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The paper reviews current experience with water quality trading programs and evaluates trading's potential as a future water quality management tool. The relative virtues of cap and trade (CAT) versus regulatory offset programs are discussed, as are administrative and technical barriers to trading. Several existing trade programs are discussed in detail. The article places particular emphasis on the relationship between water quality trading and watershed-based regulatory initiatives such as the total maximum daily load program.

This paper seeks to investigate sulphur dioxide (SO₂) emissions trading practice in China and discusses what it might reveal about the suitability of using emissions trading to achieve carbon reductions in China.

The paper explores the Taiyuan SO₂ emissions trading program case through interviews with key participants in the scheme. The interview questions are developed from the literature on emissions trading practice and theory.

The Taiyuan SO₂ emissions trading program does not seem to be functioning anything like a theoretically ideal model and this brings into question proposals to introduce emissions trading in China. Limitations would seem to be the semi‐free market, the weakness of the legal system and the nature of business‐bureaucracy interactions.

This case study is geographically limited, as are most emissions trading schemes in China and the number of interviewees is relatively small. There was also little historical quantitative data because of the limited records kept in the enterprises and so there is a high reliance on interviewees' recollection.

The evidence suggests that a national carbon trading scheme may not be suitable in China in the short run because the implementation of the program and emissions trading market are very important.

This is the first paper investigating the actual performance of SO₂ emissions trading practice in China and also the first one discussing the suitability of using emissions trading to achieve carbon reductions in China based on the existing practice.

This study investigates the impact of program trading on the market volatility by separating the volatility into long-run and short-run components using VA-CEGARCH model. This approach allows us to observe the two channels through which the program trading affects the market volatility. We have following results. Program trading and non-program trading both have no impact on the long-run component but do increase short-run component. In case of short-run component‘ program trading has a larger impact compared to non-program trading. Secondly, in both daily and intra-day analysis, arbitrage program trading is found to have a larger impact on short-run components than non-arbitrage program trading.

Thirdly, ARCH effects are found in short-run components of daily analysis and long-run components of intra-day analysis. And the volatility’s asymmetric responses to good or bad news are introduced through long-run components. What is noteworthy is the fact that non-arbitrage program trading is actually found to reduce short-run volatility in the intra-day analysis.

Which means that non-arbitrage program trading, such as hedging transactions, helps promote intra-day market stability. Our findings mean that the short-run component is the main channel by which program trading produce unnecessary market volatility.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the announcement and implementation of short sales and margin trading regulation affects Chinese stock returns and trading volume. On 31 March 2010, the Chinese regulators launched a pilot programme, allowing short sales and margin trading for 50 Shanghai Stock Exchange and 40 Shenzhen Stock Exchange stocks.

This paper uses an event study approach to compare market model abnormal returns (ARs) of the pilot firms with two distinct matched firm samples. A volume event study is also conducted to examine abnormal trading activity surrounding the key events in the pilot stocks.

Negative ARs follow both the announcement and implementation of short selling and margin trading. This suggests the negative impact of short sales dominates the positive impact of margin trading on an average. Volume also declines, which is consistent with uninformed investors’ seeking to avoid trading against informed traders.

The paper appears to be the first to address the impact of both the announcement and implementation of short selling and margin trading rule changes on returns and liquidity using individual stock data.

Purpose – Emissions trading is often heralded as an efficient approach to environmental regulation. In the mid-90s Communities for a Better Environment (CBE), a Los Angeles-based advocacy organization, raised concerns that emissions trading in the South Coast Air Basin, the most polluted region in Southern California, would result in environmental injustice. The organizations concerns received mixed responses from regulators. Historical analysis is used to assess the clash between emissions trading and environmental justice (EJ).

Methodology/approach – Emissions trading and EJ arose side by side between the 1960s and the 1990s, yet they disagree on how to clean the air. Historical analysis of legal documents, presidential addresses, letters, working papers, reports, and the like offers a better understanding of the development of emissions trading and EJ, and their intersection in environmental policy.

Findings – Emissions trading was grafted onto Clean Air Act policies not inherently designed for their incorporation. As a result, emissions trading came into direct philosophical opposition with EJ as political pressures calling for both economically efficient antiregulatory-ism and environmental equity forced their intersection. Formally, regional and national government accepted EJ as part of law. However, in principle, emissions trading undermined this acceptance. As a result, CBE could not easily win or explicitly lose its battle against emissions trading.

