Variable preference relations: Existence of maximal elements

We consider variable preference relations, also called reference dependent preference relations, which are typical in the study of dynamic models in economic theories. We introduce a new concept of weak consistency, a generalization of acyclicity, as an immediate regret condition for variable preferences. The main result to establish is on an existence criterion for maximal elements of a space equipped with a weakly consistent variable preference relation. It is expressed via a preference completeness condition which is equivalent to existence of aspiration points. As applications, we show that a number of results known in the recent literature on maximum principles on a space with or without topological structure can be obtained from the unifying approach of this paper. Habit formation and state functions are also discussed in the framework of variable preference relations.     

Board independence and operating performance: analysis on (French) company and individual data

This article studies the relationship between board independence and firm operating performance in French listed companies. We take advantage of an original database, with a time-series dimension that can be used to mitigate heterogeneity and dynamic endogeneity issues. In addition, this database can be disaggregated at the individual (director) level. This design enables us to introduce firm fixed effects and individual fixed effects in firm performance equations, thereby controlling for heterogeneity at the firm and individual levels. Our main result is to document a significant negative relationship between independence and accounting performance. This result suggests that, in the French context, the costs of independence (i.e. the informational gap supported by independent directors compared to insiders and affiliated directors) outweigh the benefits of independence (i.e. the reduction in agency costs).     

Trade and growth: A gravity approach

The impact of international trade, or “openness,” on economic growth is difficult to quantify because of reverse causality. In this article, I use recent advances in gravity equation estimation to generate a geography‐based instrument for openness à la Frankel and Romer (1999). In contrast with the benchmark, the new instrument is constructed using consistent and unbiased estimates of the impact of geography on bilateral trade. As a result, the instrument provides stronger identification of the impact of trade on income and increases the efficiency of the two‐stage least square estimation. An important advantage of the corrected procedure over the benchmark is that the estimated effect of trade on income remains large, positive, and statistically significant even after controlling for regional indicators and endogenous institutional quality.     

Conditional moment models under semi-strong identification

We consider conditional moment models under semi-strong identification. Identification strength is directly defined through the conditional moments that flatten as the sample size increases. Our new minimum distance estimator is consistent, asymptotically normal, robust to semi-strong identification, and does not rely on the choice of a user-chosen parameter, such as the number of instruments or some smoothing parameter. Heteroskedasticity-robust inference is possible through Wald testing without prior knowledge of the identification pattern. Simulations show that our estimator is competitive with alternative estimators based on many instruments, being well-centered with better coverage rates for confidence intervals.     

Organizational innovation,technological innovation,and export performance: The effects of innovation radicalness and extensiveness

This study focuses on the relevance of different types of innovation for firms’ export performance. Despite ample research on the innovation–performance relationship, previous studies have mainly focused on technological innovations, leaving the effects of organizational innovations relatively unexplored. Hypotheses on the relationship between organizational and technological innovations and firm export performance are tested by structural equation modelling using data from 218 Swedish export ventures. The results indicate that organizational innovation enhances export performance both directly and indirectly by sustaining technological innovation. Moreover, by fine-graining our analysis of the mediating role of technological innovation, according to its radicalness and extensiveness, for organizational innovation, we show how the latter enhances both the radicalness and extensiveness of technological innovation although, notably, only extensiveness is actually beneficial for export performance. This study helps alleviate the scarcity of research examining the links among different types of innovation in relation to export performance and contributes to international business and marketing literature by generating new evidence regarding the mechanisms through which organizational and technological innovations may improve export performance.     

The large-maturity smile for the Heston model

Using the Gärtner–Ellis theorem from large deviations theory, we characterise the leading-order behaviour of call option prices under the Heston model, in a new regime where the maturity is large and the log-moneyness is also proportional to the maturity. Using this result, we then derive the implied volatility in the large-time limit in the new regime, and we find that the large-time smile mimics the large-time smile for the Barndorff–Nielsen normal inverse Gaussian model. This makes precise the sense in which the Heston model tends to an exponential Lévy process for large times. We find that the implied volatility smile does not flatten out as the maturity increases, but rather it spreads out, and the large-time, large-moneyness regime is needed to capture this effect. As a special case, we provide a rigorous proof of the well-known result by Lewis (Option Valuation Under Stochastic Volatility, Finance Press, Newport Beach, 2000) for the implied volatility in the usual large-time, fixed-strike regime, at leading order. We find that there are two critical strike values where there is a qualitative change of behaviour for the call option price, and we use a limiting argument to compute the asymptotic implied volatility in these two cases.     

Capital utilization and retirement

This empirical analysis assesses the determinants of firms’ capital retirement. Particular attention is paid to the impact of the business cycle and the capital usage intensity. Compared to previous studies, we directly control for the capital utilization and disentangle the short-run mechanisms from the long-run ones. The analysis is carried out with an original and large firm-level dataset. The main results of the analysis may be summarized as follows: (i) the retirement rate increases during slowdowns and decreases during booms. This corresponds to a countercyclical capital retirement; (ii) the capital retirement rate increases with the capital usage intensity in the long run. This corresponds to a wear and tear effect, which is small compared to the countercyclical one; (iii) the capital retirement rate increases with the average age of capital; (iv) the profit rate and the wage cost per capita do not have a significant impact on the retirement rate.     

Excessive continuation and dynamic agency costs of debt

This paper analyses the incentives of the equityholders of a leveraged company to shut it down in a continuous time, stochastic environment. Keeping the firm as an ongoing concern has an option value but equity and debt holders value it differently. Equityholders’ decisions exhibit excessive continuation and reduce firm's value. Using a compound exchange option approach, we characterise the resulting agency costs of debt, derive the “price” of these costs and analyse their dynamics. We also show how agency costs can be reduced by the design of debt.     

Emerging inter-industry partnerships between shipping lines and stevedores: from rivalry to cooperation?

Since late-1960s stevedoring operations assumed a dramatic importance for shipping lines, who have been securing dedicated berths for some decades. Over the last 20 years, the institutional turn in ports drove the overseas expansion of pure stevedoring companies. For quite a long time carriers and stevedores fiercely battled each other both for bargaining contractual arrangements and for securing new concessions in the key port areas. Currently this scenario is slowly changing and some early-forms of partnership are coming out. This paper analyses the different pathways through which carriers satisfy their needs of handling services. Based on 2006 data it empirically demonstrates the growing resort to such forms of cooperation both contractually and via equity ventures.     

An inquiry into the Ramsey-Hotelling connection

Ramsey’s 1928 Ramsey, F. P. 1928. “A Mathematical Theory of Saving.” Economic Journal 38 (152): 543–559. doi:10.2307/2224098[Crossref] , [Google Scholar] paper on saving and Hotelling’s 1931 article on exhaustible resources are considered to be two seminal contributions in economic dynamics. They have been associated because of their temporal proximity, use of the calculus of variations, and because of Hotelling’s citation of Ramsey. This connection however needs to be precisely investigated and characterized. On the basis of archival material, this paper shows that, on the interpersonal and theoretical ground, the connection is quite thin, but that significant parallels are found in Ramsey’s and Hotelling’s expectations with mathematical economics for the progress of science and for informing public decision.