Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México

About: Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México is a education organization based out in Mexico City, Mexico. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Politics & Population. The organization has 1098 authors who have published 2532 publications receiving 39083 citations. The organization is also known as: Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico & Mexico Autonomous Institute of Technology.

Risk Management and Firm Value: Evidence from Weather Derivatives

Abstract: This paper examines the impact of financial innovation on firm value, investment, and financing decisions. More specifically, we examine the effect of the introduction of weather derivatives on electric and gas utilities, arguably some of the most weather-exposed businesses in the economy. Weather derivatives were introduced in 1997 to help firms manage their weather-related risk exposure. We derive instruments for weather derivative use based on historical (pre-1997) weather exposure. Intuitively, firms whose cash flows have historically fluctuated with changing weather conditions are, relative to other firms, more likely to use weather derivatives once they become available, irrespective of their investment opportunities. Using data from U.S. energy firms, we find that weather derivatives lead to higher market valuations, investments, and leverage. Overall, our results demonstrate that financial innovation can significantly affect firm outcomes and that risk management meaningfully affects valuation, investments, and financing decisions.

Dispositional resistance to change : measurement equivalence and the link to personal values across 17 nations

Abstract: The concept of dispositional resistance to change has been introduced in a series of exploratory and confirmatory analyses through which the validity of the Resistance to Change (RTC) Scale has been established (S. Oreg, 2003). However, the vast majority of participants with whom the scale was validated were from the United States. The purpose of the present work was to examine the meaningfulness of the construct and the validity of the scale across nations. Measurement equivalence analyses of data from 17 countries, representing 13 languages and 4 continents, confirmed the cross-national validity of the scale. Equivalent patterns of relationships between personal values and RTC across samples extend the nomological net of the construct and provide further evidence that dispositional resistance to change holds equivalent meanings across nations.

Large Shareholders and Dividends: Evidence from U.S. Tax Reforms

Abstract: This paper tests whether firms' dividend policy is determined by the preferences of their large shareholders. Exogenous variation from changing personal income tax rates is used to analyze dividend payments of firms whose large shareholders were affected by these reforms (individuals), compared to a control group of firms whose large shareholders were not. The evidence shows that dividend payouts increased in years when dividend income was less tax-disadvantaged relative to capital gains, and decreased as this tendency was reverted, but only for firms whose large shareholders were affected by these tax reforms. Furthermore, using ex-dividend day stock price analysis I find significant increases in the valuation of dividend income for those firms with individual large shareholders in periods when dividends were less tax-disadvantaged. These results show that large shareholders influence dividend decisions, and provide strong evidence of the existence of tax clienteles.

Monte Carlo Valuation of American Options through Computation of the Optimal Exercise Frontier

Abstract: This paper introduces a Monte Carlo simulation method for pricing multidimensional American options based on the computation of the optimal exercise frontier. We consider Bermudan options that can be exercised at a finite number of times and compute the optimal exercise frontier recursively. We show that for every date of possible exercise, any single point of the optimal exercise frontier is a fixed point of a simple algorithm. Once the frontier is computed, we use plain vanilla Monte Carlo simulation to price the option and obtain a low-biased estimator. We illustrate the method with applications to several types of options.