Towards the ‘cult of the equity’? Insurance companies and the interwar capital market

This article examines the ways in which insurance companies modified their investment policies during the interwar years, arguing that this period marked the start of the transition from ‘traditional’ to ‘modern’ investment practice. Economic and financial conditions raised considerable doubts regarding the suitability of traditional insurance investments, while competitive conditions forced insurance offices to seek higher‐yielding assets. These pressures led to a considerable increase in the proportion of new investment devoted to corporate securities, including ordinary shares. Meanwhile new insurance investment philosophies began to be advocated, which accorded both legitimacy and importance to the role of ordinary shares in insurance portfolios.     

Timeliness of Annual Reports of Chinese Listed Companies

The timeliness of annual reports has received serious attention by the Chinese regulatory and professional bodies in recent years. Using 8294 company reports from the Chinese listed companies during 1993–2003, this paper analyzes the timeliness of annual reports by first examining the trend of reporting lags, separating the effects of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ news on timeliness, and then by using a multivariate regression to identify the determinants of reporting lags. It is found that there is a significant improvement on timeliness of reports although the shortening of reporting lags shows a U-shape over the data period. There is strong evidence that reporting lags were related to firm performance as bad news tended to hold back timely release of corporate reports. It is interesting to note that government policies have also played an important role in improving timeliness of corporate annual reporting in China but much more work needs to be done to make sure that listed companies provide more timely and reliable reports to investors and regulatory authorities.     

Dutch-Asiatic trade in the 17th and 18th centuries

Abstract

Dr. Glamann's study of Dutch-Asiatic trade marks a new approach in the treatment of European-Asiatic relations during the centuries of European invasion and rule of the Indian peninsula and the Indian archipelago. About 1600 the Dutch and English East India Companies became the competitors and successors of the Portuguese in that area. These companies, however, have often been treated in historical writings primarily as the precursors of Holland and England as Empire-builders. Such a view is all too sweeping. It is true that the role of these two companies in the transition from medieval partnerships and regulated companies into modern joint-stock companies has not been overlooked by former historians. But this role is worthy of consideration as a major problem and Dr. Glamann has devoted attention to it, in addition to the trade proper of the Dutch company which was the central theme of his investigation.     

The Effects of M&A on Corporate Performance in Japan:DID Analysis in the Era of Corporate Governance Reform

This study analyzes how mergers and acquisitions (M&A) affect the performance of acquired companies in Japan. The sample period includes the era in which the government of Japan promoted a series of corporate governance reforms. A difference-in-differences analysis is implemented to eliminate the endogenous effects of a corporate acquisition. Choosing a control group by propensity score matching, we find that acquisitions have significantly negative effects on employment but no significant effects on labor productivity. For acquisitions by Japanese companies, we also find no significant improvement in ROA but significant improvement in Tobin’s q. The results are consistent with the zombie company theory, which indicates that an M&A prolongs the life of an insolvent company. Acquisitions by Japanese companies are in contrast with those by foreign companies, which have positive effects on ROA.     

Profiling emerging contractors for effective transformation in the South African construction sector

South Africa's construction industry is transforming. Its economy requires a wider base of contracting entities. Much of this growth is expected to be delivered by ‘emerging’ contractors. Yet these companies face significant obstacles. Targeted interventions that foster companies need a better picture of these firms and their core members. A survey of the civil engineering sector, targeting emerging contractors, showed that the owners of these companies lack training and experience, and that there are gender-related differences. Classifications according to company turnover, contract sizes or employee numbers alone do not reflect circumstances. Combining these data with the core members' backgrounds gives a clearer picture. Most companies hover between the ‘Existence’ and ‘Survival’ stages of business development. Development initiatives that assume companies require knowledge must accommodate large cognitive distances between sender and receiver. Initiatives thus need to focus on the owners, considering the status and background of their companies.     

Incorporation and Company Formation in Australasia, 1790–1860

Nearly 260 companies were founded in and for the Australasian colonies between 1790 and 1860. A quantitative survey suggests that the patterns of incorporation mainly reflected ‘functionalist’ economic factors rather than ‘autonomous’ legal conditions, though the changing nature of company law did influence the various forms that incorporation took. In some sectors, outside factors and even historical accidents also pushed patterns of incorporation along distinct lines. The result was a tradition of adapting legal powers of incorporation to local needs which persisted beyond the introduction of modern company acts to the region in the 1860s and therefore shaped the subsequent evolution of the company in Australia and New Zealand.     

