Bank capital in the crisis: It's not just how much you have but who provides it

Bank capital is the cornerstone of bank regulation and is considered a key determinant of a bank's ability to withstand economic shocks. In the area of bank capital regulation, the general view is that more bank capital is better, irrespective of who provides it. In this paper, we investigate whether the investment horizon of bank capital providers matters for bank performance during the recent financial crisis. We observe that banks with more short-term investor ownership have worse stock returns during the crisis. Further exploration suggests that this is partially because banks with higher short-term investor ownership took more risk prior to the crisis but mainly because they experienced higher selling pressure during the crisis. Our results confirm the economic benefit of bank capital in helping banks to perform better during crises. However, when we decompose bank capital by the nature of its providers, we show that more capital is associated with worse performance when it is provided by short-term institutional investors.     

中国:理财市场竞争大战在即

中国理财市场的规模、性质及增长特征概述 尽管中国的理财业还处于新生阶段,却已经颇具规模而且前景非常广阔.目前,中国(大陆)是亚洲地区(除日本之外)的第二大市场,其富有客户拥有大约1.44万亿美金的管理资产(参阅图1).     

上市公司审计委托权定位研究

本文提出了由真实会计信息需要者委托审计这一命题,并从充分性、必要性和可行性三个方面进行了论证。对充分性的分析是为了说明结论的合理性;对必要性的分析是为了表明所得出的结论是否是解决会计信息失真与审计监管失效问题的客观需要;对可行性的分析是为了证明命题的现实可操作性。     

未来的世界:可预测的周期、趋势和未来

未来将会有许多为这些普通人做事的机会。企业家、商人和投资者将迎来重大的商业机遇。那些具有创造性而且有趣的工作岗位也会大量增加。问题是,这种机会会出现在哪些行业?如果你是一个考虑学习科学、商业或金融专业的学生,你应该关注哪些方面?如果你是一名熟练的企业家,在哪里你可以用很少的钱启动创业,并有机会让你的企业成为一个伟大的公司,甚至在相对较少的几年内,就得到初始投资1000倍的回报?或者,如果你是一个投资者,在未来的几十年里,哪些资产和哪些行业将是最有利可图的?如果你的时机和选择都很好,你完全可能在10年内获得10倍的回报.     

Understanding the impact of monetary policy announcements: The importance of language and surprises

Monetary policy announcements have a significant impact on financial market liquidity. This study provides a novel perspective on the factors driving this relationship in the market for 10-year Treasury note futures: Target rate surprises and the complexity of the monetary policy statement language are important determinants. Differences of opinion resulting from interpretation of complex language appear to result in more trading volume despite relatively low levels of liquidity (a negative liquidity-volume relationship), while large target rate surprises reduce trading activity (a positive liquidity-volume relationship). The dynamic changes over time, as unconventional polices are adopted by monetary authorities and, high frequency traders become more pervasive. Central bankers may aid market liquidity by minimizing surprises, and issuing statements that are easier to understand (with shorter sentences and more familiar words).     

Always coming home: Towards an archaeology of the future

This paper reports on a research project which facilitated a group of socially committed educators to clarify the nature of their desirable futures and to identify their sources of hope. This work is set within the normative tradition of futures studies and an account is given of how the research process was arrived at and the way in which people responded to this. A participatory and experiential focus group format enabled participants to explore these issues in a fruitful and synergetic way. Key elements of their preferable futures and primary sources of hope are identified and then compared with previous research findings. Finally these concerns are located within wider contemporary debates about revisionary postmodernism, sustainable futures and the utopian tradition.     

