雅思阅读真题（Part 2）
Part 2 · 考频：高频 · 最近考试：2023.1.7
A
How one university collected the data to try and answer this question
It all began in 1958 with a phone call from Louis Engel, a banker at Merrill Lynch, a US-based financial management company, who wanted to know how investors in shares had performed relative to investors in other assets such as low risk investments with guaranteed returns. 'I don't know, but if you gave me $50,000 I could find out,' replied Jim Lorie, a dean at the University of Chicago's business school. Louis Engel soon agreed to provide the funding, and more. The result, in 1960, was the launch of the University's Center for Research in Security Prices. Half a century later CRSP (pronounced 'crisp') data are everywhere. They provided the foundation of at least one-third of all empirical research in finance over the past 40 years, according to a presentation at a symposium held this month. They probably influenced much of the rest.
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答案：a request and a far-reaching result
原文定位：It all began in 1958 with a phone call from Louis Engel, a banker at Merrill Lynch;who wanted to know how investors in shares had performed relative to investors in other assets such as low risk investments with guaranteed returns;Louis Engel soon agreed to provide the funding;The result, in 1960, was the launch of the University's Center for Research in Security Prices. Half a century later CRSP data are everywhere. They provided the foundation of at least one-third of all empirical research in finance over the past 40 years;They probably influenced much of the rest
答案：difficulties in collecting CRSP data
原文定位：Getting the CRSP data together was a tough process in what were then the early days of computers
答案：initial findings of the CRSP project
原文定位：they reported that the annual compound return on the shares over the entire 35-year period was (depending on the tax status of the investor) between 6.8% and 9%;the study claimed that the rate of return on shares was 'substantially higher than for alternative investment media, providing the first empirical support for the still popular idea that shares outperform other investments over the long run;Fisher and Lorie also observed that many people chose to invest in assets with lower returns because they were cautious by nature, and were concerned about the risk of loss inherent in investing in the stock market
答案：technological developments improve CRSP data
原文定位：Myron Scholes;ensured the database was both kept up to date and made readily available to academic economists everywhere;In turn, this resource became ever more useful as computing power became more affordable;The CRSP database has since been expanded to include a full range of different types of investments. It has been replicated across the world
答案：CRSP data not always being a useful basis for investment
原文定位：He found that over a lengthy period share prices tended to rise and fall randomly, without showing much of a pattern;meaning there are no predictable movements in prices for smart investors to exploit;Fama did concede that there was some evidence of temporary short-term predictability in share prices;In theory, such anomalies are potentially lucrative for investors, but;no sooner are such anomalies discovered and reported in journals than they typically disappear
答案：too much data for people to have an overall understanding
原文定位：the sheer volume of material means that financial economists are becoming increasingly specialized, which may have costs as well as benefits;Some economists worry that much of this statistical analysis is creating some interference that drowns out serious thinking about the big questions;He worries that academic departments are full of economists who are so specialized in data analysis that they fail to see and understand the whole
答案：what the future holds
原文定位：At CRSP's 50th anniversary symposium, plans were unveiled to publish indicators on an expanding range of investments, as well as for growth and value stocks;These indicators, CRSP claims, will be more academically rigorous and cheaper than existing ones;For believers in the efficiency of markets, that should be enough to ensure CRSP's continuing success
答案：Robert Shiller
原文定位：Robert Shiller;feels that with the creation of the CRSP database economists suddenly believed that finance had become scientific. According to Shiller, conventional ideas about investing and financial markets - and about their vulnerabilities - seemed out-of-date to the new empiricists. He worries that academic departments are full of economists who are so specialized in data analysis that they fail to see and understand the whole
答案：Fischer and Lorie
原文定位：Fisher and Lorie also observed that many people chose to invest in assets with lower returns because they were cautious by nature, and were concerned about the risk of loss inherent in investing in the stock market
答案：Eugene Fama
原文定位：He found that over a lengthy period share prices tended to rise and fall randomly, without showing much of a pattern;meaning there are no predictable movements in prices for smart investors to exploit. Fama did concede that there was some evidence of temporary short-term predictability in share prices, however
答案：banker
原文定位：It all began in 1958 with a phone call from Louis Engel, a banker at Merrill Lynch, a US-based financial management company, who wanted to know how investors in shares had performed relative to investors in other assets such as low risk investments with guaranteed returns
答案：computers
原文定位：Getting the CRSP data together was a tough process in what were then the early days of computers
答案：paper
原文定位：Up to three million pieces of information on all the shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange between 1926 and 1960 were transferred from paper in the exchange's archive to magnetic tape