This book rehabilitates beta as a definition of systemic risk by using particle physics to evaluate discrete components of financial risk. Much of the frustration with beta stems from the failure to disaggregate its discrete components; conventional beta is often treated as if it were "atomic" in the original Greek sense: uncut and indivisible. By analogy to the Standard Model of particle physics theory's three generations of matter and the three-way interaction of quarks, Chen divides beta as the fundamental unit of systemic financial risk into three matching pairs of "baryonic" components. The resulting econophysics of beta explains no fewer than three of the most significant anomalies and puzzles in mathematical finance. Moreover, the model's three-way analysis of systemic risk connects the mechanics of mathematical finance with phenomena usually attributed to behavioral influences on capital markets. Adding consideration of volatility and correlation, and of the distinct cash flow and discount rate components of systematic risk, harmonizes mathematical finance with labor markets, human capital, and macroeconomics.

This book proposes a new capital asset pricing model dubbed the ZCAPM that outperforms other popular models in empirical tests using US stock returns. The ZCAPM is derived from Fischer Black’s well-known zero-beta CAPM, itself a more general form of the famous capital asset pricing model (CAPM) by 1990 Nobel Laureate William Sharpe and others. It is widely accepted that the CAPM has failed in its theoretical relation between market beta risk and average stock returns, as numerous studies have shown that it does not work in the real world with empirical stock return data. The upshot of the CAPM’s failure is that many new factors have been proposed by researchers. However, the number of factors proposed by authors has steadily increased into the hundreds over the past three decades. This new ZCAPM is a path-breaking asset pricing model that is shown to outperform popular models currently in practice in finance across different test assets and time periods. Since asset pricing is central to the field of finance, it can be broadly employed across many areas, including investment analysis, cost of equity analyses, valuation, corporate decision making, pension portfolio management, etc. The ZCAPM represents a revolution in finance that proves the CAPM as conceived by Sharpe and others is alive and well in a new form, and will certainly be of interest to academics, researchers, students, and professionals of finance, investing, and economics.

Econophysics applies the techniques of physics and nonlinear dynamics to complex economic problems. This essay invokes econophysics in order to introduce a theoretical model that aspires to encompass all essential features of real financial markets. It summarizes the central argument of my book, Econophysics and Capital Asset Pricing: Splitting the Atom of Systematic Risk (Palgrave Macmillan 2017). By analogy to quantum chromodynamics and other aspects of the Standard Model of particle physics, that book -- and this essay -- seek to rehabilitate the capital asset pricing model splitting beta, the basic unit of systematic risk, into subatomic (or “baryonic”) components.This essay then transcends the limitations of Econophysics and Capital Asset Pricing by offering preliminary thoughts on the application of physics to other dimensions of finance. Although Econophysics and Capital Asset Pricing addressed the diffusion of financial information and intertemporal asset pricing, it did not incorporate those subjects into a consciously physical framework. This essay proposes to integrate the baryonic model of beta, essentially a spatial representation of comovement between individual firms, capital markets, and the real economy, with the informational and temporal dimensions of finance.

The Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) and the mean-variance (M-V) rule, which are based on classic expected utility theory, have been heavily criticized theoretically and empirically. The advent of behavioral economics, prospect theory and other psychology-minded approaches in finance challenges the rational investor model from which CAPM and M-V derive. Haim Levy argues that the tension between the classic financial models and behavioral economics approaches is more apparent than real. This book aims to relax the tension between the two paradigms. Specifically, Professor Levy shows that although behavioral economics contradicts aspects of expected utility theory, CAPM and M-V are intact in both expected utility theory and cumulative prospect theory frameworks. There is furthermore no evidence to reject CAPM empirically when ex-ante parameters are employed. Professionals may thus comfortably teach and use CAPM and behavioral economics or cumulative prospect theory as coexisting paradigms.

The problem addressed in this dissertation research was the inability of the single-factor capital asset pricing model (CAPM) to identify relevant risk factors that investors consider in forming their return expectations for investing in individual stocks. Identifying the appropriate risk factors is important for investment decision making and is pertinent to the formation of stocks' prices in the stock market. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine theoretical and empirical validity of the CAPM and to develop and test a multifactor model to address and resolve the empirical shortcomings of the single-factor CAPM. To verify the empirical validity of the standard CAPM and of the multifactor model, five hypotheses were developed and tested against historical monthly data for U.S. public companies. Testing the CAPM hypothesis revealed that the explanatory power of the overall stock market rate of return in explaining individual stock's expected rates of return is very weak, suggesting the existence of other risk factors. Testing of the other hypotheses verified that the implied volatility of the overall market as a systematic risk factor and the companies' size and financial leverage as nonsystematic risk factors are important in determining stock's expected returns and investors should consider these factors in their investment decisions. The findings of this research have important implications for social change. The outcome of this study can change the way individual and institutional investors as well as corporations make investment decisions and thus change the equilibrium prices in the stock market. These changes in turn could lead to significant changes in the resource allocation in the economy, in the economy's production capacity and production composition, and in the employment structure of the society.