Analysis of Shared and Sustainable Value Creation of Companies Providing Energy Solutions at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP)

This study was conducted to analyze the shared and sustainable value creation (SSVC) of 33 energy companies selling energy solutions at the base of the pyramid (BoP) markets. SSVC by selling energy technology solutions directed to address the cooking and lighting needs of BoP consumers were the main focus of analysis. Result showed that achieving profitability and affordability is affected by the kind of energy solution that is offered as well as the investment and level of commitment required. However, companies that fulfilled the profitable and affordable solutions were also able to deliver social and environmental sustainability benefits. Social sustainability benefits point to the ability of alleviating poverty by improving productivity or offering cost‐savings. Environmental sustainability benefits point to the energy savings. The findings show that inclusive business strategy is not necessarily required to reach the poor people profitably but a suitable business strategy depends on the type of energy solution. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

Real option valuation of public sector R&D investments with a down-and-out barrier option

This paper presents a real options approach for valuing public-sector research and development projects, using a down-and-out barrier option. Specifically, it considers the potential savings to the tax payer for investing in technology to be purchased by a national government. The valuation is performed with stretched trinomial lattices. Government-driven demand for this technology is equated with the underlying asset, and valuation measured in terms of potential government savings. Two variables, volatility of demand for the technology and unit cost, are treated as uncertain. A Monte Carlo simulation is performed to understand the effects of these variables on the valuation. Other variables are estimated, and a parametric analysis is performed to understand the effects of these variables. To illustrate how this approach could be used, the development of a new sensor, to be used in large networks that track greenhouse gas fluxes, is considered as an example.     

Write-offs and Profitability in Private Firms: Disentangling the Impact of Tax-Minimisation Incentives

Private firms are likely to use the financial reporting process more for other objectives, such as tax savings, than for communicating performance. However, observing firms choosing accounting policies for tax-minimisation purposes is not straightforward due to (i) tax and non-tax costs of reporting lower income (ii) accounting policies that result in lower reported income and no tax savings but generate non-tax benefits (iii) preparers' multiple incentives and (iv) econometric issues. We observe a large sample of 20,505 private firms writing off assets in two separate regimes, one that generates tax savings and one that does not. Firms significantly decrease, but continue to use, write-offs after the adverse change in tax treatment of write-offs. The exogenous tax change should not affect other reporting incentives. This allows us to disentangle the tax-minimisation incentive from other (un-observable) incentives, including debt contracting, dividends and employee relations that contribute to the observed anomalous positive relationship between write-offs and profitability. We show that for private firms (i) obtaining tax savings is important overall (ii) non-tax costs and benefits are probably also important and (iii) earnings informativeness for future cash flows increases after the adverse tax legislation change.     

Are There Tax Arbitrage Opportunities in Private Rental Housing Markets?

Tax arbitrage opportunities in rental housing markets arise when high bracket taxpayers exploit the tax shelter and conversion features of the tax treatment of rental housing and as a consequence offer low bracket taxpayers rental housing at a cost lower than if they purchased the same quantity of housing for owner occupation. A microdata set has been employed to estimate the size of these tax arbitrage opportunities with respect to 1907 properties owned by Australian landlords. The measure of tax arbitrage opportunities is the breakeven tax rate at which the maximum rental rate a potential occupant is prepared to pay before turning to purchased housing is equal to the landlord's reservation rental rate. Potential occupants with marginal tax rates below the breakeven tax rate find that renting has a relative cost advantage over home purchase. When agency costs (the costs incurred in managing landlord-tenant relationships) are included in the tax arbitrage model, our estimates of the breakeven tax rate indicate that home purchase has a relative cost advantage over renting for most potential occupants. Renting is only financially attractive to low tax bracket individuals. This finding is consistent with Australian tenure patterns. However, there are more puzzling results. A majority of landlords belong to tax brackets below the top bracket, landlords in the lowest tax brackets typically make below normal profits, and reservation rental rates at the bottom of the rental housing market are relatively high. Down payment requirements, lock-in effects, and rent clientele groups are put forward as possible explanations for these findings.     

进行税务筹划 完善公司治理

公司采购、生产、销售等各个环节都涉及税收的问题,所以节税在每个公司都是一个重大而且必须研究的课题。文章主要介绍在公司的直接投资、间接投资和设立子公司或分公司过程中进行税务筹划,力求使公司价值最大化,获得最佳资本结构。     

Economies of scale and scope in French banking and savings institutions

In this study, we analyze the costs incurred by French commercial banks and savings institutions. One of the main distinctions between these two types of financial entities concerns management costs, which are higher for commercial bank demand deposits than for the savings institutions' tax-free livret A passbook accounts. Taking this differential into consideration by constructing separate models based on different principles, we find that the average overall and operating costs of the savings institutions are half those of commercial banks. As regards operating costs, small savings institutions enjoy a significant cost advantage over small commercial banks, but this cost advantage is smaller when one compares the performance of large savings institutions to the large banks. The results of our econometric estimates suggest a possible explanation, as we find increasing returns to scale for the banks and diminishing returns for the savings institutions. The value of the returns-to-scope parameter at the mean point appears to indicate a complementarity between certain pairs of outputs. Therefore, ouptut diversification appears to have a positive impact on cost levels for both savings institutions and commercial banks; while institution size, measured by the total assets, has a different impact in these two industries.     

