On theory as a ‘deliverable’ and its relevance in ‘policy’ arenas

This paper comments on Lee Parker's paper on “Qualitative management accounting research: deliverables and relevance”. Using it as a starting point, it highlights the need for more informed modes of theorizing as opposed to ‘more theories’ and the performative effects of theorising. Theories and theorising already matter although what they ‘deliver’ and influence will be contingent on their instantiation in specific action nets. Further, in order that such social practices might continue to generate desirable consequences, stronger forms of research training should be developed.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article: Theory of Financial Decision Making. By JONATHAN E. INGERSOLL, JR. Real Estate Finance. By SHERMAN J. MAISEL. Duration Analysis: Managing Interest Rate Risk. by GERALD O. BIERWAG.     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article: The Banking Crisis of 1933. By Susan Estabrook Kennedy Studies in The Theory of Capital Markets, Edited by Michael C. Jensen Bank-Administered Commingled Pension Funds. By Edward Malca . Introduction to Investments and Finance: Theory and Analysis, by Fred B. Renwick . Conglomerates Unlimited: The Failure of Regulation. By John F. Winslow . European Monetary Unification. By Giovanni Magnifico . International Trade and Investment by Franklin R. Root Managing the Dollar. By Sherman J. Maisel . Theory of Demand: Real and Monetary. By M. Morishima and others. Public Finance. By Bruce R. Davie and Bruce F. Duncombe .     

The language of legitimation: The narrative of reputation management within corporate disclosures

This poem is a story and a call. The story of my experience as an outsider to the field of accountancy and legitimacy theory and the resulting call to the experts in the field to move towards an epistemologically tolerant theorising for ontologically radical practice that is necessitated by the modern context of corporate practice.     

Capital Structure Theory and REIT Security Offerings

In this paper, we examine the stock price reactions to announcements of new security offerings by Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). REITs offer a unique setting in which to study these events because they do not pay taxes at the firm level. Theory suggests that the net tax gain to corporate borrowing is unambiguously negative for a REIT. Contrary to some recent studies, however, we find a positive stock price reaction to debt offerings, while the negative equity-issuance effect is preserved. Further empirical evidence lends support to signalling as the explanation for the positive significant debt-issuance effect.     

Image theory: An alternative description of audit decisions

Building upon an analysis of audit decisions by Waller & Felix (1984) [in Moriarty, S. and Joyce, E. (eds) Decision Making and Accounting: Current Research (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1984)], an alternative to the expected utility and “heuristics and biases” characterization of decision-making is presented. In this alternative, Image Theory, decisions are about adoption of goals and adoption of plans for attaining the goals, as well as about whether the plans are succeeding. The audit process is interpreted in terms of Image Theory and the salient research issues that this interpretation suggests are examined.     

Opciones reales: una propuesta para valorar proyectos de I+D en centros públicos de investigación agraria

Investment decisions in research and development (R&D) are important to the success of organizations, especially for public research. This paper evaluates an R&D project (seed breeding) using the traditional method, the Net Present Value, and the more contemporaneous technique of real options. Economic Surplus Theory and Monte Carlo simulations are used to estimate social benefits. The results indicate that the real-options approach is a useful tool for assessing R&D public projects.     

The problematics of financialization: Critical reflections

Andersson et al. (this issue) add to developing literature on financialization in reflecting on the bio-pharma industry. Their theorising is both an account of a process of financialization and a problematisation with a substantive resonance. The concern here is to contribute to a critical appreciation of the problematics of financialization through reflecting upon the developing thesis as indicated in the Andersson et al.’s study.     

Introduction to Special Issue of JREFE on REITs

This paper is an introduction to a special issue of the Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics (JREFE) devoted to papers on Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). The papers were especially written for a conference sponsored by the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts. The papers deal with the theoretical and empirical aspects of REIT underwriting behavior, corporate governance, asset pricing, takeovers and going-private transactions, capital-market based financing, changes in monetary policy and changes in REIT stock prices, and risk-bearing and liquidity.     

