Risk Takers


Book Description

Risk Takers: Uses and Abuses of Financial Derivatives goes to the heart of the arcane and largely misunderstood world of derivative finance and makes it accessible to everyone—even novice readers. Marthinsen takes us behind the scenes, into the back alleyways of corporate finance and derivative trading, to provide a bird’s-eye view of the most shocking financial disasters of the past quarter century. The book draws on real-life stories to explain how financial derivatives can be used to create or to destroy value. In an approachable, non-technical manner, Marthinsen brings these financial derivatives situations to life, fully exploring the context of each event, evaluating their outcomes, and bridging the gap between theory and practice.










Pricing and Forecasting Carbon Markets


Book Description

This book applies the multidisciplinary approaches of econometrics, statistics, finance and artificial intelligence for pricing and forecasting the carbon market in the context of managerial issues. It explores the related issues of pricing and forecasting the carbon market using theoretical models and empirical analyses, demonstrating how the carbon market, as a policy-based artificial market, is complex and influenced by both the market mechanisms and the external heterogeneous environments. By integrating the features of analytical systems, it offers insights to further our scientific understanding of the pricing mechanism and the variable laws governing the carbon market. Moreover, it lays a foundation for dealing with climate change in China and constructing a national carbon market there. Ultimately, it actively contributes to the energy saving and CO2 emission reduction promoted by the carbon market. The carbon market, represented by the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), is a cost-effective measure for tackling climate change. Furthermore, pricing and forecasting carbon market has been one of the research focuses in the fields of energy and climate change. As a policy tool of the trading mechanism, the carbon market offers a great institutional innovation for coping with climate change. Due to its multiple advantages including saving costs and environment protection, and political feasibility, more and more countries including China have applied the carbon market for carbon dioxide (CO2) emission reduction. Accurately understanding the pricing mechanism and mastering the fluctuating law of carbon market is essential to build a national carbon market for China.




Renewable Energy Uptake in Urban Latin America


Book Description

This book explores the perplexing question of how to increase sustainable energy technology use in the developing world, and specifically focuses on two megacities within Latin America. Renewable Energy Uptake in Urban Latin America examines the market and uptake of two sustainable energy technologies (solar water heaters and biogas to produce electricity) in two locations, Mexico City, Mexico and São Paulo, Brazil in the 2000s. Drawing from three systems-based analytical frameworks – including one developed by the author for the purpose of this study – the book examines the varying factors affecting the implementation of renewable energy technologies (RETs) in urban Latin America. These frameworks emphasize the importance of examining socio-political dimensions; rather than conventional explanations that focus on technical and economic aspects only. By doing so, the research improves explanations about renewable energy technology (RET) adoption in the global South. These findings are useful for scholars, policy makers and practitioners working on RET adoption; resulting in a book which helps to inform wider debates regarding innovation, decarbonization, sustainability transitions and energy system change. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of energy transitions, energy policy, development studies and science and technology studies.




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