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We show that since 1994, branching deregulations in the U.S have signi…cantly af- fected the supply of mortgage credit, and ultimately house prices. With deregulation, the number and volume of originated mortgage loans increase, while denial rates fall. But the deregulation has no eect on a placebo sample, formed of mortgage compa- nies that should not be aected by the regulatory change. This sharpens the causal interpretation of our results. Deregulation acts to relax access to mortgage credit, and pushes the demand for house ownership outwards. Interestingly, the fraction of securi- tized mortgage loans remains unchanged through the process. We …nd evidence house prices rise with branching deregulation, and particularly in Metropolitan Areas where construction is inelastic for topographic reasons. We document these results in a large sample of counties across the U.S. We also focus on a reduced cross-section formed by counties on each side of a state border, where a regression discontinuity approach is possible. Our conclusions are strengthened. JEL Classi…cation Numbers: G21, G10, G12

This paper shows that deviations from long-run price stability are optimal in the presence of price stickiness whenever profit and utility flows are discounted at a different rate. In that case, a monetary authority acting under commitment will choose a path for the inflation rate that ends with a non-zero value. Such a property is relevant in a wide range of macroeconomic environments. I first illustrate this by studying optimal monetary policy in a New Keynesian model with a perpetual youth structure. In this setting, profit flows are discounted more heavily than utility flows and the optimal inflation target is equal to 3.2 percent in a baseline calibration of the model. I also show that this property leads to a positive long-run inflation rate in models with firm entry and exit and in environments with search and matching frictions in the labor market and another form of nominal rigidity, wage stickiness.

We exploit detailed transaction and position data for a sample of long-short equity hedge funds to document new facts about the trading activity of sophisticated investors. We find that the initiation of both long and short positions is associated with significant abnormal returns, suggesting that the hedge funds in our sample possess investment skill. In contrast, the closing of long and short positions is followed by return continuation, implying that hedge funds close their positions too early and “leave money on the table.” As we demonstrate with a simple model, this behaviour can be explained by hedge funds being (risk) capital constrained and facing position monitoring costs. Consistent with our model, we document that the return continuation following closing orders is more pronounced when these constraints become more binding (e.g., after negative fund returns or increases in volatility).