Essays in Macroeconomic Experiments and Asset Market Experiments

摘要

In my dissertation, titled Essays in Macroeconomic Experiments and Asset Market Experiments, I explore and test the monetary search models with laboratory experiments and compare trading institutions in asset market experiments. My dissertation consists of three chapters.;In the first chapter of my dissertation, Government Interventions and International Currencies: An Experimental Approach, I integrate theory and experiments to explore a two-country two-currency economic system in a laboratory environment. I test how government interventions affect currencies' international status. To test the effects of two different government interventions, three experimental treatments are designed. The experimental results are mostly consistent with the theoretical predictions: the traded quantities and trade proposals involving both types of currencies are significantly larger when there is no legal restrictions on sellers. However, both government interventions tested in the experiments failed to change the international status of certain currencies and the currency regime.;In the second chapter, Over-The-Counter versus Double Auction in Asset Market Experiments, I compare the performance of an Over-The-Counter Market versus a Double Auction Market in asset market experiments. The main difference between the Over-The-Counter market and the Double Auction market is that in the Double Auction market, participants can see all available bids and offers and they do not need to specify the receiver when making a bid or offer. Both trading institutions are widely used in the field. In this study, I test whether there exists a difference in trade prices, trade volume and bubble measures between these two trading institutions in asset market experiments. The experimental results show that the traded prices, trade volumes are significantly lower in the OTC market than in the DA market.The bubble measures commonly used in asset market experiments are also significantly lower in the OTC market than in the DA market.;The third chapter of my dissertation, Decentralized Money Supply in a Monetary Search Model is motivated by the rising of crypto-currencies such as Bitcoin. It provides a monetary search model with decentralized money supply where the only available money is not issued by a single authority but possibly by all agents. Under assumptions about the cost function of minting, a dynamic monetary equilibrium is characterized. This model shows that even with decentralized money supply, money can still be valued and the economy will reach a steady state monetary equilibrium with constant value of money eventually.