its logarithm is the ìcommon featureîin every asset return of the economy. Our estimator is a simple function of asset returns and does not depend on any parametric function representing preferences, making it suitable for testing di§erent preference speciÖcations or investigating intertemporal substitution puzzles.

Simple calvo economies with heterogeneous pricing

A motivação para este trabalho vem dos principais resultados de Carvalho e Schwartzman (2008), onde a heterogeneidade surge a partir de diferentes regras de ajuste de preço entre os setores. Os momentos setoriais da duração da rigidez nominal são su cientes para explicar certos efeitos monetários. Uma vez que concordamos que a heterogeneidade é relevante para o estudo da rigidez de preços, como poderíamos escrever um modelo com o menor número possível de setores, embora com um mínimo de heterogeneidade su ciente para produzir qualquer impacto monetário desejado, ou ainda, qualquer três momentos da duração? Para responder a esta questão, este artigo se restringe a estudar modelos com hazard-constante e considera que o efeito acumulado e a dinâmica de curto-prazo da política monetária são boas formas de se resumir grandes economias heterogêneas. Mostramos que dois setores são su cientes para resumir os efeitos acumulados de choques monetários, e economias com 3 setores são boas aproximações para a dinâmica destes efeitos. Exercícios numéricos para a dinâmica de curto prazo de uma economia com rigidez de informação mostram que aproximar 500 setores usando apenas 3 produz erros inferiores a 3%. Ou seja, se um choque monetário reduz o produto em 5%, a economia aproximada produzirá um impacto entre 4,85% e 5,15%. O mesmo vale para a dinâmica produzida por choques de nível de moeda em uma economia com rigidez de preços. Para choques na taxa de crescimento da moeda, a erro máximo por conta da aproximação é de 2,4%.