▼ By employing quarterly data from the period of 2001 through 2008, this thesis tries to test the effect of four determinants on China's demand for international reserves. The four determinants are international reserves variability, GDP, average propensity to import and interest rate spread. Empirical results shows China's holding of international reserves experiences economies of scale. Of these four determinants, international reserves variability has the most significant positive impact on the demand for international reserves. GDP has the second largest positive impact on the demand for international reserves, and the average propensity to import has much less positive impact than the former two. As measured by interest rate spread, opportunity cost of holding reserves has a small negative effect on China's demand for international reserves. If Chinese monetary authority does not want the reserves to grow further, constraints must be put on the determinants which have a positive effect on demand for reserves. While, as for opportunity cost, no substantial adjustments need to be undertaken if interest rate spread increases. Advisors/Committee Members: Doroodian, Khosrow.

▼ This thesis aimed to investigate the relationships among the following variables: U.S. corn prices, U.S. ethanol production, U.S. soybean prices and world oil prices. After performing econometric tests, I chose the model that best fits my data. The Vector Autoregression (VAR) Model with one lag showed interesting results about links among the variables. First, U.S. corn prices seem to be negatively linked to U.S. ethanol production. In other words, an increase in corn prices is likely to drive ethanol production down. The reverse relationship, between ethanol production and corn prices, does not seem to be significant. Secondly, the world oil price showed to be negatively linked to corn and soybean prices. A rise in oil prices is likely to lead to a drop in corn and soybean prices. After running an Impulse Response Function, I found that a shock in the corn price has a temporary effect on ethanol production. Similarly, a shock in the world oil price leads to a temporary drop in corn and soybean prices. In other words, ethanol production, the corn price and the soybean price would eventually return to their initial levels within a ten-month period. Advisors/Committee Members: Jayasuriya, Shamila.