The literature on behavioral finance and economics has established the notion that the economy and the financial markets are not only driven by fundamentals. Theoretical and practical evidence suggests that the news media have gained in influence over the past years. This book attempts to explain a missing piece of the puzzle in behavioral finance and economics by measuring sentiment in the media and its influence on consumer and investor behavior systematically. Matthias W. Uhl introduces novel and unique datasets to show that quantitative measures of sentiment in the print, TV, and financial markets media work for explaining and predicting private consumption as well as stock markets in the US. Two alternatives, namely news and TV sentiment, for the University of Michigan Index of Consumer Sentiment are introduced, examining their usefulness for explaining and nowcasting US private consumption. Successful trading strategies are built with sentiment from Reuters news to predict US stock markets. The book aims at economists as well as financial market researchers and investors who want to identify alternative ways to explaining and forecasting consumer and investor behavior.

holds a Ph.D. in applied macroeconomics from ETH Zurich, a Master of Science in economic history from Oxford University, and Bachelor of Arts degrees from the American University of Paris. He has worked for Deutsche Bank, UBS Investment Bank and the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at ETH Zurich. Currently, he works in the financial industry.