Rethinking investment risk
Monday, August 26, 2013 - 06:00
in Mathematics & Economics
Financial innovation is supposed to reduce risk—in theory, at least. Yes, new financial instruments based on the housing market helped cause the financial crisis of 2008. But in the abstract, those same instruments have the potential to spread risk more evenly throughout the marketplace by making it possible to trade debt more extensively, rather than having it concentrated in a relatively few hands.