Incentive Effects, Monitoring Mechanisms and the Market for Corporate Control: An Analysis of the Factors Affecting Public to Private Transactions in the UK

Abstract:   This paper investigates the factors that influence the decision to change the status of a publicly quoted company to that of a private company. We find that firms that go private are more likely to have higher CEO ownership and higher institutional ownership. In relation to their board structures, firms going private tend to have more duality but there is no statistical difference in the proportion of non‐executive directors. They do not show signs of having excess free cash flows but there is some evidence of lower growth opportunities. We do not find that firms going private experience a greater threat of hostile acquisition. The results are therefore consistent with incentive and monitoring explanations of going private. Calculation of the probability of going private shows that incentive effects are stronger than the monitoring effects.     

Intergovernmental Fiscal Transfers and Local Incentives and Responses: The Case of Indonesia

Indonesian policymakers are convinced that a number of perverse incentives are embedded in their system of intergovernmental transfers. Officials in countries throughout the developing world have similar views about their own intergovernmental frameworks. In Indonesia, perverse incentives are thought to negatively influence a wide range of local government fiscal behaviours, including as regards own‐source revenues, spending and savings. An empirical analysis of the local government response to transfers, however, offers only mixed support for the existence and strength of the presumed incentives. Overall, the findings in this paper highlight the benefits to central governments of rigorously examining assumed perverse incentives in their intergovernmental frameworks before embarking on attempts to expunge them.     

What we spend and what we get: Public and private provision of crime prevention and criminal justice

In this paper, we consider a number of issues regarding crime prevention and criminal justice. We begin by considering how crime is measured and present both general and specific evidence on the level of crime in a variety of countries. Crime is pervasive and varies substantially across countries. We outline the arguments for some public role in crime prevention, enforcement, prosecution, defence, adjudication and punishment. We consider the relative roles of the public and private sectors in crime control and criminal justice. We discuss various measures for the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. We conclude by suggesting some potential areas for research.     

Configuring blockchain architectures for transaction information in blockchain consortiums: The case of accounting and supply chain systems

This paper investigates alternative configurations of different blockchain architectures that can be used for gathering and processing transactions in a range of different settings, including accounting, auditing, supply chain and other types of transaction information. Although there has been substantial focus on the peer‐to‐peer and public versions of blockchain, this paper focuses primarily on cloud‐based and private configuration versions of blockchains and investigates use configurations, advantages and limitations as firms bring blockchain‐based market mechanisms into their organizations. In addition, this paper investigates some emerging issues associated with blockchain use in consortium settings. Finally, this paper relates some proposed uses of blockchain for transaction processing to other technologies, such as data warehouses and databases.