PwC携手北京2008奥运会

作为北京2008年奥运会会计服务供应商,普华永道为北京2008年奥运会和残奥会、北京奥组委、中国奥委会以及参加北京2008年奥运会的中国体育代表团提供预算与财务规划咨询、内部控制咨询服务以及其他相关方面的专业服务。自2000年北京申奥开始,普华永道便与北京奥申委进行紧密合作,为奥申委提供相关的财务咨询服务。在2001年北京申奥成功之后,普华永道中天会计师事务所又为北京市5个新建的奥运场馆,包括“鸟巢”项目法人招标提供了财务顾问服务。就在距北京奥运会召开不足一个月之际,《国际融资》杂志记者采访了普华永道北京主管合伙入封和平先生、普华永道咨询服务合伙入张逸明先生、普华永道咨询服务合伙入丛宏彬先生,了解到普华永道携手北京奥运的全过程     

Stock market reaction to fed funds rate surprises: State dependence and the financial crisis

This paper examines the response of US stock returns to Federal Funds rate (FFR) surprises between 1989 and 2012, focusing on the impact of the recent financial crisis. We find that outside the crisis period, stock prices increased as a response to unexpected FFR cuts. State dependence is identified with stocks exhibiting larger increases when interest rate easing coincided with recessions, bear markets, and tightening credit conditions. However, an important structural shift occurred during the crisis, changing the stocks’ response to FFR shocks and the nature of state dependence. Throughout the crisis period, stocks did not react positively to unexpected FFR cuts, which were interpreted as signals of worsening future economic conditions. This triggered a rebalancing of investment portfolios away from falling equities and towards safe-haven assets. Our results highlight the severity of the crisis and the ineffectiveness of conventional monetary policy close to the zero lower bound.     

The impact of monetary policy surprises on asset return volatility: the case of Germany

This paper investigates the impact of monetary policy surprises by the FED or Bundesbank/ECB on the return volatility of German stocks and bonds using a GARCH-M model. We show that stock return volatility is susceptible to monetary policy surprises in the United States, whereas monetary policy surprises in the Euro zone matter for bond return volatility. These findings are robust for other Euro zone stock markets, but not significant for other Euro zone bond markets. The empirical evidence also suggests that monetary policy surprises have larger effects on German stock return volatility in bear markets than in bull phases. Moreover, our results support the claim that stock return volatility can be negatively correlated with stock returns, contradicting predictions made by many asset pricing models (e.g., CAPM or ICAPM) and the empirical finding of an insignificant relationship often reported in the literature.

Paradigms lost?: Reflections on the coming organizational ‘revolution’

The question of optimal organizational change for the future is attracting growing interest. The authors examine the literature to date and find that its basic tenets are too simplistic and over-optimistic to provide a methodological base for evaluation of change in the future.     

Information efficiency of the U.S. credit default swap market: Evidence from earnings surprises

The credit default swap (CDS) market attracted much debate during the 2008 financial crisis. Opponents of CDS argue that CDS could lead to financial instability as it allows speculators to bet against companies and make the crisis worse. Proponents of CDS believe that CDS could increase market competition and benefit hedging activities. Moreover, an efficient CDS market can serve as a barometer to regulators and investors regarding the credit health of the underlying reference entity. We investigate information efficiency of the U.S. CDS market using evidence from earnings surprises. Our findings confirm that negative earnings surprises are well anticipated in the CDS market in the month prior to the announcement, with both economically and statistically stronger reactions for speculative-grade firms than for investment-grade firms. On the announcement day, for both positive and negative earnings surprises, the CDS spread for speculative-grade firms presents abnormal changes. Moreover, there is no post-earnings announcement drift in the CDS market, which is in direct contrast to the well-documented post-earnings drift in the stock market. Our evidence supports the efficiency of the CDS market.     

Consumerism's sea change: how it will affect your company in the coming years

Consumerism and care management are the cost-containment strategies most employers say they will focus on over the next five years. This article reviews the growth of these strategies and the different ways employers have implemented them. The author then delineates the ten key ways that consumerism may affect companies over the next five- to ten-year time period, as these strategies continue to move health benefits toward greater transparency, flexibility and accountability.     

Organisations and the sixth wave: Are ethics transforming our economies in the coming decades?