A decision model for bank branch site selection: Define branch success and do not deviate

Site selection is one of the most important decision making processes for firms since, if done correctly, it provides access to the best customers and the greatest market potential. In contrast, poor location choices are costly and difficult to reverse.This paper deals with the single branch site selection problem in the banking context. Due to the high level of complexity (several factors have to be taken into consideration in the decision making process as well as a wide range of entities' internal requirements), to date there is no single procedure that fits all needs. This paper attempts to provide a solution to this problem by proposing a unified method based on minimizing the distance from the candidate-branch to the most successful branches, taking into account each banking institution’ notion of branch success. This methodology would work well at the lowest possible cost.     

非市场因素变动对商品房交易定价的潜在影响分析

商品房投资的交易价格主要由影响市场供求的因素决定,但一些非市场因素对商品房售价存在潜在影响。本文在考虑现金流时间价值的基础上,以净现值(NPV)等于0为基准,分析了贷款利率、折现率、契税及出售时间等因素变化,对商品房出售价格的影响,为商品房投资者的投资选择和政府调控房价的政策选择提供参考。     

Public intervention in UK small firm credit markets: Value-for-money or waste of scarce resources?

Loan guarantee schemes are used in many countries to provide financial support to small firms by guaranteeing loans from commercial banks, but questions remain about whether public intervention in private credit markets to support entrepreneurial firms is justified. This paper examines whether the UK Small Firms Loan Guarantee Scheme (SFLG) provides value-for-money to the UK tax payer, presenting a regression based performance approach which then feeds into a formal cost–benefit analysis. Specifically, we consider whether firm performance post-investment is such that it justifies the governments’ presence in the lending market and the costs associated with it. Our findings suggest that entrepreneurial firms that are able to access new finance through SFLG achieve superior performance in the form of improved sales, job creation and exports and that this justifies public intervention in private credit markets.     

International Banking Facilities Revisited

The creation of International Banking Facilities (IBFs) in 1981 was an attempt by U.S. banking regulators to allow U.S.-based banks and their offshore customers to have access to the Euromarket in a U.S. political and legal jurisdiction, operating in a U.S. time zone. The expected benefits were as follows: 1. the cost of capital for U.S.-based banks (both U.S. and foreign-owned) and their offshore customers, particularly multinational firms, would be reduced due to lower political risk, no reserve requirements, and no Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation requirements; 2. Banks could potentially reduce their operating costs to die extent that IBFs replaced offshore shell branches; 3. Additional bank employment would be created in the U.S.; 4. although IBFs would not be subject to U.S. Federal taxes, a geographical shift of bank assets to the U.S. might create a higher Federal tax revenue due to a reduction in foreign tax credit claimed by the banks. In retrospect the performance of IBFs has shown mixed results. With respect to cost of capital, the IBFs must have been cost effective because there has been an impressive growth in IBF assets and loans, coincident with a stagnation in the offshore bank shell branches. However, die largest benefit of this growdi has accrued to foreign-owned IBFs. With respect to lower operating costs, the IBFs have not caused the offshore shell branches to close since they are needed to do business with U.S. residents. With respect to employment, bank employment in the U.S. has gone up marginally, although not nearly as much as originally predicted. The impact of IBFs on Federal tax revenues was not investigated in this study. Public policy impacts of IBF operations have also been less than expected in that IBFs have not eliminated the need for offshore shell-branches in the Caribbean, although they have significantly stifled growth in these financial centers. The entrance of the Japanese Offshore Market in December 1986 and the potential that other countries may enter the competition could well have long term negative impacts on the growth potential of U.S. IBFs.     

