No Chinese Capitalism without Property Rights

The speed with which communist China has embuaced markets has surprised Western analysis and observers, But Chinese economic progress will founder in corruption and inefficiency, argues Professor Steven Cheung of the university of Hong Kong, untess she insitutes a well-defined system of private property rights to safeguord investment and stimulate trade.     

Do Gold Market Returns Have Long Memory?

This study examines the long memory behavior in gold returns during the post-Bretton Woods period using a new rescaled range technique. Unlike the conventional rescaled range analysis, the new rescaled range analysis is robust to short-term dependence and conditional heteroscedasticity found in the gold data. Statistical results suggest that the long memory behavior in gold returns is rather unstable. When only few observations corresponding to major political events in the Middle East, together with the Hunts event, in late 1979 are omitted, little evidence of long memory can be found.     

Chinese heritage tourists to heritage sites: what are the effects of heritage motivation and perceived authenticity on satisfaction?

Much of the literature on authenticity is Western-centric, while little work addresses the concept in the Asian environment. The literature relating to authenticity from Asian tourists’ point of view is even underdeveloped. This study therefore aims to fill the knowledge gap by investigating Chinese tourists’ perspective of authenticity. It also examines tourists’ perceived authenticity as a multi-dimensional construct in a consumer-based model, the relationship with heritage motivation and tourist satisfaction. Findings indicate that Chinese tourists’ perceptions of authenticity are closely related to objective and constructive authenticity. The study demonstrates that heritage motivation has a significant positive influence on perceived authenticity and that perceived authenticity has a strong ability to predict tourist satisfaction.     

Determinants and outcome of career competencies: Perspectives of hotel managers in China

This study aims to explore the determinants and outcome of career competencies. Based on the notion that organizations and individuals have respective obligations in the career management of employees’, this study developed perceived “organizational career management’ (OCM) and “career commitment” as determinants and career satisfaction as an outcome of career competencies. Data were collected in the state-owned hotels in China, and structural equation modeling was used to test the proposed relationships. The findings indicate that both perceived OCM and career commitments have positive, direct effects on career competencies. The findings of this study may benefit both hotels and hotel employees by providing valuable implications.     

From hotel career management to employees’ career satisfaction: The mediating effect of career competency

The purpose of this study is to explore the relationships between perceived hotel career management, career competency, and career satisfaction. It also aims to examine the mediating processes through which hotel career management contribute to employees’ career satisfaction. Results from structural equation modeling (SEM) show that career competency mediates the effects of three dimensions of hotel career management (career appraisal, career development, and career training) on career satisfaction. The article concludes with implications for theory development and management practice.     

Hotel career management in China: Developing a measurement scale

This study aims to develop a measurement scale for organizational career management (OCM) in China's hotel industry. The scale development procedure includes four steps: developing initial items, implementing purifying measures, data collection, and assessing the reliability and validity of the proposed measurement scale. Both exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) are used to test the reliability and validity of the measurement scale thus developed. The development process results in a reliable and valid scale for hotel career management incorporating three dimensions: (1) career appraisal and advice, (2) a career development program, and (3) career training. Given the scarcity of research on career management in China, the measurement scale developed in this study will serve as a foundation for future research. The findings of this study may help to stimulate further empirical research on the relationship between hotel career management and employees’ career commitment and career satisfaction.     

Diversification benefits of commodity futures

The finance literature seems to be in support of the diversification benefits of adding commodity futures to an existing portfolio. Yet no empirical work has been performed to test whether the benefits are indeed statistically significant. This paper addresses several unresolved issues concerning the potential diversification benefits of commodities. First, we attempt to ascertain whether the alleged diversification benefits exist and are statistically significant. Second, to what extent are the diversification benefits unique to US investors? Would investors of a resource-based economy like Canada also benefit from adding commodities to their portfolios? Third, recent studies indicate that correlations among international equity returns are higher during bear markets than during bull markets. This type of regime-switching correlation behavior will mean lower diversification benefits from international investments when investors face a bearish environment at home. Do commodity futures display the same type of regime-switching behavior? To what extent do commodity futures offer real diversification benefits that are robust over time and across regimes? Finally, commodities may appear to be an asset for the more adventurous investors with higher risk tolerance. We want to know what type of investors should hold commodities. We demonstrate that the diversification benefit of commodities is a far more complex phenomenon than often understood in the finance literature.     

Signalling Theory and Equilibrium in Strategic Management Research: An Assessment and a Research Agenda

Actors within organizations commonly must make choices armed with incomplete and asymmetrically distributed information. Signalling theory seeks to explain how individuals are able to do so. This theory's primary predictive mechanism is ‘separating equilibrium’, which occurs when a signal's expectations are confirmed through experience. A content analysis finds that most strategic management signalling theory studies have not fully leveraged separating equilibrium. This presents two possible paths for future research. First, some researchers may wish to incorporate separating equilibrium. We illustrate how doing so can uncover new relationships, generate novel insights, and fortify the theory's application. Others who want to theorize about signals, but not examine separating equilibrium, could integrate ideas from signalling theory with other information perspectives. Here a signal becomes one stimulus among many that corporate actors interpret and act upon. We provide research agendas so strategy scholars can apply signalling theory most effectively to meet their research objectives.