In a study that’s the subject of today’s highlighted paper Genia Kostka and Hui Zhou, working at the Freie Universität Berlin, present the first cross cultural study of why and how people are using AI for counseling, comfort and emotional support. The table below presents some interesting cultural bias. Chinese users seem to especially enjoy […]
Category: Sunday Papers
Yinghua Fan, Guanhao Feng and Dashan Huang believe they’ve produced a first in terms of modelling the complete spectrum of investors at work in China’s A-share markets (due to data constraints the study was of just Shanghai from 2007~2023, Shenzhen had to be left out). Many believe stock markets in China are driven by no-nothing […]
I read through most of the paper highlighted today in a bit of harrumph. What I thought Andrew W. Torrance (et al.), from the University of Kansas School of Law writing in an article for the Houston Law Review, was trying to do was set up a ‘straw man’ argument to tear it down. In […]
Like so much that China has done, and is doing, nothing like it in the history of humanity has been seen before. In the case of the paper highlighted today the subject is the extraordinary expansion of higher education that’s taken place starting from 1999. Zhaoxuan Wang from the University of British Columbia has taken […]
[I’m not sure highlighting academic work that supports any of my key investing criteria is a smart idea. Especially when it’s a favorable anomaly I’ve benefited from for years. In this case it’s the importance of brand (or market leadership as I prefer to express it). Oh well, sharing is caring, right?] Yigit Atilgan (et […]
When and why has Europe gone so wrong; and what, if anything, can be done about it? These are the issues the trio responsible for today’s paper, from the London School of Economics, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the European University Institute, take a closer look at. When did Europe go wrong? Seems to […]
The paper highlighted today provides an analysis of 36 of the largest Bank Holding Companies (BHCs) in the U.S. and finds a one standard deviation increase in AI investment produces a 24% increase in quarterly operational losses. Ouch! The more banks have incorporated AI into their operations the higher risk they’ve exposed themselves to and […]
Writing in a Working Paper for the Institute for New Economic Thinking Servaas Storm from the Delft University of Technology explains how and why the U.S. is inflating an AI-bubble, and concludes this will end badly. The paper makes three main points: For most this (below) may be the most apposite section i.e. the one […]
[An aside: I went to a presentation at the Hong Kong Society of Financial Analysts recently to hear about ‘Agentic AI’. The talk was given by a Microsoft representative who was, naturally, praising ‘Copilot’. The audience via their questions could barely suppress their frustration with both AI and their experience with the Copilot. To remind, […]
Writing in an Asian Development Bank Working Paper (#812) Shu Cai, a Professor at Jinan University (et al.) takes a look at a specific example of microfinance in the PRC. This study is important as in recent years the effectiveness of microfinance has been questioned. Studies elsewhere have shown either limited, insignificant or no effects […]
[Me, I’m big on law and order. Not so much the punishment bit as it’s practiced in most of the world. That doesn’t seem to work well in terms of stamping out the problem and is very expensive. Prevention is my preferred route so I was very interested in the findings of the work highlighted […]
[As a useful companion to the paper highlighted today I’d recommend the new(-ish) book ‘Apple in China’ by Patrick McGee. It’s the most useful ‘China Book’ I’ve read in a long while. The book sheds light on how Apple has used China to its advantage but in the process transferred know-how to an ecosystem that […]
Writing in an HKU Business School paper (HKU Jockey Club Enterprise Sustainability Global Research Institute Paper Series) Marcin T. Kacperczyk of Imperial College London (et al.) set out test whether or not extemporaneous live streaming interviews of fund managers make any difference in terms of assets subsequently flowing into their funds. There’s a large body […]
In a Harvard Business School Working Paper Sean Cao, Charles C. Y. Wang and Yi Xiang from the universities of Maryland, Harvard and The Hong Kong Polytechnic uncover a strange bias in AI-generated financial predictions. We know from prior research investors tend to favour and be more optimistic about companies in their home markets. We […]
Francisco Arizala, Tomohide Mineyama, and Hugo Tuesta, researchers at the IMF writing in a Working Paper have taken a closer look at how Mexico’s import/export dynamic changed in the period 2017~2023. The chart they start the paper with is a corker. Did you know, I didn’t, that Mexico now sends more ‘stuff’ to the U.S. […]
There are a few quality-of-character checks I perform when looking at a company. One of these is a close squint at the biographies of Directors, especially the Independent Non-Executive ones (the INEDs). Red flags include suspiciously young Directors (often family being groomed), suspiciously well paid non-Executive Directors (often family collecting stipends) and INEDs with more […]
In a blog post from the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System researchers Sina T. Ates and Sharon Jeon look more closely at China’s innovative capacity. It’s a short piece but the conclusion is unequivocal: “The particular metrics highlighted in this note suggest that China has built tremendous innovative capacity that bodes well […]
The work highlighted today is a ‘Working Paper’ from the IMF. The authors: Daniel Garcia-Macia, Siddharth Kothari, Yifen Tao and Yutong Li have tried to fix a bead on just how Industrial Policy (IP, i.e. subsidies) in China ends up being a net disbenifit. The IMF have urged China to give up this kind of […]
Dr. Samuel Johnson noted in 1775 that “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel”. The justification then, for some of the harder to understand policies of the current U.S. administration should surprise none when they come flag-wrapped as necessary for the promotion of ‘National Security’. There’s a long historical precedent for this kind of […]
Liwei Si (et al.) from the Dalian Ocean University wondered what the environmental impact of offshore wind farms might be? Nobody likes the onshore variety, much. They’re ugly, noisy and kill birds. Offshore facilities seem like a much better idea as they can be built bigger and a long way from people (and many birds). […]