What moves German Bund futures contracts on the Eurex?

The German 10‐year Bund futures contract traded on the Eurex futures and options exchange in Frankfurt became the world's most actively traded derivative product by the end of 1999. In this article, we provide a detailed exploration of the interday and intraday return volatility in the Bund futures contract using a sample of five‐min returns from 1997 to 1998. The evolution of interday volatility is described best by a MA(1)‐fractionally integrated process that allows for the long‐memory features. At the intraday level, we find that macroeconomic announcements from both Germany and the U.S. are an important source of volatility. Among the various German announcements, we identify the IFO industry survey of business climate, industrial production (preliminary), and Bundesbank policy meeting as being by far the most important. The three most significant U.S. announcements include the employment report, the National Association of Purchasing Managers (NAPM) survey, and employment costs. Overall, U.S. macroeconomic announcements have a far greater impact on the Bund futures market than their German counterparts. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 22:679–696, 2002     

The impact of basic human needs on the use of retailing self-service technologies: A study of self-determination theory

Self-service technologies (SSTs) are becoming increasingly popular in retailing contexts. Previous theories of SST adoption have largely ignored the basic human needs, such as competence, autonomy and relatedness, that drive customer motivation and the use of SSTs. We address this theoretical gap and examine self-determination theory (SDT) in the context of the supermarket self-checkout. Based on the argument proposed by SDT, self-determined motivation is hypothesized to mediate the relationships between autonomy, competence, and perceived anonymity, and the intention to use SSTs. Data collected from 361 respondents form a structural equation model and support these hypotheses. The current study is important as it helps understand the role of customers' participation in the self-service. Managerial and theoretical implications are suggested.     

Job attitudes and organizational justice in joint venture hotels in China: the role of expatriate managers

In a survey of local employees in joint venture hotels in China, perceived interactional justice was found to be predictive of job attitudes, and perceived salary fairness in comparison with expatriate managers explained additional variance in job attitudes. Compared to previous results, local employees now perceived their pay as much more unfair when compared with that of expatriate managers. In addition to perceived justice, perceived managerial practices of expatriate managers and incentives received were also predictive of job attitudes of local employees. Consistent with previous results, employees working with overseas Chinese and Japanese managers reported less positive job attitudes than those working with Western and other Asian managers. These differences were related to neither perceived differences in managerial practices or managerial experiences of the expatriate managers nor perceived differences in incentives received. The justice framework provides the best explanation for these results.     

Delinquency,schooling, and work: time allocation decision of youth

This paper examines the possible factors that affect the time allocation decision of youth between delinquency, schooling, and work. Based on a joint decision model, evidence from Montreal shows that influences from different social institutions such as family, church, school, peers and the workplace are important determinants of how young people decide to spend their time on various activities. The findings provided here take into account the joint decision nature of the problem and therefore provide more precise estimates than those of the existing literature.     

Toward performance-based compensation: a study of the gaps between organizational practices and employee preferences with regard to compensation criteria in the state-owned sector in China

This study seeks to explore the gaps between employees' preferences of compensation criteria and compensation criteria adopted in the state-owned sector in China. A survey among 772 employees from a large state-owned enterprise shows that employee preferences were at variance with organizational practices in that employees emphasized performance-oriented (i.e. task- relevant and collaboration-relevant) criteria more, and personal background criteria less, than did organizational practices. These gaps were moderated by employees' education level and tenure. Employees with higher education and shorter tenure showed larger gaps between preferred criteria and those used in the organization. Interviews of employees further substantiated the quantitative findings and provided some reasons for the existence of the gaps. Theoretical and practical of the results are discussed.     

Double signals or single signal? An investigation of insider trading around share repurchases

We examine directors’ dealing activity around share repurchasing periods in Hong Kong. There are significant insider trading activities before the share repurchasing period. Consistent with the signaling hypothesis, the directors’ purchase activities during the share repurchase period are significantly higher than the expected level while the directors’ sale activities are significantly lower than the expected level. Double signals of share repurchase and directors’ purchases create a stronger signal in conveying undervaluation, while insider sales around share repurchase reduces the undervaluation signal. We find some evidence that is consistent with the free cash flow and signaling arguments for share repurchases.     

Stock returns,order imbalances,and commonality: Evidence on individual,institutional, and proprietary investors in China

Using a unique dataset from the Shanghai Stock Exchange, we study the relation between daily open-to-close stock returns and order imbalances, and the commonality in order imbalances across individual, institutional, and proprietary investors. We find that institutional (proprietary) order imbalances have a larger price impact, but account for a significantly smaller proportion of daily price fluctuations. Commonality is much stronger for individual, rather than institutional (proprietary), order imbalances. Institutional (proprietary) investors favor large capitalization stocks, and co-movement in institutional (proprietary) order imbalances is stronger for these stocks.     

The entry and exit decisions of foreign banks in Hong Kong

This paper presents a theoretical framework for explaining the entry and exit decisions of a firm, motivated by the differential returns in its home and a host market. Within this framework, the factors underpinning the entry and exit decisions of foreign banks in Hong Kong are examined, using a duration (accelerated failure time) model. It can be seen that a foreign bank, with international experience from having more overseas markets will take a shorter (longer) time to enter (exit) the Hong Kong market. Faster (slower) growth both in home trade with Hong Kong and in the Hong Kong banking sector itself will increase the likelihood of entry (exit). Ceteris paribus, Asian banks enter at a faster rate and survive longer in the Hong Kong market. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The performance of enhanced-return index funds: evidence from bootstrap analysis

We apply the bootstrap technique proposed by Kosowski et al. [J. Finance, 2006, 61, 2551–2595] in conjunction with Carhart's [J. Finance, 1997, 52, 57–82] unconditional and Ferson and Schadt's [J. Finance, 1996, 51, 425–461] conditional four-factor models of performance to examine whether the performances of enhanced-return index funds over the 1996 to 2007 period are based on luck or superior ‘enhancing’ skills. The advantages of using the bootstrap to rank fund performance are many. It eliminates the need to specify the exact shape of the distribution from which returns are drawn and does not require estimating correlations between portfolio returns. It also eliminates the need to explicitly control for potential ‘data snooping’ biases that arise from an ex-post sort. Our results show evidence of enhanced-return index funds with positive and significant alphas after controlling for luck and sampling variability. The results are robust to both stock-only and derivative-enhanced index funds, although the spread of cross-sectional alphas for derivative-enhanced funds is slightly more pronounced. The study also examines various sub-periods within the sample horizon.     

Students,Patients, Citizens,and Believers as “Customers”: A Cross-National Exploratory Study

ABSTRACT

Executives in 94 large UK companies engaging in cause related marketing (CRM) completed a questionnaire concerning (i) their firms' approaches to the management and evaluation of CRM, (ii) the benefits perceived to accrue to the practice, and (iii) whether these businesses applied commercial rather than philanthropic principles when selecting CRM partners. It emerged that, in general, the sample firms employed mainly commercial criteria when choosing CRM projects, that selections were frequently influenced by employee opinion, and that most of the evaluation techniques conventionally used to appraise commercial sponsorship and advertising were also utilised to assess CRM programmes. Companies were reported to demand close and obvious links between their products and the activities of partner charities. Typically, they preferred to affiliate with well-known charities and tended to dislike “controversial” causes. In the main the respondents held low opinions of their charity partners' marketing abilities. The article concludes with a number of recommendations regarding the ways in which charities should formulate proposals when inviting businesses to participate in CRM programmes.