Day-of-the-Week Effects in the Long-Run Performance of Initial Public Offerings

This study examines the influence of day-of-the-week patterns in security returns on long-run IPO underperformance. Comparisons are made between the IPOs in Ritter's [20] database, and a constructed set of matching firms based on SIC code and size, using NYSE, AMEX, and NASDAQ securities. It is found that virtually all of the IPO underperformance occurs on Mondays and Tuesdays and that the degree of underperformance significantly differs from other days. Thus, a common explanation may exist for the general day-of-the-week pattern in security returns and IPO long-run underperformance.     

Technological trajectories and R&D for environmental innovation in UK firms

This article reports results of a 1993 questionnaire survey of how UK companies have been innovating technologically in response to environmental pressures. The survey sought to identify factors stimulating UK firms to innovate more environmentally friendly products and processes, and to investigate the changes in R&D activity they have undertaken to facilitate such innovation. In devising the questionnaire and interpreting the results, we have been strongly influenced by the theoretical frameworks developed over the past 15 years which describe technological developments in terms of ‘selection environments’ and ‘technological trajectories’. Useful though such frameworks are, we conclude that they need to be supplemented by concepts derived from the sociology of technology and from studies of corporate strategies.     

Economic design of one-sided screening procedures based on a correlated variable with all parameters unknown

Summary Economic design of one-sided screening procedures for improving outgoing product quality based on a screening variable is considered for the case with all parameters unknown. It is assumed that the performance and screening variables are jointly normally distributed and that costs are incurred by screening inspection, acceptance of an imperfect item, and disposition of a rejected one. A method for finding optimal cutoff value based on the predictive distribution is presented.     

Issues in the estimation and application of latent structure models of choice

Our paper provides a brief review and summary of issues and advances in the use of latent structure and other finite mixture models in the analysis of choice data. Focus is directed to three primary areas: (1) estimation and computational issues, (2) specification and interpretation issues, and (3) future research issues. We comment on what latent structure models have promised, what has been, to date, delivered, and what we should look forward to in the future.     

DISCOUNT RATES AND ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Empirical studies provide compelling evidence that economic agents do not adopt the complete range of energy-efficient technologies that are cost-effective under prevailing prices and market conditions. Analysts commonly attribute this anomaly to the use of high discount rates in energy-related decisions-an interpretation that is difficult to reconcile with standard models of rational choice. This paper recasts the controversy from the perspective of economic theory and finds that market failures related to asymmetric information, bounded rationality, and transaction costs are major contributors to the so-called "efficiency gap."     

Equity‐Based Compensation for Employees: Firm Performance and Determinants

I examine the effect of employee equity‐based compensation (EBC) on firm performance and the determinants of EBC. Using two samples, I find that firms have come to rely more heavily on EBC than in the past. For both samples, I document a significant, positive relation between Tobin's q and the percentage of employee compensation that is equity based. For accounting returns, I find a positive relation with the earlier sample. However, for the later sample I find that greater use of EBC leads to lower levels of future accounting returns. I also find that the determinants of the proportion of EBC are different between the two samples.     

Interpreting IS alignment: A multiple case study in professional organizations

This paper centers on the interpretation attributed by organizational members to the information systems (IS) alignment concept. Its objective is to study IS alignment in professional organizations. Specifically, it reports on an interpretive study conducted in five Chilean organizations; four professional and one entrepreneurial, of which two are private and three are public. The theoretical background of our study is derived from three IS strategic alignment conceptualizations: managerial, emergent and critical. These concepts formed our theoretical framework that guided data collection and analysis. The study centers on the meanings organizational members assigned to IS strategic alignment, as well as their views on the barriers that hinder achieving this level of organizational integration. The analysis results are summarized in seven hermeneutic themes that point out the different connotations the organizations assigned to IS alignment. The significance of the findings are summarized in four insights that formulate theoretical and practical implications. These insights refer to: (1) the difficulties of achieving alignment for professional organizations, particularly public ones, (2) the limitations these organizations have in being agile, (3) the rationale for acquiring technology and determining IT skills, and (4) the imperative meaning that CIOs attribute to IS alignment. The paper concludes with a reflection on the limitations and relevance of the research.     

From rationality to hyperreality: paradigm poker

This paper, following McGoun's (1997) seminal article comparing the economy of financial securities to a hyperreal poker game, argues that finance and accounting researchers should take the “linguistic turn” that has rejuvenated theory and research in many, if not most, of the social science and humanities in recent decades. In general terms, this means following Ludwig Wittgenstein's language game paradigm rather than Karl Popper's scientific deductive hypothesis testing methodology. The paper illustrates this by drawing on some of Jean Baudrillard's' ideas, particularly his concept of hyperreality and his phases of the image theoretic.The paper presents a poststructuralist genealogical analysis of the radical ruptures and reformulation of the meaning attributed to the accounting sign of earnings over the feudal, counterfeit, production, and simulation eras. It concludes that, as with many other signs in contemporary society, the earnings sign no longer has any relationship with, nor does it any longer refer to, any real or intrinsic profit but instead floats ungrounded in today's financial economy.The paper recommends that researchers in finance and accounting adopt paradigms from literary theory, semiotics, linguistics, and semiology rather than continue to rely on economics-based theory, which has lost its power for explaining and predicting happenings in today's financial economy of self-referencing models and images.