Common influences,spillover and integration in Chinese stock markets

The Chinese stock market features an interesting history of divided market segments: domestic (A), foreigners' (B) and overseas (H). This puts forth questions of market integration as well as cross-divisional information transmission. We address these issues in a structural DCC framework, an econometric technique capable of identifying common factor influences from (bi-directional) spillovers as constituents of contemporaneous correlations. We find initial dominance of transmission from A to B and to a lesser extent from H to B and A to H. However, since the opening of the B-market for Chinese citizens in 2001, common factors have largely replaced direct spillovers.     

Customers’ emotions in service failure and recovery: a meta-analysis

Marketing Letters - Customers’ emotions have emerged as a dominant dimension in the complaint-handling domain. This research provides a quantitative synthesis of the role of emotions...     

Exploring the impact of a supplier portal on the buyer-supplier relationship. The case of Ferrari Auto

This article concentrates on the relationship between companies and their suppliers with a specific focus on the impact that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have on industrial (business to business) purchasing processes. After reviewing the extant literature, we classify the potential impact of ICTs on the buyer-supplier interactions into three main categories, i.e. impact on buyer-supplier relationship, impact on purchase process efficiency and impact on logistics process performance. Whilst scholars generally agree on the impact ICTs may have on buyer-supplier exchanges, they have not investigated concurrently all of these three impacts to understand their comparative relevance and the context in which this comparative relevance may change. In order to redress this gap in the literature our research study focuses on a particular form of ICT solution - supplier portals - and takes a supplier (rather than buyer) perspective. We explore empirical evidence from a single customer-multiple supplier case study, that of the Ferrari Auto supplier portal. Our study leads us to contend that suppliers view such portals as offering far more significant benefits to their relationship with customers than to the improvements in purchase process efficiency or to the performance of buyer-supplier logistics processes. We conclude with a short discussion of the main managerial implications and suggestions for future research.     

Capitalist crisis,neo-dualism,and marginalization

La crise économique actuelle, et de là, le ralentissement ou la réduction de l'accumulation capitaliste a, bien sûr, conduit à de nouvelles tentatives pour augmenter l'exploitation de la classe ouvrière. La réussite ou l'échec de ces tentatives dépendra du degré de résistance qu' on leur opposera. Cet article examine un certain nombre de stratégies capitalistes possibles, ainsi que leurs faiblesses. Il s'attache tout particulièrement à l'existence d'une couche grandissante d'ouvriers sans emploi ou sous-employés, qui peuvent être largement exploités. Mais cette solution tend à accroître l'inadaptation sociale, en même temps qu'elle augmente fortement le fardeau de la Sécurité sociale, et à plus longue échéance, a des conséquences économiques douteuses. En conclusion, l'article rattache le récent accroissement de la lutte urbaine et régionale en Italie, à cette perspective plus vaste.     

Labour market forecasting in Germany: is disaggregation useful?

This paper examines whether labour market forecasts can be improved by using disaggregated information. We construct vector-autoregressive models for employment by sector in order to produce out-of-sample forecasts of aggregate employment. Forecast accuracy is compared to univariate models by using Clark/West tests. In an application to German data, it is evident that disaggregation significantly improves the employment forecast. Moreover, using fluctuation-window tests we find that disaggregation yields superior results especially in phases with strong and sustained employment changes.     

Approximations in power transmission planning: implications for the cost and performance of renewable portfolio standards

Renewable portfolio standards (RPSs) are popular market-based mechanisms for promoting development of renewable power generation. However, they are usually implemented without considering the capabilities and cost of transmission infrastructure. We use single- and multi-stage planning approaches to find cost-effective transmission and generation investments to meet single and multi-year RPS goals, respectively. Using a six-node network and assuming a linearized DC power flow, we examine how the lumpy nature of network reinforcements and Kirchhoff’s Voltage Law can affect the performance of RPSs. First, we show how simplified planning approaches that ignore transmission constraints, transmission lumpiness, or Kirchhoff’s voltage law yield distorted estimates of the type and location of infrastructure, as well as inaccurate compliance costs to meet the renewable goals. Second, we illustrate how lumpy transmission investments and Kirchhoff’s voltage law result in compliance costs that are nonconvex with respect to the RPS targets, in the sense that the marginal costs of meeting the RPS may decrease rather than increase as the target is raised. Thus, the value of renewable energy certificates (RECs) also depends on the network topology, as does the amount of noncompliance with the RPS, if noncompliance is penalized but not prohibited. Finally, we use a multi-stage planning model to determine the optimal generation and transmission infrastructure for RPS designs that set multiyear goals. We find that the optimal infrastructure to meet RPS policies that are enforced year-by-year differ from the optimal infrastructure if banking and borrowing is allowed in the REC market.     

Risk and Policy Shocks on the US Term Structure

We document two stylized facts of US short‐term and long‐term interest rate data seemingly incompatible with the expectations hypothesis: low contemporaneous cross‐correlation and relatively slow adjustment to long‐run relationships. We explain these features in a small structural model with three types of randomness: While a persistent monetary policy shock implies immediate identical reactions through the term structure, both a transitory policy shock and an autocorrelated risk premium allow for sustained deviations. Indeed, we find important impacts and persistence of risk premia and considerable contribution of transitory policy shocks to short rates. Results of standard expectations hypothesis tests can be rationalized.     

Robotization and labour dislocation in the manufacturing sectors of OECD countries: a panel VAR approach

Robots are the most important innovation which has affected the production process in the last three decades. Thanks to the latest advances in technology, they have been able to perform an ever-increasing number of tasks, eventually replacing human work within the whole production process. However, because of the scarcity of suitable data, the extent of this potentially disrupting process is not fully assessed. This paper makes up for the lack of empirical evidence on the effect of robotization on labour dislocation using data collected by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR) on the number of robots installed in the different manufacturing industries of 16 OECD countries over the period 2011–2016. We show that at the industry level a 1% growth in the number of robots reduces the growth rate of worked hours by 0.16, as well as the selling prices and the real values of the compensations of employees. Moreover, we show that a given sector is more likely to be robotized when it is expanding both in terms of relative prices and employee compensations. We conclude that, at least in the selected countries, the introduction of robots plays a key role in slowing down human labour and compensation growth.