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(Ir)rational Exuberance: Optimism, Ambiguity, and Risk

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  • Anat Bracha
  • Donald Brown

Abstract

The equilibrium prices in asset markets, as stated by Keynes (1930): "...will be fixed at the point at which the sales of the bears and the purchases of the bulls are balanced." We propose a descriptive theory of finance explicating Keynes' claim that the prices of assets today equilibrate the optimism and pessimism of bulls and bears regarding the payoffs of assets tomorrow. This equilibration of optimistic and pessimistic beliefs of investors is a consequence of investors maximizing Keynesian utilities subject to budget constraints defined by market prices and investor's income. The set of Keynesian utilities is a new class of non-expected utility functions representing the preferences of investors for optimism or pessimism, defined as the composition of the investor's preferences for risk and her preferences for ambiguity. Bulls and bears are defined respectively as optimistic and pessimistic investors. (Ir)rational exuberance is an intrinsic property of asset markets where bulls and bears are endowed with Keynesian utilities.
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Suggested Citation

  • Anat Bracha & Donald Brown, 2013. "(Ir)rational Exuberance: Optimism, Ambiguity, and Risk," Levine's Working Paper Archive 786969000000000782, David K. Levine.
    • Handle: RePEc:cla:levarc:786969000000000782
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Magnus, J.R. & Neudecker, H., 1985. "Matrix differential calculus with applications to simple, Hadamard, and Kronecker products," Other publications TiSEM 1b2f1740-bfd1-4ea5-986c-9, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Bracha, Anat & Brown, Donald J., 2012. "Affective decision making: A theory of optimism bias," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 67-80.
    3. Chris Shannon & William R. Zame, 2002. "Quadratic Concavity and Determinacy of Equilibrium," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(2), pages 631-662, March.
    4. Daniel Ellsberg, 1961. "Risk, Ambiguity, and the Savage Axioms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 75(4), pages 643-669.
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    Cited by:

    1. Robert J. Shiller, 2014. "Speculative Asset Prices (Nobel Prize Lecture)," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1936, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    2. Robert J. Shiller, 2014. "Speculative Asset Prices," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(6), pages 1486-1517, June.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • G02 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Behavioral Finance: Underlying Principles
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions

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