Originality/value of paper – Previous work on the relationship between emissions trading and EJ tend to focus on legal analysis and normative implications of emissions trading. Putting emissions trading and environment justice into historical perspective helps to illuminate larger questions about EJ activism and policy. Also, as California, the United States, and Europe turn to emissions trading to combat not only air pollution but also climate change, important lessons can be learned from the histories and collision of emissions trading and EJ.

Recently, program trading has allowed arbitrageurs to take advantage of the discrepancies in the futures market and the stock market. The key that enables program trading is computer technology. This article presents the design of PROTRADER ‐ an expert system prototype for program trading implemented in M.1. In particular, a learning mech‐anism that allows the system to adapt to the changes in the market is presented.

The purpose of this paper is to overview the development of China's emission trading, which is transforming environmental policy measures from traditional command and control regulations to business‐led decision making within government initiated environmental markets, and investigates the main factors that affect China's policy making with regards to further climate changes.

This paper is based on the authors' review of the literatures on emissions trading program in China and their critical analysis.

Initially China's environmental protection policies were focused principally upon the reduction of sulfur dioxide (SO₂) emissions for improving air quality. Since the authorization of the Kyoto Protocol in 2002, project‐based activities such as Clean Development Mechanism producing carbon credit developed rapidly. However, the implementation of carbon dioxide emission trading is still under discussion and research is much inferior to that of SO₂ emission trading. The barriers of and suggestions for designing future emissions trading market are also discussed.

This review helps to raise awareness and understand possible scenarios for emission trading in China.

When a stock is added into the S&P 500 Index, it in effect becomes cross-listed in the Index derivative markets. When index-based trading strategies such as index arbitrage are executed, the component stocks are directly affected by such trading. We find increased volatility of daily returns, plus increased trading volume for the underlying stocks. Utilizing a list of S&P 500 Index composition changes over the period September 1976 to December 2005, we study the market-adjusted volume turnover and return variance of the stocks added to and deleted from the Index. The results indicate that after the introduction of the S&P 500 Index futures and options contracts, stocks added to the S&P 500 experience statistically significant increase in both trading volume and return volatility. Both daily and monthly return variances increase following index inclusion. When stocks are removed from the index, though, neither volatility of returns nor trading volume experiences any significant change. So, we have new evidence showing that Index inclusion changes a firm's return volatility, and supporting the destabilization hypothesis.

This study aims to propose a set of institutional frameworks, as well as practical polices and steps, with a view to facilitating the establishment of a unified carbon trading market in China.

Based on existing empirical studies and reviews of the socioeconomic contexts, this study followed a qualitative approach consisting of secondary data collection and analysis, semi-structured interviews to collect primary data and comparative analysis.

The establishment of a national carbon trading market in China is a systemic and complex process which requires coordination among various concerned government agencies and supporting mechanisms. Currently, the development of a unified national carbon market has been impeded by the lack of coordination among local pilot programs, and there is no specific law passed by the People’s Congress or by its Standing Committee to regulate the emerging carbon trading market. It is of vital importance for China, in terms of both practical and strategic aspects, to take a gradualist approach in establishing laws and institutions to guide and support the development of its emerging carbon market.

This present study forms a part of a regional research project aiming to identify sound policy approaches for the establishment of a carbon trading market in China. Due to scope reasons, it focuses only on policy analysis and recommendations.

China’s emerging national carbon trading market has attracted much research attention. However, little has been done from the perspectives of legislations and policies.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of UK investment firms’ implementation of the requirements in Commission Delegated Regulation 2017/589 (more commonly known as “Regulatory Technical Standard 6” or “RTS 6”) that govern the conduct of algorithmic trading activities.

A qualitative examination of 19 semi-structured interviews with practitioners working for, or with, UK investment firms engaged in algorithmic trading activities.

The paper finds that practitioners generally have a good understanding of the requirements in RTS 6. Some lack knowledge of algorithms, coding and algorithmic strategies but have used best efforts to implement RTS 6. However, regulatory fatigue, complacency, cost pressures, governance in international groups, overreliance on external knowledge and generous risk parameter calibration threaten to undermine these efforts.

The study’s findings are limited to the participants’ insights. Some areas of the RTS 6 regime attracted little comment from participants.

The paper proposes the introduction of mandatory algorithmic trading qualification requirements for key staff; the lessening of the requirements in RTS 6 for automated executors; and the introduction of a recognised software vendor regime to reduce duplication and improve coordination between market participants that deploy algorithmic trading systems.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, the study represents the first qualitative examination of firms’ implementation of the algorithmic trading regime in the second Markets in Financial Instruments Directive 2014/65/EU.