Play fair! Innovating internal self-regulation in the market for profit

Regulation imposes compliance demands on business, but these controls by no means ensure that corporations will act ethically. Externally imposed controls by government or industry are prompts intended to move organizations to engage in a moral minimum. Such efforts are typically reactionary corrective measures, often crafted and applied after an ethical scandal occurs, and thereby offer limited effectiveness in providing systemic change. To provide insight on internally driven controls, this article examines how a newer form of monetized self-regulation, referred to as inverted moral markets, might be leveraged to motivate corporate ethical behavior. Inverted moral market (IMM) operations target firms suspected of unethical action, providing a type of market whistleblowing. Such activities are monetized through the sale of information to investors and by short selling. Rather than a desire to build moral strength, IMM firms are motivated by self-interest and profit. They can potentially ‘do good’ by imposing self-correction within the market, but without virtuous intent. We explore IMMs and the varied impacts their activities may have on the functioning of the overall market. We argue that a more balanced approach between internal and external regulation may enhance the environment for moral balance in a capitalist market system.     

Forecasts of US short-term interest rates: A flexible forecast combination approach

This paper develops a flexible approach to combine forecasts of future spot rates with forecasts from time-series models or macroeconomic variables. We find empirical evidence that, accounting for both regimes in interest rate dynamics, and combining forecasts from different models, helps improve the out-of-sample forecasting performance for US short-term rates. Imposing restrictions from the expectations hypothesis on the forecasting model are found to help at long forecasting horizons.     

放松卖空管制能够抑制并购商誉泡沫吗？

本文以我国放松卖空管制作为切入点,系统检验了其对并购商誉泡沫的影响。研究发现,放松卖空管制之后,超额商誉显著下降,同时商誉资产也显著下降,且该效应在民营控股公司中更显著;机制检验发现,卖空通过吸引更多分析师跟踪、增加对管理者的激励来抑制商誉泡沫;进一步研究发现,在市场化水平较高、行业竞争度较低的情形下,卖空机制对商誉泡沫的抑制作用更强。本文的研究结论丰富了卖空和并购商誉领域的文献,并为以市场导向原则化解并购商誉泡沫提供了新思路和新范式。     

2006年诺贝尔经济学奖得主菲尔普斯理论评介

本文介绍了2006年诺贝尔经济学奖得主埃德蒙.菲尔普斯的主要理论贡献。他在宏观经济政策跨期权衡分析、“黄金律”与经济增长、宏观经济政策的“短期—长期”分析、“自然率”、构建宏观经济学的微观基础,以及结构性萧条与繁荣等诸多领域进行了开创性的研究。菲尔普斯的理论和主张对西方经济理论和经济政策的研究都有十分重大的影响。     

Margin trading,short selling,and bond yield spread

Using a quasi-natural experiment, this study examines the effects of margin trading and short selling on bond yield spread in China. It finds that both margin trading and short selling can reduce bond yield spread. Additionally, it finds that margin trading lowers firms’ debt ratios and increases their credit ratings, which explains the reduced spread. In other words, margin trading can impact investors’ decisions by revealing positive information about a firm. Another finding is that short selling lowers the bond yield spread by decreasing earnings management, suggesting that short selling has an impact on investors’ decisions through its effect on corporate governance. Our results suggest that margin trading transmits positive information and short selling impacts firms’ policies. These results provide support for future regulations of margin trading and short selling.     

The role payment depreciation in short temporal separations: Should online retailer make customers wait?

In recent times, it has become common for customers to pre-pay for goods but consume them later. The pain of payment reduces over time, in a phenomenon called payment depreciation (PD). Researchers have examined this phenomenon in situations when payment precedes consumption by long periods, ranging from three weeks to several years. The present study examines the occurrence of payment depreciation when costs precede benefits by short periods, such as three days to two weeks. The three experiments establish the presence of PD in short intervals of less than two weeks. The results are robust for both inventoried and non-inventoried consumption. The results further suggest that the sunk cost of a payment devalues discretely and not continuously. The value of the sunk cost in the consumer's mental account drops significantly after two weeks, as compared to one week. The results fail to demonstrate the effect of payment mode on the payment depreciation phenomenon. Implications indicate that retailers can vary their order delivery period to reduce product returns.     

Two tales of earnings management with short sales deregulation

We study the impact of short sales on accrual-based and real earnings management (EM). Based on the costs and benefits of using EM to hide negative information, we derive an analytical model showing that there are two possibilities: (1) a firm engages in less accrual-based and real EM when facing short-seller scrutiny (the informational efficiency hypothesis), or (2) a firm switches from accrual-based EM (a less sophisticated method) to real EM (a more sophisticated method), which we call the sophisticated information-hiding hypothesis. That is, there is a tradeoff between accrual-based and real EM in the presence of short sales. Using a natural experiment of the recent short sales deregulation in China, we show findings consistent with the latter reaction. Additional analysis suggests that the decrease in accrual-based EM and increase in real EM are driven primarily by firms with non-Big 10 auditors or firms not under shareholder or regulatory scrutiny. We interpret the findings as being consistent with the model prediction that for firms with weak inside and outside monitoring, the probability of detecting real EM is low, and thus the tradeoff between accrual-based and real EM prevails in the presence of short sales.     

Short-selling restrictions and firms’ environment responsibility

We examine the effect of short selling on firms’ environmental pollution control behavior. Using novel data from Chinese listed firms, we demonstrate that when the short selling of stocks is permitted, the respective firms invest more in pollution protection. Consequently, ex ante threats to short selling could potentially explain firms’ investment in pollution protection. In contrast, we do not find a positive relation between margin trading and firms’ pollution protection expenses. We further discover that the effect of short selling is more pronounced in firms with lower institutional ownership and lower market competition. These findings shed light on the role of short sales in pollution abatement.     

短波选频和选址呼叫技术的研究与实践

本文从短波模拟话音通信的实际情况出发,讨论了短波无中心组网中,实时选频和数字选址技术.提出了以绝对值信噪比(ASNR)代替常用信噪比进行信道评判的实时选频方案,和以双门限连续判决器及简易纠错码-(7,4)循环码的软件编译码,作为数字选址呼叫信可靠传输、识别手段的数字选址呼叫方案,并通过了实验验证.