论企业高管股权激励有效性

企业高管股票期权激励制度已成为人们关注的焦点。依据股权激励的内在机理,结合我国股票期权激励的制度基础,在重新审视相关制约因素的基础上,从提升股票期权激励的有效性角度,提出了完善绩效评价体系、切实解决"内部人控制"与审慎处理期权费用化、尽快调整股权激励的税收政策等相关措施与政策建议。     

Deregulation, Mergers, and Cost Savingsin Class I U.S. Railroads, 1974-1986

In this paper we attempt to disentangle the effects of deregulation on rail costs from those directly attributable to mergers. We estimate that cost reductions obtained from mergers ranged from a high of 33% for the Burlington Northern to a low of a 3% cost increase for the CSX. However, firms not engaged in significant merger activities experienced similar cost differentials indicating that consolidation was not a prerequisite for cost savings. We conclude that although mergers did confer some benefits on the participating firms, they were not a prerequisite for railroads being able to achieve substantial cost savings.     

关于企业纳税筹划的几点思考

纳税筹划就是利用税法相关政策而进行的节税法律行为。对于企业来说,要树立税收筹划意识,用合法的方式保护自己的正当权益,从而提高企业效益。     

Estimating the economic impacts of public spending in a sub-region: an econometric approach.

Expenditures on a public institution represent not only a cost to the taxpayer but an economic benefit to the region in which it is located. The economic impact on a region's income is here calculated through an econometric model and associated multipliers. The impact on government income tax recepits is similarly calculated. The tax revenues are also used in determining the net cost of operation of the institution. These calculations are performed for the expenditures associated with the new State University Hospital at Stony Brook, N.Y. located in the region formed by Nassau and Suffolk Countries. The regional income multiplier is found to be 1.64.     

Development Rights and the Differential Assessment of Agricultural Land: Fractional Valuation of Farmland is Ineffective for Preserving Open Space and Subsidizes Speculation

Abstract . The relative fiscal efficacy of using differential assessment as a means of preserving agricultural land is examined. A simple model of land use and land rent determination is developed and tested. An implication is that differential assessment merely delays or retards, but does not prevent, the conversion of land to developed uses. Differential assessment is viewed as a tax expenditure, or special tax reduction, that in essence leases development rights, Landowners are also shown to be overcompensated for the development rights implicitly acquired by the public sector. The fee simple purchase of development rights or regulatory control over the use of development rights can be employed to preserve farm land at a lower fiscal cost.     

Rights and judicial independence

This paper models endogenous judicial independence (JI) as a commitment device in a political commitment game between a ruler and citizens. In a situation where citizens can observe the effectiveness of JI with some positive probability, the model shows that the ruler in fact creates an independent judiciary and credibly commits to an announced tax rate, i.e., the ruler protects private property rights. Even when citizens have no chance to observe the effectiveness of JI, the ruler can still guarantee property rights by granting human rights as a signal of JI. Although the creation of JI achieves a Pareto improvement compared with its lack, two sources of inefficiency arise. First, the equilibrium tax is inefficiently high in the sense that the tax rate is on the inefficient side of the Laffer curve. This inefficiently high tax reflects the cost of credible commitment. Second, equilibrium JI for guaranteeing human rights is inefficiently high in the sense that the ruler does not entirely use JI for credibly committing to a low tax. This inefficiently high JI represents the cost of credible signalling.     

永煤贵州地区煤炭企业纳税成本研究

根据永煤贵州地区煤炭企业股权结构比较复杂,涉税地点分布广,当地税收政策混乱、税费成本畸高等现象,结合永煤贵州地区煤炭企业纳税成本现状,提出了纳税筹划的各种举措,降低企业税负,提高企业的经济效益。     

企业纳税筹划的非税成本因素分析

在纳税筹划中,企业往往注重税收成本因素筹划,而忽略非税收成本因素的筹划,文章从心理成本、主观意识、环境因素三个方面分析了非税成本因素对纳税筹划的影响。     

Multi‐unit pricing

A price takes the form of a cost for either one unit (single‐unit pricing) or multiple units (multi‐unit pricing). I consider a monopolist selling units of a good to a population of homogeneous consumers to explain why one is preferred to the other. A mental cost arises if the division problem a multi‐unit price causes is done. If marginal utility remains high multiple units are desired. Multi‐unit pricing is preferred since it creates a cost if fewer units are purchased. If utility exhibits strong diminishing returns single‐unit pricing is used to avoid the calculation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Problems in Acquiring Mineral Revenues for Financing Economic Development: A Case Study of Zambia During 1970–78

A bstract . During the 1970s Zambia granted tax incentives to transnational mining companies (thereby foregoing some revenue ) in order to achieve expected investment benefits to the economy and government. The Government also acquired ownership interests in the companies via asset acquisition. Global market forces turned against Zambia's interests, and expected benefits were not forthcoming because company profits had become the sole tax base in the mineral sector. Zambia's experience from 1970 to 1978 suggests that it and other mineral export countries should (a) evaluate carefully whether reducing the effective tax rate on company profits actually induces investment , and (b) consider thoroughly whether a tax scheme that includes a proper mix of profit, mineral and export levies is more appropriate than a single tax base.