Book Reviews

Book reviews in this article: Cases in Business Finance. By Z. Lew Melnyk and Charles L. Barngrover. Principles of Financial Management Ward S. Curran. Program Budgeting and Benefit-Cost Analysis, Cases, Text and Readings. By Harley H. Hinrichs and Graeme M. Taylor The Management of Capital Expenditures. By Robert G. Murdick and Donald D. Deming. The Role of Private Placements in Corporate Finance. By Eli Shapiro and Charles R. Wolf. Turnaround Management. Edited by Joseph Eisenberg. Welcome to Our Conglomerate-You're Fired! By Isadore Barmash. Banking Markets and Financial Institutions. Edited by Thomas G. Gies and Vincent P. Apilado. Economics of Financial Institutions and Markets. By Paul F. Smith. Financial Institutions and Markets. By Murray E. Polakoff and others. Money and Banking. By John M. Culbertson. Insurance: Its Theory and Practice in the United States. Sixth edition. By Albert H. Mowbray, Ralph H. Blanchard, and C. Arthur Williams, Jr. Risk Management and Insurance. Second Edition. By C. Arthur Williams, Jr. and Richard M. Heins. The Behavior of Interest Rates: The Application of the Efficient Market Model to U.S. Treasury Bills. By Richard Roll. An Introduction to Risk and Return from Common Stocks. By Richard A. Brealey. Security Prices in a Competitive Market: More about Risk and Return from Common Stocks. By Richard A. Brealey. Investment and Portfolio Analysis. By Haim Levy and Marshall Sarnat. Investments: Analysis and Management. By Jack Clark Francis. The Stock Markets. Revised edition. By Gilbert W. Cooke. Personal Financial Management. By David A. West and Glenn L. Wood. Personal Investing. By Wilbur W. Widicus, Jr. and Thomas E. Stitzel. Principles of Real Estate Law. By Edna Hebard and Gerald S. Meisel. Principles of Real Estate Management. Tenth Edition. By James C. Downs, Jr. Real Estate-Principles and Practices. Fourth Edition. By Maurice A. Uiiger. Real Estate Securities and Syndication, A Workbook. Edited by Stephen E. Roulac. Case Studies in Property Development. By Stephen E. Roulac. Real Estate Syndication Digest 1972, Principles and Applications. By Stephen E. Roulac. Real Estate Venture Analysis. Proceedings of a session chaired by Stephen E. Roulac. International Economic Integration. Edited by P. Robson. International Managerial Finance. By J. Fred Weston and Bart W. Sorge. Consumer Theory. By H. A. John Green. Fiscal Federalism. By Wallace E. Oates. Game Theory—A Nontechnical Introduction. By Morton D. Davis. Monetary Economics, Readings on Current Issues. By William E. Gibson and George G. Kaufman.     

An organizational contingencies view of accounting and information systems implementation

Most research on accounting and information systems (A&IS) development and implementation has focused on the individual and small group level phenomena which impact implementation success. While some researchers have considered organizational level variables, no consistent relationships between these variables and A&IS implementation success have yet emerged. To a great extent, this is due to an atheoretical research approach coupled with an undifferentiated view of A&IS.This paper develops a typology of A&IS types based on the nature of the task supported by the system. Theory and the results of research in the organization design area are drawn upon to develop propositions about the differential impacts of eight organizational characteristics on the implementation of different A&IS types. These propositions form an organizational level framework for analyzing A&IS implementation. The propositions can serve as testable hypotheses for future research efforts.     

Investigating the operation of the affect heuristic: is it an associative construct?

Affect is of central importance in risk perception and risky decision-making, and the affect heuristic is a very influential construct developed in relation to this. We examined whether this heuristic operates at an associative level of processing as, despite much theorising, empirical evidence on this issue is lacking. We compared affective heuristic task performance with performance on established implicit association tasks. Participants (n?=?151) completed explicit attitude and risk measures, and five experimental tasks (three Go/No-Go Association Tasks (GNAT), a priming task and a time-pressured affect heuristic task). A modified ‘risk-benefit’ GNAT provided a speeded analogue of the affect heuristic task which was equivalent to the evaluative GNAT in terms of response mode and cognitive effort. Affect heuristic task performance was not associated with implicit task performance. The evaluative GNAT did not correlate with the risk-benefit GNAT (speeded affect heuristic task). However, affect heuristic task performance was strongly associated with, and significantly predicted by, explicit affective attitude and explicit risk measures suggesting that this heuristic may primarily reflect deliberative rather than associative processing. Findings contradict the (much cited) notion that this important psychological construct operates at an associative level. However, the conclusions that can be drawn from this study are limited by the implicit attitude measures used here. In future research, it would be desirable to use different measures of implicit associations, e.g. the Single-Category Implicit Association task, to further interrogate the processes operating within the affect heuristic.     

Exploring the adoption of a service innovation: A study of Internet banking adopters and non-adopters

Internet banking (IB) is the latest and most innovative service offered by the banks in Turkey. However, recent indicators regarding IB use in Turkey show that the majority of the Internet users have not adopted the service. The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors affecting the process of IB adoption and to characterise different IB adopter and non-adopter segments in Turkey. The paper adopted a multi-method approach employing qualitative and quantitative types of research. The findings showed that IB adopters and non-adopters have different perceptual, experience related, socioeconomic and situational characteristics. It was further revealed that besides the perceptual factors related to IB use, perceptual factors in relation to the banks in Turkey were also influential in IB adoption process. The paper applied an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) with Diffusion of Innovation Theory and Theory of Perceived Risk to characterise different IB adopter and non-adopter categories. The paper provided a methodological contribution to the adoption literature by applying the TAM to the context of the Turkish bank market and studying the issue in a multi-method research format.     

