PhD Tez Savunusu, Ahmet Usta

PhD THESIS DEFENSE
ESSAYS in MACRO-FINANCE

Ahmet Usta, Ph.D. in Business Administration Candidate
Date: Thursday, December 26, 2019
Time: 12:30
Location: Room 301, Business Administration Building,
                 Özyeğin University, Çekmeköy, İstanbul

PhD Thesis Committee:
Prof. Dr. Ümit Özlale, Advisor, Özyeğin University
Prof. Mübariz Hasanov, Okan University
Dr. Levent Güntay, Özyeğin Üniversity
Dr. Özgün Ekici, Özyeğin Üniversity
Dr. Burak Alparslan Eroğlu, Bilgi University

Abstract:
This dissertation includes three essays within macro-finance literature ranging from international macroeconomics, to labor market and to housing market dynamics. While the focus of first essay is more on international, particular focus of last two chapters is on the Turkish economy. In the first essay, we examine the impacts of monetary policies, stock market volatilities, and banking conditions in center economies including the US, UK, and Europe on macroeconomic and financial performance of a sample of emerging economies, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Turkey, and Indonesia over the period between 2009:M1 and 2017:12. Using dynamic factor modelling approach, we find significant roles of asset purchase program by the Fed, volatility conditions in the UK, and European banking conditions in shaping the global financial and economic conditions. Second essay studies the role of sentiment, which is aggregate investor attitude, in explaining asset prices within housing market framework. We uncover the long run relationship among sentiment, housing credit and prices, and supply in Turkish housing market over the period of 2010:01 and 2018:06. We find that the sentiment is significant in forecasting housing credit and supply in the short run. The sentiment is also a significant factor at work in explaining the housing prices and supply of dwellings in the long run. The third essay is at the intersection of corporate finance and labor market. We examine the effect of corporate decision on real economic activity by considering the role of capital raised at IPO on employment decision and use of funds on corporate decisions during and in post-IPO periods for firms listed in Borsa Istanbul (BIST) between 2000 and 2016. We find that accessing public equity market has positive impact on employment growth. Firms invest more in capital expenditures because their borrowing capacities improve upon accessing equity market.

Short Bio:
Ahmet Usta received his bachelor’s degree in Economics (2008) from Uludağ University, Bursa. He obtained his M.Sc. in Economics (2012) and M.A. in Economics (2014) from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA, and Bilkent University, Ankara, respectively. He attended to one-year course phase in Ph.D. program in Economics (2015) at University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria. He is pursuing his Ph.D. degree in Business, with a specialization on finance under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Ümit Özlale, Faculty of Business Administration, Özyeğin University. His current research is related to the topics at the intersection of macroeconomics and finance. Particularly, He is interested in the monetary policies and global liquidity conditions, and their effects on real economy and financial markets. He has served as a Research Assistant in the Department of Economics at Recep Tayyip Erdoğan University, Rize since 2012.