"Certainty Amid Uncertainty: Relationship between Aggregate Uncertainty and Individual Expectations", joint with Poramapa Poonpakdee, accepted in the International Journal of Forecasting (data and replication package here), 2026
We study how individual income expectations adjust in times of high macroeconomic uncertainty, using survey data of professional forecasters and households. We find that mean expectations decrease disproportionally with rising macroeconomic uncertainty, as predicted by most economics and finance models. However, the relationship between macroeconomic uncertainty and individual subjective uncertainty is more nuanced. While there is a positive correlation for professional forecasters, this is not the case for households. In fact, for households the correlation is often negative, contrary to what is typically predicted. In addition, subjective uncertainty shows significant persistence, even after controlling for macroeconomic and individual factors. We demonstrate that our empirical results can be reconciled with Max-Min expected utility and smooth ambiguity preferences. This has implications for economics and finance research aiming to study periods of high macroeconomic uncertainty.
“Fake News Zealots: Effect of Perception of News on Online Sharing Behaviour”, joint with t'Serstevens, F. and Grigoriev, A., Frontiers in Psychology, 2022
This paper studies the relationship between sharing and believing news in a simulated social media environment. The main finding highlights that believing news is an important factor in order to sharing them, but it is not the only one.
“Modeling Diverse Expectations in an Aggregated New Keynesian Model”, joint with Mordecai Kurz and Howei Wu, Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Volume 37, Issue 8, August 2013
This paper shows the amplification role that uncertainty-based, diverse beliefs have on economic volatility. As a consequence of these beliefs the role of the monetary policy maker is more nuanced and complex than when volatility arises as a result of only exogenous shocks.
"Diverse risk preferences and heterogeneous expectations in an asset pricing model", joint with Thomas Gomez, forthcoming in the Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, 2026;
In this paper we study the consequences for heterogenous expectations, of agents having different preferences of risk aversion, leading to different choices in the mean variance space of asset returns. It turns out that the system can become chaotic under part of the parameter space, with endogenous changes even in the absence of shocks.
"Asset prices and Exchange rates: A time dependent approach", chapter in book: Convincing Economics - Essays in honour of Prof. Dr. Clemens Kool, published by Maastricht University Press, Editors: Jaap Bos and Mark Sanders, 2025
“The Central Bank Governor and Interest Rate Setting by Committee”, joint with van Ommeren, Emile, CESifo Economic Studies Volume 67, Issue 2, June 2021
This paper, summarized in some detail in the Financial Post, shows the relevance central bank governors have on mmonetary policy, even when within a committee. As a result, characteristics of the governors become relevant also for monetary policy.
“The Relation between Corporate and Government Debt Maturity in Europe” joint with Lugo, Stefano, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, 54(5), pp. 2119-2140 (2019)
This paper extends research done on the US financial markets to the Euro Area. We show that when governments in the Euro Area borrow funds at long maturities, they incentivize firms in the Euro Area to borrow at shorter maturities. Therefore this result holds internationally in the EA financial market as it does within the US market.
“Exploring multi-scale variability in hotspot mapping: A case study on housing prices and crime occurrences in Heerlen”, joint with Fabiënne Kortas, Alexander Grigoriev, Cities, Volume 128, 2022, 103814, ISSN 0264-2751
In this paper we study the relationship between house prices and crime within Heerlen, NL. We especially explore the stability of the relationship at different scales, highlighting new insight into theoretical mechanisms.
“African trade dynamics: is China a different trading partner?” Joint with Paul De Grauwe and Romain Houssa, Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, Volume 10, Issue 1, 2012
In this paper we show that China has been trading with several African countries based on consistent choices of import/export and national traits of trading partners.
"Foreign exchange and stock market: two related markets?", book chapter in "Globalisation New Challenges" edited by Isabel Vieira, 2010; Part of ISBN: 978-3-8383-6250-2
In this paper I show that the foreign exchange market and the stock markets are tied in a non linear way through market expectations.
Principal Investigator for the external project: Social media Communication for Regional Analysis and Provincial Expertise (S.C.R.A.P.E.): project co-funded by UM and the Province of Limburg on topics and linguistics of communication in the region of Limburg, under the Provincial Agenda of Digital Society (2018 and 2019)
The surprising effect of social distancing on our perception: Coping with uncertainty, G Piccillo, J Van Den Hurk; Covid Economics, 2020, 132
2025: Dr. Freija van Lent - Mathematical Contributions to the Theory of Change
2025: Dr. Siavash Mohades - Uncertainty, Investment and Firm Dynamics
2024: Dr. Poramapa Poonpakdee - Making sense of uncertainty in macroeconomic models
2022: Dr. Thomas Gomez - The roles of uncertainty and beliefs in the economy
To see the complete list of our department's seminars follow this link