Government accounting with Chinese characteristics and challenges

This paper explains the Chinese government's decision to adopt accrual accounting by referring to an ancient Chinese strategy of governing. It also provides a rationale for whole-of-government financial reports in China's current fiscal context. The nature of the existing government accounting system is described and the technical and implementation challenges in achieving the goals of the ambitious reform agenda are identified. The country's unique institutional structure makes it necessary to craft a system of government accounting and reporting with Chinese characteristics.     

A comparison of debt measures in fiscal statistics and public sector financial statements

This paper examines the differences between measures of debt used to analyse a government's financial position. It compares the statistical and accounting approaches and presents a way of reconciling the two statements: thereby identifying possible convergence between GPFS and GFS. In doing so, it contributes to the ongoing international debate on harmonization of public sector accounting standards, such as IPSAS/EPSAS and GFS.     

Performance of State-Owned Enterprises During Public Elections: The Case of Korea

State-owned enterprises (SOEs) pursue multiple goals to maximize public welfare. Therefore, governments must evaluate both their economic efficiency and their social effectiveness. However, government performance evaluation (GPE) of SOEs may be affected by political motives. This paper investigates whether SOEs are fairly evaluated by governments during political events. Using Korean data, we find no significant relation between public elections (presidential and national assembly elections) and the financial performance of SOEs. However, the GPE scores of SOEs are significantly lower in years in which a public election is held than in other years. In addition, the GPE of SOEs can be an important determinant of whether or not to replace CEOs. This research sheds light on the political use of the GPE for SOEs.     

New development: A new history of collective bargaining in South Korean governance

Collective bargaining in the public sector is less developed in most East Asian countries due to legal restrictions imposed on employees in the public sector. Surprisingly, for the first time since the Act on the Establishment and Operation of Labour Unions for Public Officials took effect in 2006, collective bargaining and negotiations led to an agreement between the South Korean government and the union representing national government officials in December 2017, heralding a new era of collective bargaining in South Korean governance. This new development offers meaningful lessons for governments and public sector unions around the world.     

公平视域下机关事业单位养老保险新政的功效分析

2015年1月国务院出台了机关事业单位养老保险新政,将机关事业单位工作人员与企业职工基本养老保险制度"并轨"。本文在围绕起点、过程、结果三个维度对新政出台前我国基本养老保险公平情况进行研究的基础上,分析新政带来的一定程度上促进基本养老保险公平发展、推动补充养老保险发展、促进人员合理流动的直接功效,并且进一步对职业年金的建立倒逼企业年金的发展,企业年金的发展倒逼基本养老保险公平发展的潜在功效进行了剖析。在此基础上,构建出底线公平养老保险体系的过渡性结构,随着政府财政支付社会统筹账户养老金能力的提高,这一结构最终应发展成为真正意义上底线公平养老保险体系的目标结构。     

我国中小企业信用担保体系的国际借鉴——以日本为例

在当前金融危机的背景下,随着中小企业的大量倒闭,各国深受严重失业所带来的困扰。中国作为一个人口大国,中小企业的发展是事关亿万民众安居乐业、社会稳定的大事,而融资难则是长期以来制约中小企业发展的瓶颈,其根源就在于我国尚缺乏针对中小企业融资的完善的担保体系。日本素有中小企业王国之称,在世界各国中,日本是最早开始建立中小企业信用担保体系的国家,在长期的社会经济发展实践中,探索并建立起较为完善的中小企业信用担保体系。本文在详细分析日本中小企业担保体系的特点和运作方式的基础上,总结并提出可供我国借鉴的方法和经验。     

Mean-variance hedging for continuous processes: New proofs and examples

Let be a special semimartingale of the form and denote by the mean-variance tradeoff process of . Let be the space of predictable processes for which the stochastic integral is a square-integrable semimartingale. For a given constant and a given square-integrable random variable , the mean-variance optimal hedging strategy by definition minimizes the distance in between and the space . In financial terms, provides an approximation of the contingent claim by means of a self-financing trading strategy with minimal global risk. Assuming that is bounded and continuous, we first give a simple new proof of the closedness of in and of the existence of the F?llmer-Schweizer decomposition. If moreover is continuous and satisfies an additional condition, we can describe the mean-variance optimal strategy in feedback form, and we provide several examples where it can be computed explicitly. The additional condition states that the minimal and the variance-optimal martingale measures for should coincide. We provide examples where this assumption is satisfied, but we also show that it will typically fail if is not deterministic and includes exogenous randomness which is not induced by .     

From the bird's eye to the microscope: A survey of new stylized facts of the intra-daily foreign exchange markets

This paper presents stylized facts concerning the spot intra-daily foreign exchange markets. It first describes intra-daily data and proposes a set of definitions for the variables of interest. Empirical regularities of the foreign exchange intra-daily data are then grouped under three major topics: the distribution of price changes, the process of price formation and the heterogeneous structure of the market. The stylized facts surveyed in this paper shed new light on the market structure that appears composed of heterogeneous agents. It also poses several challenges such as the definition of price and of the time-scale, the concepts of risk and efficiency, the modeling of the markets and the learning process.     

Analyzing the state-accounting profession dynamic: Some insights from the professionalization experience in China

The dynamic nature of the state-accounting profession relationship has been mostly explored within a western democratic and capitalist context. Taking into account the unique culture and the system of power in China, this paper contributes by examining the influence of the state over the Chinese public accounting profession during the 1990s. Utilizing a corporatist framework and combined with Gramsci’s concept of hegemony, this paper provides insights into the power relation between the state and the accounting profession, as well as illuminates the ideological influence of the state in the development of the profession. The empirical investigation also pays particular attention to the intra-professional conflicts that took place in the 1990s and provides further insights into the dynamic of the state-accounting profession relationship in that era.     

Post-audits for managing cyber security investments: Bayesian post-audit using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation

With increasing security spending in organizations, evaluation of the quality and effectiveness of IT security investments has become an important component in managing these projects. The academic literature, however, is largely silent on post-audit of such investments, which is a formal evaluation of IT resource allocation decisions. IT post-audits are considered a useful risk management tool for organizations and are often emphasized in security certifications and standards. To fill this research gap and contribute to practice, we suggest post-auditing of IT security investments using the generic Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation approach. This approach does not place stringent conjugate assumptions and can handle high-dimensional Bayesian post-audit inference problems often associated with information security resource allocation decisions. We develop two Bayesian post-audit models using the MCMC method: (1) measuring the effectiveness of an IT security investment using posterior mean score ratios (MSR), and posterior crossover error rates (CER); and (2) measuring the effectiveness through detection of a denial of service (DOS) attack using Bayesian estimation to statistically compare the degree of divergence using the concept of entropy. We demonstrate the utility of the proposed methodology using an email intrusion detection system application.     

A Note on the Proprietary and Entity Perspectives in Financial Statements: The Implications for two Current Controversial Issues

Financial statements can portray the financial position and performance of an entity from different perspectives. Two dominant perspectives are the proprietary and entity perspectives. These perspectives also feature in recent discussions by the IASB and the FASB in relation to their conceptual framework project. The adopted perspective will yield different presentations for a number of issues. This paper illustrates the implications for two controversial issues currently under discussion by the IASB and the FASB: accounting for changes in a reporting entity’s own credit risk when liabilities are measured at fair value, and the classification of certain obligations as either equity or liabilities. The paper explains why the adoption and consistent application of one perspective are important for standard setting and financial reporting to ensure the consistent presentation of an entity’s performance and financial position that can be correctly interpreted by users of financial statements against the background of the chosen perspective.