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131. What Makes Investors Over or Underweight? Explaining International Appetites for Foreign Equities

Author:
Carol C. Bertaut and Linda S. Kole
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Abstract:
Using data from the IMF Coordinated Portfolio Investment Surveys conducted in 2001, we analyze the determinants of 31 countries' international equity holdings. We show that investors in all countries underweight U.S. equities in their portfolios, many by more than they underweight foreign equities in general. Such behavior is surprising given the common perception of the United States as a desirable investment destination due to its well-developed legal and regulatory environment. Instead we find that investors in some countries are overweight in equities from other countries with which they have close regional or political ties. Such ties, along with distance, trade, issuance of U.S. ADRs or cross-listing on the London Stock exchange, market concentration, and estimated betas help explain patterns of diversification. However, even when all these variables are included, we find significant fixed effects for most countries, suggesting that a considerable amount of cross-country variation in investment positions and in home bias remains to be explained. Our work confirms previous findings and extends results most completely documented for the United States to other major investor countries. But it also suggests caution should be used when interpreting results derived from studies of one or a few countries.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States and London

132. Special Policy Forum Report: Operation Iraqi Freedom -- One Year On

Author:
Michael Knights
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On March 15, 2004, Michael Knights addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Dr. Knights, the Mendelow defense fellow at the Institute, is a frequent contributor to Jane's Intelligence Review and author of a forthcoming Institute monograph on Persian Gulf security. He has a doctorate from the Department of War Studies at King's College, London, where he wrote his dissertation on U.S. military operations in Iraq from Operation Desert Storm through Operation Iraqi Freedom. The following is a rapporteur's summary of his remarks.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Washington, Middle East, London, and Arab Countries

133. Post-Arafat Transition: Upcoming Palestinian Elections

Author:
David Makovsky
Publication Date:
11-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
As the Palestinians seek to sort out the post-Arafat succession, ostensibly the first order of business is presidential elections. The Palestinian Authority (PA) has said it would hold presidential elections on January 9, 2005. However, making the election successful may require prior commitment to a cease fire, which in turn requires understandings among Palestinian factions accepted by Israel; this would be necessary to ensure peaceful conditions on the ground and the absence of Israeli military interruption during the election itself and the preceding campaign. According to the London-based Arab daily al-sharq al-Awsat, Mahmoud Abbas (a.k.a. Abu Mazen), former Palestinian premier and newly named chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization drove home this point in two rounds of talks with Palestinian rejectionist groups over the last week. Abu Mazen is quoted as saying, "We need a safe, secure and calm internal situation, so we can hold elections. There is no possibility of holding elections while we are in a state of war and violent struggle. Elections need a secure environment that will allow for it to be done in a free and fair manner. Elections require freedom of movement and transportation to reach the ballot boxes and ensuring the participation of citizens." Indeed, there have been a variety of quotes from rejectionist leaders saying they may be willing to adhere to a unilateral ceasefire, but so far, there has been no definitive word from the main rejectionist group, Hamas. There have been a variety of reports that Hamas would agree to a ceasefire, but it seems that it will only if Israel accepts it as well. Israel may respect a truce brokered by Egypt among the Palestinian factions just as it consented to one during the summer of 2003. At the same time, it will be concerned that its acceptance not be exploited by undisciplined radicals in a way that ties Israel's hands and makes it vulnerable to attack. The last ceasefire fell apart because of differing understandings of its terms among the key protagonists. Unless that lesson is learned another truce is likely to fall apart, too. Another prerequisite for elections is that Abu Mazen needs to receive the nomination of the dominant Fatah party. Abu Mazen's nomination could easily be a formality, since so far, there is no real opposition. Yet, Fatah elections, while recognized by many as necessary, might be resisted by an Old Guard seeking to preserve its power. The issue of Fatah elections has been a dominant motif of the Young Guard. They believe that a combination of elections on all levels will have the cleansing effect of ridding the PA of old cronies of Yasser Arafat, who were beneficiaries of corruption. Moreover, it will inject new blood into a calcified system.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, London, Palestine, and Czech Republic

134. Institutions for Fiscal Stability (Financial Integration in Europe and Asia)

Author:
Barry Eichengreen and Yung Chul Park
Publication Date:
01-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies (IES), UC Berkeley
Abstract:
One of the most striking aspects of Europe's recent development has been the growth and integration of financial markets. Bond markets have grown explosively since the advent of the euro. Cross border transactions in government bonds have risen sharply with the emergence of the German bund as a benchmark asset, while the volume of corporate bond issues has grown even more dramatically. Securities markets are consolidating around London and Frankfurt, which are competing for the mantle of Europe's dominant financial center. This rapid market integration has raised questions about the viability of Europe's traditional model of bank-based financial intermediation, causing commercial and investment banks to respond with a wave of mergers and acquisitions.
Topic:
Economics and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Europe, Asia, London, and Germany

