Financial Literacy, Financial Markets Index, and Investors’ Biased Responses

Using earnings data from Q1 2012 to Q4 2015 for 300 stocks in 15 countries, this study aims to investigate relations between financial literacy, financial markets index, and investors’ biased responses to earnings news. Financial literacy refers to an individual’s abilities and skills to manage financial problems and make informed decisions that benefit his or her personal financial well-being, including retirement, investing, and loans, etc. (Lusardi & Mitchell, 2014). Financial markets index reflects how developed a financial market is, including its depth, access, and efficiency (Svirydzenka, 2016). Stock prices’ biased responses happen when prices fail to reflect all available information. A variety of studies have been done to investigate why stock prices underreact or overreact to earnings news. There is, however, few or no study trying to link financial education and financial markets development to stock price’s biased responses. Therefore, objectives of this study are to better understand whether a higher level of financial education would ease investors’ sensitivity to news, and if a more developed financial market would lessen underreactions and overreactions of stock prices to earnings announcements. The methodology of this study is regression analysis. Major findings are that the level of financial literacy does not have a significant influence on the magnitude of earnings surprise, and that financial markets index is negatively correlated to investors’ biased responses to earnings surprise. The more developed a market is, the better market movements incorporate anticipated information.No embargoAcademic Major: Financ

Field-induced topological pair-density wave states in a multilayer optical lattice

We study the superfluid phases of a Fermi gas in a multilayer optical lattice system in the presence of out-of-plane Zeeman field, as well as spin-orbit (SO) coupling. We show that the Zeeman field combined with the SO coupling leads to exotic topological pair-density wave (PDW) phases in which different layers possess different superfluid order parameters, even though each layer experiences the same Zeeman field and the SO coupling. We elucidate the mechanism of the emerging PDW phases, and characterize their topological properties by calculating the associated Chern numbers.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, accepted by Phys. Rev.

Disordered, strongly scattering porous materials as miniature multipass gas cells

Spectroscopic gas sensing is both a commercial success and a rapidly advancing scientific field. Throughout the years, massive efforts have been directed towards improving detection limits by achieving long interaction pathlengths. Prominent examples include the use of conventional multipass gas cells, sophisticated high-finesse cavities, gas-filled holey fibers, integrating spheres, and diffusive reflectors. Despite this rich flora of approaches, there is a continuous struggle to reduce size, gas volume, cost and alignment complexity. Here, we show that extreme light scattering in porous materials can be used to realise miniature gas cells. Near-infrared transmission through a 7 mm zirconia (ZrO2) sample with a 49% porosity and subwavelength pore structure (on the order of 100 nm) gives rise to an effective gas interaction pathlength above 5 meters, an enhancement corresponding to 750 passes through a conventional multipass cell. This essentially different approach to pathlength enhancement opens a new route to compact, alignment-free and low-cost optical sensor systems