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This paper analyzes how the use of mass vs. direct advertising can affect the pattern of price and quality competition in a market where two firms compete with vertically differentiated products. We show that, compared to the casewheresellersemployonlymassadvertising,theuseofdatabaseadvertising based on historical sales records improves the competitive position of the lowquality firm, which achieves a larger market share and can obtain higher profits. As a result, the high-quality firm lowers the supply of quality, which decreases thedegreeofproductdifferentiationinthemarketandtriggersstrongpricecompetition,thusdecreasingitsprofitsandincreasingconsumersurplus. Finally,we show that, although database advertising is more cost-efficient than mass advertising, the market distortion in the provision of quality implies that the use of direct advertising can yield a welfare loss.

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The instability of the financial system is likely to occur when particular types of loans surge rather than all types of loans surge at the same time. A preemptive policy response requires a monitoring system based on forecasts by different loan types. The purpose of this study is to forecast household loans bycategorizingintofourtypes:bankmortgageloan,bankcreditloan,non-bank mortgage loan, and non-bank credit loan. Given the fact that there are numerous determinants and forecasting models for household loans, and that the determinants differ depending on the type of household loans, this study sets out the density forecasting algorithm based on Bayesian Machine Learning. which consists of a variable learning process, a model learning process, and a forecasting combination process. We find bank mortgage loans are largely predicted by the loan rates, the volume of apartments to be moved in, and the number of apartment units to be sold. while the key determinants of bank credit loans are the employmentrateandJeon-sepriceindex.Ontheotherhand,thenon-bankmortgage loans are largely determined by the loan rates and the ratio of apartment sales prices relative to Jeon-se prices. The non-bank credit loans are also influencedbynotonlytheemploymentrateandtheJeon-sepriceindexbutalsostock returns.

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This study considers firms�� coarse information about a worker��s possible types in Spence��s (1973) job market signaling model. Using incentive compatibility constraints appropriate to coarse information, we derive perfect Bayesian equilibria, which are refined into a unique equilibrium by invoking an extension of Cho and Kreps�� (1987) Intuitive Criterion. In the unique refined equilibrium, a high-type worker may acquire a higher education level with a lower wage than in Spence��s (1973) model. This implies that education signaling may be less effective signal when firms have coarse information about a worker��s possible types compared to that in Spence (1973).