Ownership Structure and the Cost of Debt

This paper examines the impact on the cost of debt by ownership concentration and shareholder identity; that is, whether the shareholders are banks, non-financial firms, the state, institutional investors or the board of directors. Our analysis suggests that directors who own shares tend to be aligned with external shareholders, that firms with government ownership enjoy lower cost of debt and that banks effectively monitor management, so reducing the agency costs of debt.     

Buddhist Feminist Transnational Networks,Female Ordination and Women's Empowerment

Consideration of the role that religion plays in women's lives in developing contexts can be important in understanding ways of approaching their “strategic gender needs”. Rather than rejecting religion for its inherent patriarchy, styles of “religious feminism” have emerged across the globe. These argue for reinterpretations of religious systems that are consistent with the “core” values of the tradition as well as various types of feminist thinking. The aim of this paper is to discuss the emergence of a transnational movement across Buddhist traditions and countries that is concerned to make full ordination an available option to women in contexts where it is currently prohibited. While becoming fully ordained is considered to be the most suitable way of becoming enlightened and escaping future rebirths, a strong theme within the movement is the argument that gender hierarchies within Buddhism have a broader cultural impact upon social attitudes that disempower women and limit their development. Dialogue between members of Buddhist communities across the world has encouraged reflection upon and a challenge to unequal and oppressive gender hierarchies within the Buddhist tradition and within Buddhist societies. This paper explores four “international” events/examples that enable information exchange as well as the flow of material support between women from different traditions.     

Factor Components of Inequality: A Cross‐Country Study

This paper uses data from the Luxembourg Income Study to examine some of the forces that have driven changes in household income inequality over the last three decades of the twentieth century. We decompose inequality for six countries (Canada, Germany, Norway, Sweden, the U.K., and the U.S.) into the three sources of market income (earnings, property income, and income from self‐employment) and taxes and transfers. Our findings indicate that although changes in the distribution of earnings are an important force behind recent trends, they are not the only one. Greater earnings dispersion has in some cases been accompanied by a reduction in the share of earnings which dampened its impact on overall household income inequality. In some countries the contribution of self‐employment income to inequality has been on the rise, while in others, increases in inequality in capital income account for a substantial fraction of the observed distributional changes.     

The effects of Information Technology on absorptive capacity and organisational performance

Information Technology (IT) offers many opportunities for firms to succeed. The aim of this paper is to present a model to reflect how technical IT skills and the use of IT in interdependent tasks may influence the development of organisational absorptive capacity, both potential and realised, which also affects organisational performance. Since knowledge constitutes one of the main resources for organisations to gain competitive advantages and helps firms to improve their organisational performance, absorptive capacity is a key factor in success. This model was tested empirically using a sample of 160 European technological firms. The results of our analysis suggest that the mastery of technical IT skills and the use of IT in interdependent tasks positively affect potential and realised absorptive capacities, which in turn enhances organisational performance. The study concludes by presenting some theoretical and practical implications, limitations, and future research lines.     

An analysis of extreme movements of exchange rates of the main currencies traded in the Foreign Exchange market

This article analyses the extreme movements of exchange rates of the seven main currencies traded in the Foreign Exchange market against the US dollar: Euro, British pound, Canadian dollar, Japanese Yen, Swiss franc, Australian dollar and New Zealand dollar by using tail index indicators. Payaslio?lu (2009) considers the case of the Turkish exchange rate using the traditional Hill (1975) estimator as a tool. In this article, we employ also an alternative estimator proposed in Iglesias and Linton (2009) that is shown to have, in some cases, improved finite sample properties and it provides substantially different results versus the Hill estimator. We find that for the Euro, Japanese Yen, Swiss franc, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand dollars, the Hill estimator provides a better measure to analyse the extreme behaviour; while for the British pound, the Iglesias and Linton alternative estimator is superior by using Hausman-type tests of misspecification. Measures of value at risk are also provided for the seven markets. We also find that the largest estimated value at risk by far is for the Japanese Yen, followed by the Swiss franc, the Canadian dollar, the Euro, the New Zealand dollar and the Australian dollar. The UK pound has the smallest value at risk when extreme movements occur.     

Using the Dagum model to explain changes in personal income distribution

This article studies the evolution of personal income distribution in Spain from 1995 to 2005 using the Dagum model. Dagum's three parameter model (type I) provides a good fitting to empirical income distributions in Spain. Moreover, its parameters can be interpreted as economic indicators of income distribution changes. After studying the economic interpretation of the Dagum model parameters, we analyse the impact of parameter changes on different income percentiles and also on the evolution of inequality in Spain using data from the European Community Household Panel (ECHP) and the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC).     

When does ownership matter? Board characteristics and behavior

We develop a contingency approach to explain how firm ownership influences the monitoring function of the board—measured as the magnitude of external audit fees contracted by the board—by extending agency theory to incorporate the resource dependence notion that boards have distinct incentives and abilities to monitor management. Analyses of data on Continental European companies reveal that while board independence and audit services are complementary when ownership is dispersed, this is not the case when ownership is concentrated—suggesting that ownership concentration and board composition become substitutes in terms of monitoring management. Additional analysis shows that the relationship between board composition and external audit fees is also contingent upon the type of the controlling shareholder. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Opportunistic disclosure in press release headlines

This paper examines managerial, self-serving, disclosure practices in the headlines of press releases announcing annual results. Headlines are a framing feature that can be used to capture and retain attention with the ultimate intention of affecting the thoughts and feelings of readers, thus influencing their opinions. Therefore, headlines have a key role in a company's communication strategy. Using a large sample of Spanish listed companies for the years 2005 and 2006, we provide evidence of persistent impression management in press release headlines. Companies, irrespective of whether they perform well or badly, are inclined to stress good news and downplay bad news. Companies with very small profits report surprising amounts of good news. We provide evidence that companies are selective in the performance figures they include in the headlines of press releases. In particular, the disclosure of profits or sales figures in press release headlines is also associated with earnings performance. Finally, we find that larger firms are more likely to issue press releases than smaller ones, consistent with the theory that highly visible firms face a greater demand for information transparency.     

The Effect of Product Innovation,Promotion, and Price on Consumer Switching to Private Labels

The channel conflict that exists between retailers and manufacturers of branded products has dynamically shifted as large retailers have expanded their offerings of private label products. This study investigates the ability of consumer packaged goods companies to exert influence in the channel by testing which marketing initiatives implemented by manufacturer brands are more efficient in preventing consumer switching to private labels. We use a hazard model to simultaneously measure the effects due to product innovation, promotion, and price on consumer switching and how strong those effects are. We find that as expected product innovation, promotion, and price exert a negative effect on the consumer likelihood of switching to private labels. However, we find the strongest effect on promotion suggesting the importance of understanding how consumers perceive value in the national brands offer.