135. GFN-SSR Advisory Group Meeting

Author:
Ann Fitz-Gerald
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Global Facilitation Network for Security Sector Reform
Abstract:
Robin Luckham opened the meeting by thanking all members for attending, particularly after two busy days spent in London at the SSR International Forum. He emphasised how well the Forum had gone and how successful the team had been with the level of participation, bearing in mind the current political uncertainty.
Topic:
Security and Defense Policy
Political Geography:
London

136. Deaths in Wars and Conflicts Between 1945 and 2000

Author:
Milton Leitenberg
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies
Abstract:
"A Beastly Century": It was a phrase used by Margaret Drabble, a British novelist, in an address to the Royal Society of Literature in London, on December 14, 2000. But of course it was no more than a human century. In 1994, the historian Eric Hobsbawm wrote that 187 million people were "killed or allowed to die by human decision" in what he called the "short century"-a period of about 75 years from 1914 to 1991. The period chosen by Hobsbawm spanned the beginning of World War I to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Soviet occupation of its Eastern European "allies." Given that Hobsbawm is a Marxist historian, his choice of the category "by human decision" was particularly significant. However, the sum that he provided was low by just about 29 million people for the full twentieth century, during which approximately 216 million people died in wars and conflict and, in very large numbers, "by human decision." The data to support this statement are presented in the following pages and in a detailed table beginning on page 43 of this document. The purpose of this study is to provide the derivation of the numbers in that table and to briefly discuss several instances in the past decade or so when large numbers of deaths could unquestionably have been averted by international action.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Peace Studies, and War
Political Geography:
Soviet Union and London

137. Special Policy Forum Report: An Arab Liberal Looks at the Post-Saddam Middle East

Author:
Hazem Saghie
Publication Date:
05-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
On May 8, 2003, Hazem Saghie addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Mr. Saghie has been the editor of the weekly supplement of the London-based daily al-Hayat for the past fifteen years and served fourteen years in Beirut for the Lebanon daily al-Safir. He is currently a visiting fellow at the Institute and editor of The Predicament of the Individual in the Middle East (Saqi Books, 2000). The following is a rapporteur's summary of his remarks.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Washington, Middle East, London, Lebanon, Beirut, and Czech Republic

138. Bush and Blair: Tensions in the Relationship

Author:
Simon Henderson
Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
This week, speaking at the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), U.S. secretary of state Colin Powell, after mentioning the war in Iraq, declared, "no challenge, no opportunity, is more important, more pressing, than the quest to put an end to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians." Such wording is similar to sentiments expressed in recent weeks by British prime minister Tony Blair. However, there are indications that Washington's view about Israeli-Palestinian issues sharply differs from that of London.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Iraq, America, Europe, Middle East, Israel, London, Palestine, and Arabia

139. Bolivia: A Revolt That Leads Nowhere

Author:
Mark Falcoff
Publication Date:
12-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
Joseph Conrad's novel Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard (1905), considered by many the Polish master's best novel, is set in the fictitious South American country of Costaguana. During the colonial period and for decades thereafter, the republic flourished thanks to the existence of a rich vein of silver mined since the early days of the Spanish conquest. At the time the novel opens, however, Costaguana has fallen on hard times because the most accessible deposits of the precious ore have been exhausted; massive new investment and technology are required to return the mine to full operation. Anglo-Costaguanan Charles Gould finds the necessary financing in London and New York, and almost as if by magic the resumption of mining breathes new life and progress into the republic.
Topic:
International Relations, International Trade and Finance, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
New York, London, South America, and Bolivia

140. Behind the French Tanker Bombing: Yemen's Ongoing Problems with Islamist Terrorism

Author:
Jonathan Schanzer
Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
Since September 2001, Yemen has worked hard to shed its image as a hotbed of Islamist terrorism. That image, however, was reinforced when London's al-Sharq al-Awsat Arabic daily reported that the Islamic Army of Aden (IAA, or Aden-Abyan Islamic Army), an al-Qaeda affiliate, claimed responsibility for an explosion that crippled a French tanker on October 6 in the Yemeni harbor of Mina' al-Dabba. Moreover, a recent letter allegedly written by Osama bin Laden praises the "bold heroic jihad operations . . . against the crusader's oil tanker." The attack, which killed one crewman, underscores Yemen's importance as an area of concern in the U.S. government's "war on terror."
Topic:
Security, Religion, Terrorism, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, London, and Arab Countries