The Search for Neutrino-Antineutrino Mixing from Lorentz Invariance Violation using Neutrino Interactions in MINOS

We searched for a sidereal modulation in the rate of neutrinos observed by the MINOS far detector. The detection of these signals could be a signature of neutrino-antineutrino mixing due to Lorentz and CPT violation as described by the Standard-Model Extension framework. We found no evidence for these sidereal signals and we placed limits on the coefficients in this theory describing the effect.Comment: Presented at the Sixth Meeting on CPT and Lorentz Symmetry, Bloomington, Indiana, June 17-21, 201

Legal origin, creditor protection and bank lending around the world

In this study, we test whether bankers make more loans when they enjoy superior creditor protection. We test these hypotheses using bank-level data from 35 developed countries and 113 developing countries over the period 2000-2006 and using a random-effects model that controls for bank heterogeneity. We find that bankers allocate a significantly larger portion of their assets to risky loans: (i) when they enjoy English common-law legal origin rather than French civil-law legal origin; (ii) when creditors’ rights are weaker; (iii) when their banks are larger; and (iv) when the largest shareholder has a lower percentage ownership. We also find that bankers in developing countries, but not in developed countries, allocate a significantly larger portion of their assets to risky loans when legal enforcement of creditor rights is more efficient. Overall, these results provide strong support for the theory of legal origin but provide only mixed support for the “power” theories of credit.banking, bank loans, bank risk-taking, creditor protection, creditors’ rights, emerging markets, investor protection, judicial enforcement, law and finance, legal origin, legal rights

Testing Lorentz and CPT Invariance with MINOS Near Detector Neutrinos

We present an analysis designed to search for Lorentz and CPT violations as predicted by the SME framework using the charged current neutrino events in the MINOS near detector. In particular we develop methods to identify periodic variations in the normalized number of charged current neutrino events as a function of sidereal phase. To test these methods, we simulated a set of 1,000 experiments without Lorentz and CPT violation signals using the standard MINOS Monte Carlo. We performed an FFT on each of the simulated experiments to find the distribution of powers in the sidereal phase diagram without a signal. We then injected a signal of increasing strength into the sidereal neutrino oscillation probability until we found a 5$\sigma$ deviation from the mean in the FFT power spectrum. By this method, we can establish upper limits for the Lorentz and CPT violating terms in the SME.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, CPT'07 Conference proceeding

The role of commercial real estate investments in the banking crisis of 1985-92

This article examines the role of commercial real estate investments in the banking crisis of 1985-92, an unprecedented period during which more than 1,300 banks failed. Bank failures are fundamentally important because of the unique role played by financial institutions in the provision of business credit. We discover three striking features of banks failing during this period. First, commercial real estate was only a factor in the bank failures of 1988-92. Second, construction loans played a much larger role in bank failures than permanent loans, and the relationship is strongest with construction loans booked during 1983-1985. Third, other ex ante risk measures are systematically related to banking failure throughout the sample period. These results suggest that risk-seeking banks brought about their own demise and commercial real estate, especially construction lending, was one of the vehicles.bank; bank failure; commercial bank; commercial real estate; construction lending; real estate

How accurate are commercial-real-estate appraisals? evidence from 25 years of NCREIF sales data

In this study, we provide new evidence on the performance measurement and reporting of commercial real estate returns. We do so by examining the accuracy of commercial-real-estate appraisals that occurred prior to the sale of properties from the NCREIF National Property Index (“NPI”) during 1984 – 2010, a period which spans two up-and-down cycles of the market. We find that, on average, appraisals are more than 12% above, or below, subsequent sales prices that take place two quarters following the appraisal. Even in a portfolio context, allowing for offsetting positive and negative differences, appraisals are off by an average of 4% – 5 % of value, even after adjusting for capital appreciation during those two quarters. We also provide new evidence regarding how, and by how much, appraised values lag behind sales prices. We find that appraisals appear to lag the true sales prices, falling significantly below in hot markets and remaining significantly above in cold markets. This new evidence provides guidance to investors, regulators and others about how to interpret real-estate indices like the NPI that are based upon appraised values, in both a rising and falling market. Finally, we find that this “appraisal error” is largely systematic; we can explain more than half of the variation in the signed percentage difference in sales price and appraised value. Hence, appraisal errors are not due solely to property-specific heterogeneity.appraisal; commercial real estate; commingled real estate fund; NCREIF; real estate

The Search for Neutrino-Antineutrino Mixing Resulting from Lorentz Invariance Violation using neutrino interactions in MINOS

We searched for a sidereal modulation in the rate of neutrinos produced by the NuMI beam and observed by the MINOS far detector. The detection of such harmonic signals could be a signature of neutrino-antineutrino mixing due to Lorentz and CPT violation as described by the Standard Model Extension framework. We found no evidence for these sidereal signals and we placed limits on the coefficients in this theory describing the effect. This is the first report of limits on these neutrino-antineutrino mixing coefficients.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures, 3 table

A Skylab program for the International Hydrological Decade (IHD)

There are no author-identified significant results in this report

A CAMEL rating's shelf life

How quickly do the CAMEL ratings regulators assign to banks during on-site examinations become "stale"? One measure of the information content of CAMEL ratings is their ability to discriminate between banks that will fail and those that will survive. To assess the accuracy of CAMEL ratings in predicting failure, Rebel Cole and Jeffery Gunther use as a benchmark an offsite monitoring system based on publicly available accounting data. Their findings suggest that, if a bank has not been examined for more than two quarters, off-site monitoring systems usually provide a more accurate indication of survivability than its CAMEL rating. The lower predictive accuracy for CAMEL ratings “older” than two quarters causes the overall accuracy of CAMEL ratings to fall substantially below that of off-site monitoring systems. The higher predictive accuracy of off-site systems derives from both their timeliness—an updated off-site rating is available for every bank in every quarter—and the accuracy of the financial data on which they are based. Cole and Gunther conclude that off-site monitoring systems should continue to play a prominent role in the supervisory process, as a complement to on-site examinations.bank; bank failure; CAMEL; CAMEL rating; commercial bank; offsite supervision