Do organizations adopt sophisticated capital budgeting practices to deal with uncertainty in the investment decision?: A research note

This study examines the impact of uncertainty on the sophistication of capital budgeting practices. While the theoretical applications of sophisticated capital budgeting practices (defined as the use of real option reasoning and/or game theory decision rules) have been well documented, empirical evidence on the factors that affect the importance and use of these sophisticated capital budgeting practices is scarce. I investigate the relation between specific uncertainties and sophisticated capital budgeting practices in 189 Dutch organizations. The empirical results show that sophisticated capital budgeting involves the use of multiple tools and procedures (such as Monte Carlo simulations, certainty equivalents, Game Theory decision rules and Real Option Reasoning). An increase in financial uncertainty is associated with the use and importance of sophisticated capital budgeting practices. Finally, size and industry are also related to the use and importance of sophisticated capital budgeting practices.     

Pareto Index Estimation Under Moderate Right Censoring

Real claim data sometimes are censored from above at a high value induced by the sum insured. In this note we examine the behaviour of extreme-value methods in such settings and propose an adaptation of the popular Hill (1975) estimator. It is argued that the censoring typically cannot exceed 5% for an effective use of the methods suggested.     

Interrogating an accounting-based intervention on three axes: Instrumental, moral and aesthetic

Accounting research is beginning to concern itself with mapping the operation of accounting in specific empirical settings. This paper has a similar aim — to track the effects of an accounting-based intervention in a rationalized lifeworld that is constituted by three cultural spheres with their associated modes of rationality —instrumental, moral and aesthetic (Habermas, J., The Theory of Communicative Action, Vol. 1, Heinemann, 1984). The institutional setting chosen is the U.S. health-care industry and the empirical event focused upon is the introduction of a prospective payment system in 1983. The empirics raise some interesting suggestions for future research. It appears that accounting struggles as an instrumental technology but enables action by providing a way out of moral dilemmas and in so doing enacts substantive power effects upon human bodies, both individual and collective.     

Emerging pathways for critical futures research: Changing contexts and impacts of social theory

There has always been a critical, emancipatory tradition within futures studies. Although those voices can still be heard, there has been a growing tendency for futures studies to be driven by more utilitarian needs in business and government. Whilst it is positive that futures thinking and research is increasingly valued within corporate and policy-making settings, much of that work appears to lack genuine plurality of worldviews and interests.The paper traces the changing contexts for futures research over the past 25 years. It argues that futures research needs to be viewed as part of the re-politicisation – in the Habermasian sense – of technocratic decision-making. It suggests that there are three particular reasons for revisiting the need for criticality in futures research: the increasing acknowledgement of systemic interrelatedness (ecological, social, economic), a growth in the forward-looking socio-economic paradigm that permeates both business and policy, and the challenge of theory development. Drawing on social theory and futures research, we suggest three pathways for revived critical futures research: socio-technical practices, future-oriented dialectics, and socio-economic imaginaries. As a result, the paper calls for development in futures studies that would dialectically integrate and overcome the dichotomy between instrumentalisation and (critical) theorising that can be currently understood as somewhat antagonistic. In order to find a balance between these antagonistic dimensions, futures research should be more engaged in enabling critique and revealing assumptions and interests.     

Operating Lease as Alternative Financing for REITs: a Viable Strategy or a Sign of Trouble?

The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics - Extant REIT research largely overlooks operating leases as an alternative source of financing. In this study, we hand-collect lease information of...     

Currents of Liquidity Flows Created by the Different Type of Payments: the Case of SPEI

In the present study we examine through network model and transactional analysis the structure of participants’ funds assigned to cover their own payments and payments initiated by their clients (third party) in the Mexican Real Time Payment system SPEI 2 2 SPEI is an hybrid system, equivalent to a Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS)
. First we build two networks by splitting the number of transactions in two sets of operations, namely payments initiated by third parties and by participants. Our main finding in this regards is that both networks have a core-periphery structure and third party payments help to increase connectivity at the core. From the transactional analysis, we found that third party payments use 47% of the total amount of funds - an indication that participants have strong interest to settle third party payment on real time. Further, in the case of third parties’ payments the ratio of external funds vs. funds formed with incoming payments, is 15%-85%, whereas for transactions initiated by participants this ratio is 19%-81%. This finding is an evidence that with third party payments banks are able to increase the overall level of recycling in the system. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

关于前景理论的理论综述

卡尼曼（ Kahneman ）与特沃斯基（ Tversky ）对行为经济学进行了广泛而系统的研究后所提出的前景理论,冲击了预期效用理论,从动态的角度和行为者的风险偏好行为做了具体深入的研究,并强调微观层次上的决策者和环境之间的互动,较好的解释了认知偏见如何影响决策者对信息的处理,进而影响其决策的行为。