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Featuring insights from prominent academics, financial experts, policymakers and journalists, this volume examines the fundamentals behind volatility in today´s equity markets. Readers will find a deeper knowledge of the dynamic process of price formation, market structure and regulatory environment.

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Volatility is very much with us in today´s equity markets. Day-to-day price swings are often large and intra-day volatility elevated, especially at market openings and closings. What explains this? What does this say about the quality of our markets? Can short-period volatility be controlled by better market design and a more effective use of electronic technology? Featuring insights from an international array of prominent academics, financial markets experts, policymakers and journalists, the book addresses these and other questions concerning this timely topic. In so doing, we seek deeper knowledge of the dynamic process of price formation, and of the market structure and regulatory environment within which our markets function.

The Zicklin School of Business Financial Markets Series presents the insights emerging from a sequence of conferences hosted by the Zicklin School at Baruch College for industry professionals, regulators, and scholars. Much more than historical documents, the transcripts from the conferences are edited for clarity, perspective and context; material and comments from subsequent interviews with the panelists and speakers are integrated for a complete thematic presentation. Each book is focused on a well delineated topic, but all deliver broader insights into the quality and efficiency of the U.S. equity markets and the dynamic forces changing them.

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Preface.- Conference sponsors.- List of participants.- Intra-Day Volatility: The Empirical Evidence.- Opening Address: Reto Francioni, CEO, Deutsche Boerse.- Mid-Day Address: Robert Engle, Nobel Laureate 2003.- Volatility and Technology.- Volatility and Market Structure.- Implications for Trading.- Closing Dialog: Robert Greifeld, CEO, The NASDAQ OMX Group, with Erin Burnett, Anchor and Reporter, CNBC.- Participant Biographies.- Index

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Robert A. Schwartz is Marvin M. Speiser Professor of Finance and University Distinguished Professor in the Zicklin School of Business, Baruch College, CUNY. Before joining the Baruch faculty in 1997, he was Professor of Finance and Economics and Yamaichi Faculty Fellow at New York University´s Leonard N. Stern School of Business, where he had been a member of the faculty since 1965. Professor Schwartz received his PhD in economics from Columbia University. He has published over fifty journal articles and fifteen books. He has served as a consultant to various market centers including the New York Stock Exchange, the American Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, and Deutsche Börse, and has been an associate editor for several finance journals. In 1995, Professor Schwartz was named the first chairman of NASDAQ´s Economic Advisory Board, where he served until the spring of 1999.

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