新时期公司境外税务筹划策略研究

越来越多的中国公司跨出国门从事国际商业活动。由于境内外的税务环境、税法及征管与中国存在差异,中国公司必须承担税负带来的风险从而影响境外经营的收益。文章从商业经营运作模式、国外经营地点的选择、境外税务代理及服务、费用的确认和安排、内部交易转移定价、税收优惠政策、国际税收协定等方面提出了税务筹划的内容,提倡中资公司在合理合法的前提下,综合地运用差异空间做好税务筹划,降低税务成本。     

The limits of globalization in the early modern world

This article reviews the ways in which historians and economists have applied the term ‘globalization’ to the early modern era. It distinguishes a soft and a hard definition, and goes on to test the claims made about the driving forces shaping the growth and character of long‐distance trade between Europe and Asia in the age of the European trading companies. On the basis of new estimates of the volume and value of European trade with Asia, the article concludes by identifying the factors limiting the growth of trade in this period.     

Most-favoured-nation treaty in service of trade? Case: early trade policy relations between Finland and Japan and their impact on the sales networks of the Finnish forest industry

This article scrutinises the significance of the most-favoured-nation (MFN) treaty in promoting the development of commercial activity and its results in transnational trade. As cardinal agents of trade policy, governments act as ‘umpires’ in formulating and guarding the rules of international trade, while the ‘players’ are private corporations which conduct commercial operations in the playing field of international trade. Within the framework of Finno-Japanese trade relations, the players established and developed their trade networks (corporate interconnections) regardless of the umpires and their official rules, meaning the commercial treaties. Through a close examination of the early trade policy relations between Finland and Japan along with the formation and development of the Finnish forest industry’s sales networks into the Japanese market in the early twentieth century, this study demonstrates that there was no explicit causal connection between MFN treaties and the evolution of the Finnish forest industry’s export efforts – and their results.     

出版企业境外投资的国别风险分析与应对--以F出版公司收购美国P公司为例

近年来,我国不少出版企业开始将境外市场纳入自身发展版图,境外投资成为出版企业国际化经营的重要手段。如何科学分析国别风险,合理防控风险,是我国出版企业需要面对的重要课题。本文以F出版公司收购美国P公司为例,分析并购发生前后美国的政治、经济和文化等方面的风险变化情况,梳理F出版公司的应对举措,为我国出版企业管控境外投资风险提出建议。     

Consumption and material culture in sixteenth‐century Ireland1

New evidence from a series of 11 Bristol customs accounts indicates that Irish consumption patterns underwent significant changes over the course of the sixteenth century. This article considers the use of the Bristol ‘particular’ accounts and port books as a source for Irish material culture and consumption studies and uses the customs data as a statistical framework on which to establish how, why, and to what extent patterns of consumption changed in Ireland. It considers who was consuming the increasing range of commodities that were imported into Ireland from Bristol towards the end of the century, and what changing consumption patterns may reveal about the nature of Ireland's economy, society, and culture during this critical period in Irish history.     

“Large” and “small” regional trading blocs and trade regime bias: A comparison of the EC and CARICOM

‘Large’ and ‘Small’ Regional Trading Blocs and Trade Regime Bias: A Comparison of the EC and CARICOM. — Liberalizing trade on a regional basis may, but does not necessarily, reduce trade (anti-export) bias; the outcome depends upon the characteristics of the regional grouping and the height of external tariffs. There are a priori grounds for expecting trading arrangements for ‘small’ blocs to induce greater trade regime bias than ‘large’ ones. This paper explores the reasons for this, and provides evidence of potential trade regime bias from CARICOM (Barbados) and the EC (UK). The paper also considers to what extent regional commitments may constrain the scope for lowering trade regime bias, and investigates some of the national and regional policy options for lowering the bias associated with ‘small’ regional trade arrangements.     

‘Eating the bread out of their mouth’: Antwerp's export trade and generalized institutions, 1544–5

This article studies the distribution of exports from mid‐sixteenth‐century Antwerp at the individual and group level (grouped by merchant origin). Recently, scholars have argued that sixteenth‐century Antwerp, and in its wake a series of other cities, hosted an open‐access market as a result of an evolution towards open‐access institutions. However, the direct effect of this institutional change on merchant enterprise is hard to measure. Relying on detailed tax records, preferences at the individual merchant level for particular destinations and commodities are documented, to evaluate whether exporters had equal chances in Antwerp's export market. A few exporters had large export shares next to a multitude of smaller merchants. The exports of these smaller merchants to distant destinations and their participation in the export of important products demonstrate a fairly level commercial playing field with regard to their larger‐scale colleagues. Foreign traders had access to trade in Low Countries products, while local merchants were active in the export of major transit products. The activities of the latter group are particularly important; contrary to previous literature, Low Countries traders did not differ in their preference for home‐grown products.     

