Informed trading around earnings announcements—Spot,futures, or options?

Recent literature reports higher single stock options (SSO) volume before earnings announcements (EA). There are no studies that explore single stock futures (SSF) in this context because of illiquid SSF markets in developed countries. Similar to SSO, SSF provide embedded leverage and facilitate short selling although at a lower cost, but do not provide downside-risk protection. India’s liquid SSO and SSF provide a unique setting to study the preference of informed traders. We observe an increase in both SSO and SSF volume before EA. Further, SSF dominate SSO possibly due to SSO becoming expensive before EA and higher information leakage in India.     

Women and international assignments: the impact of supervisor-subordinate relationships

During the past two decades, more and more organizations have been going global, and, as a result, more and more employees are being sent on international assignments. For the most part, though, the percentage of females being sent on these assignments is much lower than the percentage of males. Several recent studies have suggested that the supervisor-subordinate relationship might be a critical determinant of who gets selected for expatriate assignments. To explore this issue in some detail, the leader-member exchange (LMX) model is used to examine the link between supervisor-subordinate relationships and selection for international assignments. Strategies that female employees can use to improve their chances of being sent on international assignments are also suggested.     

FIRM CHARACTERISTICS AND THE PRESENCE OF EVENT RISK COVENANTS IN BOND INDENTURES

Event risk covenants (ERCs) became popular as a bondholder protection measure during the height of restructuring activities in the 1980s. We investigate the empirical relation between firm characteristics and the likelihood of ERCs in bond indentures. In particular, we examine whether a firm's agency costs of debt, financial distress costs, and/or takeover potential influence its decision to include ERCs. Employing bonds with and without ERCs issued during 1986–90, we provide evidence that the likelihood a firm will include ERCs is positively related to the firm's agency costs of debt and to its potential for takeover. The results, however, do not support the financial distress costs hypothesis.     

Marketing Strategy Development Styles,Implementation Capability,and Firm Performance: Investigating the Curvilinear Impact of Multiple Strategy-Making Styles

There is growing interest in the process by which marketing strategy is developed. This article reports on a study in which we investigate the performance implications of using multiple organizational approaches to the development of marketing strategy. Specifically, we test a model in which implementation capability mediates the relationship between number of marketing strategy development (MSD) styles used and firm performance. Based on data collected from manufacturers, the results indicate that: (1) the relationship between the number of MSD styles used and implementation capability is curvilinear (an inverse U-shaped relationship), (2) implementation capability positively impacts firm performance, and (3) implementation capability mediates the relationship between number of MSD styles used and firm performance.     

“A little competition goes a long way”: Substitutive effects of emotional intelligence and workplace competition on salesperson creative selling

Marketing Letters - Despite receiving significant attention in the popular press, the topic of creative selling remains underexamined in the sales literature. The current research helps to correct...     

Book review

Thomas, Vinod, John Nash, and associates, Best Practices in Trade Policy Reform, Washington, DC: World Bank Publications, 1991, xiii + 226 pages.

Turner, Charlie G., Japan's Dynamic Efficiency in the Global Market: Trade, Investment, and Economic Growth, New York: Quorum Books, 1991, xiv + 177 pages.

de Melo, Jaime, and David Tarr, A General Equilibrium Analysis of US Foreign Trade Policy, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992, pp. xviii + 289.

McGarry, Michael J., and Andrew Schmitz, The World Grain Trade: Grain Marketing, Institutions, and Policies, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1992, xx + 511 pages.

Islam, Shafiqul (ed.), Yen for Development: Japanese Foreign Aid and the Politics of Burden Sharing, New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1991, xii + 243 pages.

Heckscher, Eli, and Bertil Ohlin, Heckscher-Ohlin Trade Theory, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992, x + 222 pages (translated, edited, and introduced by Harry Flam and M. June Flanders).     

Finance Constraints and Firm Transition in the Informal Sector: Evidence from Indian Manufacturing

This paper focuses on the role of finance constraints in determining the lack of transition of firms in India from very small family firms, which are the predominant type of firms in the informal sector, into larger informal firms that employ non-family labour. Using a rich firm-level data-set drawn from nationally representative surveys of the Indian informal manufacturing sector, this paper tests for the role played by finance constraints in firm transition in the informal sector at the firm and district level. There is evidence that the difficulty that firms face in accessing external finance acts as a significant constraint to small firm growth in the informal sector. Looking at data from India's districts, it is found that the financial development in a given district increases the likelihood that firms in the district will make the transition from household enterprises into non-household enterprises.     

Comparison of Entrepreneurship Environment for Executives between State-owned and Private Enterprises in China

This research aims at exploring the differences in the effects of environment on entrepreneurship growth between state‐owned enterprises and private businesses. Through executive investigation, reasons are provided for better performance of private businesses. Environmental factors, including economic, legal, technological, cultural and social factors, which influence entrepreneurship growth, are examined to determine differences between state‐owned enterprise and private business executives. It is found that the methods of executive assignment to managerial posts determine executives’effort towards entrepreneurship.