Three essays in applied financial econometrics

Efficiency is perhaps one of the most important concepts associated with the functioning of markets in modern economies. When markets are efficient, economic theory suggests that the prices we observe reflect the relative scarcity of resources; and hence, effectively channel those resources to their most productive use. The primary objective of this dissertation is to investigate the efficiency property of the U.S. housing market for single-family homes and the stock market. It does so through the application of advanced techniques in financial and time series econometrics. In relation to the housing market, the empirical evidence is consistent with the version of the efficiency market hypothesis which suggests that asset prices follow a random walk. However, in relation in relation to the stock market, the empirical evidence is inconsistent with the version of the efficient market hypothesis that attributes price changes to the random arrival of new information. For both markets, however, we do not find the empirical evidence to be definitive. In the context of the crisis that emerged in the subprime mortgage segment of U.S. housing market in 2006, this dissertation also investigates the interdependency structure of the housing market as a secondary objective. The main result suggests that home prices do not comove systematically over time.