Title: Portfolio Choices, Asset Returns and Wealth Inequality:  Evidence from China

Abstract: 

This paper empirically investigates the relationship between household porfolio choices and wealth distribution with micro-survey data in China. The decreasing relative risk aversion combined with high payoff of risky assets magnifies wealth inequality among the population. The return for household portfolio increases with wealth, with the well-heeled gains more over the poor in the capital market. This therefore serves as a reason for lack of social mobility.  

Biography:

Zhang Linwan is the lecturer of school of finance for Capital University of Economics and Business. Her research interest is household finance and empirical asset pricing. She has been a visiting research scholar in Einaudi Institute of Economics and Finance in Italy and Columbia University in United States. Her works have been published in   Financial Research Journal and Economic Systems.