CFO特征与公司价值相关性研究 —基于中国上市公司经验数据

论文主要依据“高层梯队理论”,以2010-2014年A股上市公司为研究样本,实证检验了CFO的个人能力、激励和制度三大类特征对公司价值的影响。研究表明,CFO的学历、职称、社会兼职、薪酬水平以及是否持股与公司价值显著正相关;而CFO的性别、年龄、任期及是否进入董事会则与公司价值没有显著相关性。本文认为,通过健全CFO选拔机制、建立有效的薪酬和股权激励机制、完善CFO制度,通过CFO兼职构建良好的社会网络关系,可以有效地推动CFO发挥其战略支持作用,从而提升公司价值。     

The impact of opportunity factors on fraudulent behavior in the Vietnamese stock market

This study examines the opportunity factors on fraudulent behavior in Vietnam’s stock market by employing mixed methodology. In this regard, data were obtained from 20 in-depth interviews and 568 questionnaire survey responses of securities companies, fund management companies, stock exchanges and the State Securities Commission in Vietnam. Using the exploratory factor analysis, the study discovered that the following groups of opportunity factors result in fraudulent behavior: (i) influences of the internal person and issuer, which include (person whose internal information has not been published by the company), collusion of the issuer and securities company, abuse of power by influential person in the company, complex organizational structure of the issuer (one person handling multiple positions) and failure of an issuer to properly control internal information; (ii) investors’ factors, which include investors’ trade of securities based on the insider’s suggestion, framework of foreign investors, brokerage company recommendations, and advisory information on securities forums; and (iii) factors associated with market management and supervision, such as use of lenient penalty with no deterrent effect, untimely market management and limited authority of the securities committee. Using regression analysis, the order of the impact of each group of factors was found as follows: factors due to internal person and the issuing organization, the market management and supervision, and investors.     

国有跨国经营公司办公室思想政治工作研究

随着国有企业“走出去”战略的实施,传统的国有企业通过海外并购及重组整合,转变成跨国经营公司,这对于办公室各项工作提出了更高的要求。办公室是一个企业对外开放的基本平台,是展示企业形象的窗口,只有在以提高办公室思想政治工作为基础的前提下,才能不断提高工作质量和工作效率,适应跨国经营以及国企改革对于办公室工作提出的新目标。     

董事会治理与公司绩效关系的研究综述

董事会治理是公司治理的重要组成部分,其治理因素是多方面的,文章试从治理结构和治理机制两方面系统地综述了国内外的相关研究成果,以期对提高我国上市公司董事会治理效率具有借鉴意义.     

中国上市公司海外并购绩效分析

本文利用2005～2009年间进行海外并购的210家中国上市公司的数据,检验了我国上市公司进行海外并购前后绩效的变化情况。利用会计指标法研究公司并购后的长期绩效发现,并购后整体样本绩效出现了不显著的先降后升的情况。另外,对港澳台资企业的并购比对单纯的外国企业的并购更容易取得成功。结合企业面临的现实条件,中国企业对待海外并购应抱审慎的态度,先易后难,以提高成功率。     

Institutionalising corporate citizenship: the case of Barloworld and its ‘Employee Value Creation’ process

This article investigates the institutionalisation of corporate citizenship (CC) at Barloworld Limited, a diversified industrial enterprise. It describes a model that relates corporate identity, stakeholder engagement, internal structure and accountability and applies this model to a case study of Barloworld. The case study illustrates the importance of the company's corporate identity, or guiding philosophy, and its impact on organisational culture and management processes. The company's ‘Employee Value Creation’ strategy has comprehensively overhauled employee relations to achieve a high degree of employee commitment and participation. It institutionalises CC by integrating social or environmental issues into the organisation ‘from below’ and by helping employees understand why such issues matter to the organisation and are relevant to employees' responsibilities. Whereas the relevant literature emphasises the possible role of CC in creating employee commitment, this case study illustrates the reverse possibility: that employee commitment can be a catalyst for integrating CC into a company.     

The changing geography of world trade: Projections to 2030

Rapid economic growth in Asia (and some other emerging economies) has been shifting the global economic and industrial centres of gravity away from the north Atlantic, raising the importance of Asia in world trade, and boosting South–South trade. This paper examines how trade patterns are likely to change in the course of continuing economic growth and structural changes in Asia and the rest of the world over the next two decades. It does so by projecting a core baseline for the world economy from 2004 to 2030 and comparing it with alternative scenarios, including slower economic growth rates in the ‘North’, slower productivity growth in primary sectors, and prospective trade policy reforms in Developing Asia, without and with policy reforms also in the ‘North’ and in South–South trade. Projected impacts on international trade patterns, sectoral shares of GDP, ‘openness’ to trade, and potential welfare gains from reforms are highlighted, in addition to effects on bilateral trade patterns as summarized by intra- and extra-regional trade intensity and propensity indexes. The paper concludes with implications for regional and multilateral trade policy.