Measuring the deadly embrace: Systemic and sovereign risks

This study contributes to the literature by making a first step toward implementing a comprehensive internally coherent measurement of systemic risk in a country. It measures systemic risk and the ensuing conditional contingent liabilities of the sovereign stemming from Luxembourg’s Other Systemically Important Institutions (OSIIs), the Global Systemically Important Banks (G-SIBs) to which they belong, the investment funds sponsored by the OSIIs, the household and the non-financial corporate sectors. The ensuing estimated systemic contingent claims are included in a stochastic version of the general government’s balance sheet to gauge their impact on the country’s sovereign risk. Results indicate that time-varying conditional implicit guarantees from OSSIs are larger than those from G-SIBs and investment funds, while systemic risk stemming from the household and non-financial corporate sectors is moderate. The robustness of the sovereign is not drastically affected by systemic risk stemming from the rest of the economy. However, illustrating the so-called “deadly embrace”, sovereign risk would significantly rise as a result of a historically plausible increase in sovereign assets’ value volatility combined with an economy-wide shock. The main policy implication is that financial stability stands on two columns, a resilient financial sector and a sustainable fiscal position.     

后路隧道施工重点及难点分析研究

本文主要以中石化中原建设工程有限公司承建的海西天然气管网二期工程-后路隧道工程为例,分析研究大坡度、小断面隧道施工中的控制重点、难点及相关处理措施,并通过对隧道开挖的重点环节进行分析研究来确定相应的应对措施,旨在为今后类似情况的隧道施工提供科学依据。     

Assessing Systemic Importance With a Fuzzy Logic Inference System

Three metrics are designed to assess Colombian financial institutions' size, connectedness and non-substitutability as the main drivers of systemic importance: (i) centrality as net borrower in the money market network; (ii) centrality as payments originator in the large-value payment system network; and (iii) asset value of core financial services. An aggregated systemic importance index is calculated based on expert knowledge by using a fuzzy logic inference system. We use principal component analysis to calculate a benchmark index for comparison purposes. Overall similarities between both indexes put forward that expert knowledge aggregation is consistent with that based on a purely quantitative standard approach. Specific non-negligible differences concur with the nonlinear features of an approach whose intention is to replicate human reasoning. Both indexes are complementary and provide a comprehensive relative assessment of each financial institution's systemic importance in the Colombian case, in which the choice of metrics pursues the macroprudential perspective of financial stability. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

广甘高速公路边坡安全监测实践与思考

本文结合四川广甘高速公路边坡安全监测实践,对边坡安全监测技术的发展过程与前景进行了认真的思考与分析。     

The tortoise and the hare: the impact of employment instability on firm performance

The main objective of this study is to assess the influence of employment instability on firm performance in a sample of publicly traded firms. Competing theoretical arguments are considered with regard to likely outcomes associated with employment instability. A large sample of cross‐sectional time‐series data is then analysed using generalised estimating equations (GEE) regression techniques. Results indicate that employment instability is negatively associated with firm performance, although the relationship is also demonstrated to be quadratic (an inverse U‐shaped relationship). This suggests that the main relationship varies depending upon the level of employment instability. Industry characteristics are also examined as moderators of this main effect. The results suggest a disordinal interaction effect for industry differentiation, where employment instability is negatively associated with firm performance for firms in highly differentiated industries and positively associated in less differentiated industries.     

重大水利工程项目决策社会稳定风险评估中的公众参与博弈

为改善重大水利工程项目决策社会稳定风险评估中公众参与现状,从社会稳定风险评估3个主要利益主体——中央政府、地方政府与公众不同的利益诉求出发,运用演化博弈模型,探讨在不同利益诉求的相互作用下影响地方政府与公众在社会稳定风险评估中策略选择的因素。研究发现,当公众受到的损失大于参与付出的成本时,双方稳定均衡状态均表现积极,反之,双方可能均表现为消极或积极这两种截然不同的状态。基于此,分析了中央政府对地方政府和公众在社会稳定风险评估博弈中策略选择的影响。最后,提出应加大对地方政府的支持、规范公众参与相关制度、加大教育培训及宣传力度、创新公众参与方式几项政策建议。     

Impact of short selling activity on market dynamics: Evidence from an emerging market

With unique daily short sale data of Borsa Istanbul (stock exchange of Turkey), we investigate the dynamic relationship between short selling activity and volatility, liquidity and market return from January 2005 to December 2012 using a VAR(p)-cDCC-FIEGARCH(1,d,1) approach. Our findings suggest that short sellers are contrarian traders and contribute to efficient stock market in Turkey. We also show that increased short selling activity is associated with higher liquidity and decreased volatility. However this relation weakens during the financial turmoil of 2008. Our results indicate that any ban on short sales may be detrimental for financial stability and market quality in Turkey.     

Does travellers’ casual attribution affect pre-recovery emotions and behavioural intentions? A field study of airline travellers in Malaysia

This study examines the relationship between airline travellers' casual attribution, pre-recovery emotions, and negative behavioural intentions after a service failure and proposes a model for analysing direct effects of airline travellers' casual attribution of stability (failure frequency) and controllability (the extent to which the airline can control the failure) on negative behavioural intentions as well as its indirect effects through pre-recovery emotions. Data were gathered through a survey of airline travellers who experienced a failure in the past six months. The results indicate that both dimensions of casual attribution influenced pre-recovery emotions and negative behavioural intentions, and that pre-recovery emotions were significantly related to negative behavioural intentions. In addition, the results verify the mediating effect of pre-recovery emotions on the relationship between casual attribution and behavioural intentions. These results have important managerial implications.     

Explaining banking stability in Sub-Saharan Africa

The study examined banking stability in Sub-Saharan Africa. The results reveal that banking spread (Net Interest Margin – NIM) is the main determinant of stability and the major means to achieve stability during crises periods. We however find the existence of a threshold effect in NIM.Crises in the banking sector consistently showed to reduce stability. While the results show that high percentage of foreign banks reduce stability, we find foreign banks help stabilize the banking sector in periods of crises. The results show that diversification could also have a positive impact on stability (Z-score) even though this relationship was not robust enough. The results also largely support the competition-fragility view. Particularly, we find that less competition during crises periods can help improve stability. Again, we find evidence for both concentration-stability and concentration-fragility hypotheses depending on the stability measure used. We however find that when large banks in concentrated markets are well regulated, stability could be improved. Weak regulatory environment reduces stability (Z-score) directly and matters during crises periods. Our results are robust to the use of different indicators of stability and estimation methods.     

An experiment on the role of tourist attribution: Evidence from negative nature-based incidents

More so than previously, in recent years tourists have been exposed to unexpected adverse situations, such as political instability, caused by the destination. Many aspects of the destination experience do not involve service delivery and product consumption; thus, such an experience needs to be treated uniquely. Acknowledging that the effects of tourists’ inner psychological processes in this context are crucial, this study applies attribution theory to examine how tourists make sense of negative incidents caused by the destination’s natural incidents. The results show the crucial effects of globality attribution in predicting the levels of satisfaction.