The Kondratieff wave theory describes how societies develop in socio-economic waves of 40–60 years. The theory postulates a set of technologies and practices that are unique to each wave. Although a challenge of the Kondratieff wave theory is great variance in interpretations about the timing of the waves among scholars, based on several analyses we suggest that with the financial crisis of 2008, and resulting economic instability, we are experiencing the end of the fifth wave and the emergence of the sixth.We take as our starting point the global trends, particularly those of scarcity and the rising cost of commodities such as energy and raw materials that have led to a widely shared hypothesis that resource productivity will be the key driver of technology and economic growth in the next wave. Socially, this driver will be fortified by growing environmental concerns since climate change and the destruction of natural ecosystems seem inevitably to proceed. Both these sources are boosting a generation of new companies and behaviour.In this article our focus is to evaluate weak signals that point to possible directions for the future of organisational practices in the sixth Kondratieff wave. We ask what will be the effects of the changing socio-technical landscape on the working life and organisational culture. The K-waves theory explains how certain ways of organising that have so far developed in the fringes of organisational culture may move into the mainstream, as a product of the systemic restructuring that has often accompanied the new K-wave.We present our findings from a workshop with representatives of five different resource efficiency oriented organisations in the Silicon Valley area. Based on the data we have gathered through the workshop and complementing interviews, we show how organisations base their considerations about the future to a surprisingly large extent on ethical arguments. Our material also includes a case that shows that this ethical approach is not self-evidently related to the aim for resource efficiency.We evaluate our results in the Future Sign – framework presented by Hiltunen. The signals we have gathered are combined with corporate shared value – thinking, and both are interpreted through the Kondratieff – wave theory. Based on our sample of five cases, along with a framework that supports our interpretation, we suggest the ethical motivations as backbone of organisations is a relatively strong future sign that has potential for strengthening in the sixth wave context.     

温家宝：进一步发挥好货币政策关键作用

国务院总理温家宝2013年1月21日在中国人民银行调研时强调,推进金融改革发展,开刨金融工作新局面。下午3时许,温家宝来到中国人民银行,看望调查统计司、货币政策司等司局工作人员,在金融信息中心听取国库业务系统和个人、企业征信系统建设及应用情况介绍。     

数据仓库建设:商业银行应审慎决策

在竞争全球化和金融信息化趋势的驱动下，许多商业银行纷纷投入了数据仓库建设，以期实现管理决策的改善与银行竞争力的提高。然而，很多数据仓库项目却因各种原由以失败告终，未能达到预期的要求，造成了资源的浪费。只有从一个理性视角分析数据仓库作为一个IT项目的特征及其开发风险，对数据仓库持有审慎的态度、全面的认识、充分的分析、合理的规划，才能使数据仓库建设真正地服务于银行的效益增长。     

‘In the end, we have the Gatling gun, and they have not’: Future prospects of indigenous knowledges

Charles Taylor argues the superiority of Western technology demonstrates the epistemological superiority of Western science over indigenous knowledges. I argue Taylor's “might makes right” argument lacks deductive and inductive cogency, begs significant questions against indigenous knowledges, and confounds military subjugation with philosophical refutation. Polycentric global epistemology represents one possible future of indigenous knowledges. It consists of a variety of dialogues between mutual epistemological “others”. Participants ask, “how may this or that knowledge practice be brought into the service of human well-being?” It admits all varieties of knowledge practices ranging from rational argument and experimentation to dance, song, and ritual performance. It establishes a trading zone for mutual sharing, borrowing, and learning as well as collaborative projects.     

Through the organizational looking glass: you can't plan tomorrow's organizations with today's assumptions

It's hard to imagine what our industrial society would be like if, for instance, there were no factories. How would things get produced, how would business survive? But are we, in fact, an industrial society? Are factories going to be the prime production place for a society that is conserving energy and doesn't need to travel to work because the silicon chip makes it more efficient to work at home? Who knows what the impact of energy conservation and women in the work force will be on future organizations? One thing we can be sure of, this author writes, is that whatever tomorrow brings, today's assumptions probably cannot account for it. We are, he asserts, entering a period of discontinuous change where the assumptions we have been working with as a society and in organizations are no longer necessarily true. He discusses three assumptions he sees fading--what causes efficiency, what work is, and what value organizational hierarchy has--and then gives some clues as to what our new assumptions might be. Regardless of what our assumptions actually are, however, our organizations and society will require leaders willing to take enormous risks and try unproved ways to cope with them.