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Although short selling has been legalized in China for nearly 10 years, due to the existence of short-sale constraints, its impact on corporate governance of listed companies remains unclear. This paper aims to examine the impact of short-sale refinancing on earnings quality after the short-selling constraints have been released. The authors further explore whether this impact is subject to the nature of property rights and shareholding structures.

This study is based on a sample of A-share firms in China for the period 2014–2016. The authors use earnings response coefficients (ERC) as a proxy for earnings quality. To empirically examine this issue, a matching sample is generated by using propensity score matching method (PSM) to reduce sample selection bias.

This study provides evidence that deregulation of short selling has positive external effect on corporate governance. The results indicate that the potential short-selling opportunities can effectively suppress earnings manipulation and improve earnings quality. However, the impact of short selling on earnings quality varies for companies with different nature of property rights and shareholding structure.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to investigate the relationship between short selling and earnings quality in the unique setting of short-sale refinancing. This study provides new evidence on the impact of short selling at the micro level and calls for further deregulation of short selling. In addition, this study contributes to existing studies on short-sale refinancing by examining an emerging market.

Considering the role of analysts in disseminating information, the paper explains the idiosyncratic volatility puzzle of China's stock market. As the largest developing country, China's research can provide meaningful reference for the research of financial markets in other new countries.

From the perspective of behavior, establishing a direct link between individual investor attention and stock price overvaluation.

The authors find that there is a significant idiosyncratic volatility puzzle in China's stock market. Due to the role of mispricing, individual investor attention significantly enhances the idiosyncratic volatility effect, that is, as individual investor attention increases, the greater the idiosyncratic volatility, the lower the expected return. Attention can explain the idiosyncratic volatility puzzle in China's stock market. In addition, due to the role of information production and dissemination, securities analysts can reduce the degree of market information asymmetry and enhance the transparency of market information.

China is the second largest economy in the world, and few scholars analyze it from the perspective of investors' attention. The authors believe this paper has the potential in contributing to the academia.

The problem in alleviating homeowner mortgage distress through refinance is how to achieve meaningful alleviation without prospectively harming the financier. The problem revolves around two parameters from real estate finance – the probability that the distress leads to foreclosure and resulting foreclosure loss severity for the financier if foreclosure does occur. Previous analysis focuses on reducing the probability that homeowner distress leads to foreclosure. By contrast, the purpose of this paper is to focus on reducing foreclosure loss severity.

The study develops a new intuitive formula for foreclosure loss severity to quantify its dependence on transaction costs. The study shows that foreclosure loss severity reduction is feasible by introducing a new refinancing instrument that lowers foreclosure transaction costs and applying property law to derive the structure of the refinancing instrument.

Foreclosure loss severity reduction can subsidize concessions on scheduled payments for homeowners with arbitrarily poor credit without prospective harm to the financier.

Quantification of mortgage distress relief is limited to distressed mortgages described by representative parameter values from various government studies.

For most distressed homeowners, payment and principal reductions could exceed those available from the recent government programs.

Implementation should significantly enlarge the pool of homeowners eligible for mortgage distress relief.

The mortgage refinance is qualitatively different from that available under existing government refinance programs because it is based on an arms-length exchange of property rights that makes market sense regardless of whether the refinancing results in subsequent homeowner default.

This paper aims to examine how the exogenous shock of the global financial crisis has had a differential impact on the housing markets of the USA and UK.

The paper begins by examining the nature and dynamics of the global financial crisis. It presents a detailed comparison of institutional and housing market characteristics in each country. A particular focus is the differences in mortgage funding and subprime lending trends over the decade leading up to the financial crisis.

The analysis demonstrates the distinctiveness of the recent housing cycles and the geography of the downward price adjustments. Relative unemployment rates play a key role in these outcomes. Despite the different dynamics of the boom and bust, there is a common legacy in terms of the collapse of house building, repossessions/foreclosures and falling home ownership rates. The short-term policy responses by both governments addressed the same target issues in alternative ways but with different outcomes. Longer-term solutions are still being debated in both countries.

Innovatory insights are provided by the comparison of the sub-national spatial pattern of the recent house price cycle in two countries.

This paper links the literatures on the life-cycle hypothesis, homeownership, home equity and pensions. Empirically, the focus is on the EU and USA. The paper aims to explore the extent that seniors extract their home equity and discuss the financial instruments available for equity extraction.

The study uses data from the EU and USA to determine homeownership rates, house values and mortgage debt. With these values, the amount of seniors’ home equity is measured for each country. The usage of home equity extraction methods is reported and factors limiting their use are identified.

Seniors’ home equity is a substantial share of their total wealth. Estimates for 2013 are that their home equity equals about €5tn in the USA and over €8tn in large EU countries. The authors find that only a small share of seniors extracts their home equity. While there are supply side constraints in many countries, the evidence suggests that the cause of low extraction rates is the lack of demand. Various reasons for the lack of demand are discussed.

The increasing share of seniors in most countries’ population suggests that there will be increasing pressure on public pension systems. One among many options to address this issue is to impose a wealth test for eligibility, where wealth includes home equity. This study suggests that although home equity is substantial for many seniors, they are reluctant to access the funds.

The paper highlights the importance of home equity in the EU and USA and the factors that affect the primary methods of extraction.

The purpose of this research was to explore the growth of Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) fraud and the role of housing counselors in its identification and prevention. HECMs are the Federal Housing Administration endorsed version of a reverse mortgage and represent the majority of reverse mortgages on the market.

To investigate HECM counselor’s training, and their ability to detect fraudulent activity, a survey was constructed and distributed nationwide using HUD’s publicly available roster of qualified agencies and counselors. The survey consisted of three main sections agency and respondent information including HECM certification process, typical interactions with clients, and mortgage fraud and HECM fraud.

Responses indicate that HECM counselors have limited awareness of and training in identifying fraudulent activities.

The case is made that additional training is needed to raise awareness among counselors so that they might better serve their clients. Given the sizable population that may legitimately need HECMs, it is important to improve awareness and provide training to detect fraudulent schemes and prevent this type of deception from occurring.

The 2000–2006 housing market bubble conformed to a classic boom–bust scenario that triggered the most serious and costly financial crisis since the Great Depression. The 2008 subprime mortgage collapse leveraged a financial system that privatizes profits and socializes risks. Several factors converge to set up the subprime mortgage market as an easy target for industry insiders to exploit. Enabling legislation expanded the potential pool of borrowers eligible for subprime mortgages and structured incentives to lenders willing to assume the risks. The securitization of subprime mortgages transformed bundles of high-risk loans into mortgage-backed securities that were in demand by domestic and foreign investors. Pressure to edge out competition produced high-risk loans marketed to unqualified borrowers. The final piece in the setup of the subprime lending crisis was a move from an origination model to a distributive model by many financial institutions in the business of lending. We find that the diffusion and totality of these business practices produced a criminogenic opportunity structure for industry insiders to profit at the expense of homebuyers and later investors.

This chapter is a contribution to a recent restricted literature dealing with the return of microfinance investment in the financial markets. We study the performance of public microfinance investment vehicles (MIVs). Microfinance is an asset class with a double bottom line: social and financial returns have to be generated. Despite a significant currency risk, we find that the integration of microfinance assets diversifies the investor’s risks and improves the efficient frontier. We conclude that microfinance institutions, via investment vehicles, are likely to attract capital from socially responsible investors seeking new investment opportunities.