708 research outputs found
Mais além do Taj Mahal
No full textDiálogos e conexões entre Índia e Brasil devem considerar desigualdades simétricas e similaridades desiguais que afetam os dois países, observa Cláudio Costa Pinheiro
Beyond chicken masala and the Taj Mahal
No full textDialogues and connections between India and Brazil should take into account the symmetric inequalities and unequal similarities that affect the two countries, says Claudio Costa Pinheiro
Monumenta Albertiana: a biblioteca africanista de Alberto da Costa e Silva
No full textHomenagem a Alberto Vasconcellos da Costa e Silv
Judicial Risk and Credit Market Performance: Micro Evidence from Brazil Payroll Loans
No full textA large body of literature has stressed the institution-development nexus as critical in explaining differences in countries' economic performance. The empirical evidence, however, has been mainly at the aggregate level, associating macro performance with measures of quality of institutions. This paper, by relating a judicial decision on the legality of payroll debit loans in Brazil to bank-level decision variables, provides micro evidence on how creditor legal protection affects market performance. Payroll loans are personal loans with principal and interests payments directly deducted from the borrowers' payroll check, which, in practice, makes a collateral out of future income. In June 2004, a high-level federal court upheld a regional court ruling that had declared payroll deduction illegal. Using personal loans without payroll deduction as a control group, we assess whether the ruling had an impact on market performance. Evidence indicates that it had an adverse impact on risk perception, interest rates, and amount lent.
Balance Sheet Effects in Currency Crises: Evidence from Brazil
No full text"Third-generation currency crises models" argue that capital losses from exchange-rate depreciation propagate the crises to the productive sector. To test these models, we use a firm-level dataset that allows us to measure currency mismatches around the 2002 Brazilian currency crisis. We find that, between 2001 and 2003, firms that shortly before the crisis had large currency mismatches decreased their investment rates by 8.1 percentual points, relatively to other public firms. Moreover, we show that the currency depreciation implied large competitive gains for the exporters, and yet the investment of exporters with large currency mismatches fell by 12.5 percentual points, relatively to other exporters. The estimated falls in investment are economically very relevant, thereby corroborating the relevance of third generation models negative balance sheet effects.
Is the Investment-Uncertainty Link Really Elusive? The Harmful Effects of Inflation Uncertainty in Brazil
No full textAfter being one the fastest growing countries in the world during the 1940-80 period, with an average growth rate of 6.8%, Brazil has experienced a severe growth slowdown since the 1980s, which coincided with the steep rise in inflation as of 1980. At the same time, real investment rates have plunged, shrinking around nine percentage points just in the 1980s. Moreover, they were unable to recover their 1989 level afterwards. This is unexpected as several pro-growth reforms took place since 1990, such as trade liberalization, privatization and economic stabilization. More strikingly, in the ten years following the stabilization of the economy, real investment rates have being at their lowest levels for, at least, fifty years. One major factor that could help explaining this dismal behavior is inflation uncertainty, which have remained high despite much lower inflation since 1994. Indeed, inflation uncertainty is at the root as many types of uncertainties faced by firms. For example, it also means uncertainty about future interest rates and demand. This work aims both at uncovering the main determinants that have driven M&E investment in Brazil since 1980 and testing the link between inflation uncertainty and investment. The evidence strongly suggests that inflation uncertainty has been an important investment deterrent in Brazil, both in the short and long runs. Moreover, its effects were found to be asymmetric. Also, despite the limited role played by price variables in empirical studies of investment, the real interest rate, itself importantly affected by inflation uncertainty and inflation risk premium, seems to be another key factor in explaining low investment rates in Brazil.
Joint Validation of Credit Rating PDs under Default Correlation
No full textThe Basel Committee on Banking Supervision recognizes that one of the greatest technical challenges to the implementation of the new Basel II Accord lies on the validation of the banks’ internal credit rating models (CRMs). This study investigates new proposals of statistical tests for validating the PDs (probabilities of default) of CRMs. It distinguishes between proposals aimed at checking calibration and those focused at discriminatory power. The proposed tests recognize the existence of default correlation, deal jointly with the default behaviour of all the ratings and, differently to previous literature, control the error of validating incorrect CRMs. Power sensitivity analysis and strategies for power improvement are discussed, providing insights on the trade-offs and limitations pertained to the calibration tests. An alternative goal is proposed for the tests of discriminatory power and results of power dominance are shown for them with direct practical consequences. Finally, as the proposed tests are asymptotic, Monte-Carlo simulations investigate the small sample bias for varying scenarios of parameters.
Building Confidence Intervals with Block Bootstraps for the Variance Ratio Test of Predictability
No full textThis paper compares different versions of the multiple variance ratio test based on bootstrap techniques for the construction of empirical distributions. It also analyzes the crucial issue of selecting optimal block sizes when block bootstrap procedures are used, by applying the methods developed by Hall et al. (1995) and by Politis and White (2004). By comparing the results of the different methods using Monte Carlo simulations, we conclude that methodologies using block bootstrap methods present better performance for the construction of empirical distributions of the variance ratio test. Moreover, the results are highly sensitive to methods employed to test the null hypothesis of random walk.
Behavior and Effects of Equity Foreign Investors on Emerging Markets
No full textThis paper analyzes empirically the behavior of foreign investors on emerging equity markets in a cross-country setting, including 14 emerging markets from the year 2000 to 2005. We could find little evidence that these investors have brought problems to local emerging markets. Foreign investors seem to build and unwind their positions on emerging stock markets slowly enough to avoid problems as price pressure or volatility and kurtosis upswings on the stock market. Also, no negative effects on the foreign exchange market could be found. Regarding feedback trading, we support two hypotheses: positive feedback trading by hedged investors and negative feedback trading by unhedged investors. The latter has stronger statistical evidence and is more likely to occur in the real world. We conclude that there is no reason to impose long-term restrictions to foreign flows.
Do Instituto Agronômico do Norte à Embrapa Amazônia Oriental: personagens ilustres, tempo e memória (1939-2019).
No full textEsta coletânea tem por objetivo também identificar a razão da homenagem, nem sempre conhecida no presente, implícita na designação de prédios, auditórios, laboratórios e locais especiais na Embrapa Amazônia Oriental.Neste primeiro volume, são contempladas 23 biografias: Adolpho Ducke, Milton de Albuquerque, George Alexander Black, George O?Neill Addison, Alfonso Wisniewski, Batista Benito Gabriel Calzavara, Rubens Rodrigues Lima, Archimar Bittencourt Baleiro, Eurico Pinheiro, José Maria Pinheiro Condurú, Fernando Carneiro de Albuquerque, Italo Claudio Falesi, Tarcísio Ewerton Rodrigues, Vicente Haroldo de Figueiredo Moraes, Hermínio Maia Rocha, Cristo Nazaré Barbosa do Nascimento, Therezinha Xavier Bastos, Carlos Hans Müller, Emerson Peçanha Salimos, Rosemary Moraes Ferreira Viégas, Armando Kouzo Kato, Olinto Gomes da Rocha Neto e Silvio Leopoldo Lima Costa
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