What Style Liquidity Timing Skills Do Mutual Fund Managers Possess?

Recent studies claim that mutual fund managers demonstrate strong MARKET liquidity timing skills. We extend their liquidity timing tests to the four‐factor case and investigate liquidity timing skills with respect to the MARKET, SIZE, VALUE and MOMENTUM factors. Contrary to these claims, we find no evidence that fund managers adjust market exposure in anticipation of market liquidity changes. We find rather strong evidence that fund managers successfully overweight small stocks as market liquidity increases. Our study also demonstrates that it is easy to misidentify SIZE liquidity timing as MARKET liquidity timing in models that focus only on MARKET liquidity timing.     

Is UK economics teaching changing? Evaluating the new subject benchmark statement

This paper evaluates the recent reform to the curricular governance framework for UK Economics teaching: the revised Subject Benchmark Statement document for Economics (SBSE). The crisis of confidence in economics which was amplified by the global financial crisis presented an opportunity for fundamental change in economics teaching. The paper asks whether the new SBSE represents change. We ask whether the new SBSE is pluralist with regard to economic theory and method; how it treats the economy and its wider socio-political dimension; what are its educational goals and approach; and overall, how much change has it brought? The paper concludes that the new SBSE does not constitute change: it still exhibits limited pluralism, ignores ethics, power and politics and ignores key educational goals.     

Residential Real Estate Brokerage Efficiency from a Cost and Profit Perspective

Using 1994–1995 microeconomic data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR), this article estimates cost and profit X-efficiency levels in the residential real estate brokerage market using traditional and Bayesian stochastic frontier models. We find that firms err more from failure to maximize profits than from failure to minimize costs. To determine what characteristics influence efficiency, we perform a regression analysis. The results show that franchising and firm age are associated with increases in efficiency, while MLS affiliation and producing a balanced output of listings and sales decrease performance. Finally, we estimate economies of scale and find compelling evidence that firms are operating at increasing returns to scale.     

Ethical Judgment of Food Fraud. Effects on Consumer Behavior

This study brings important insights for the food industry by addressing how consumers ethically judge or evaluate unethical firm behavior, in specific reference to food fraud, and if and to what extent that judgment affects the consumer–brand relationship and consumer behavior. it is an empirical investigation of the unethical intentional mislabeling in the U. S food industry. The paper analysis if there are statistically significant associations between brand attachment, ethical judgment, brand commitment, and purchase intention. Quantitative data (151) was collected about three different leading manufacturing food brands (three studies). Correlation and regression analyses were conducted. Findings reveal the important relation between all the constructs. Significant effects on how consumers ethically judged this brand transgression. Thus, it was found that as consumers judged this action as more unethical, the intentions to both stay committed to and purchase the brand were considerably damaged.     

How does ethics institutionalization reduce academic cheating?

Extant research on academic cheating primarily focuses on the impact of honor codes on academic cheating. However, the influence of ethics institutionalization is curiously missing in past research. The authors developed and validated a structural equations model in the R programming language to examine the impact of formal (explicit) and informal (implicit) ways of institutionalizing ethics on reducing students' academic cheating. They found a significant mediating effect of implicit ethics institutionalization on the relationship between explicit ethics institutionalization and academic cheating among business students. Therefore, academic administrators are encouraged to place significant emphasis on implicit forms of ethics institutionalization to curb academic cheating among students.     

Improving lay understanding of exposure to electromagnetic fields; the effect of information on perception of and responses to risk

Studies show that, although many people are concerned about the potential health risks of being exposed to electromagnetic fields (EMF), lay understanding of exposure, an important determinant of risk perceptions and responses, is limited. In an online consumer panel (n = 245), we tested the effects of providing people with information about EMF on lay understanding of exposure, and on perceptions and responses to risks, using an experimental 2?×?2?×?2 design. Providing people with specific information explaining the distance–exposure relationship, clarifying EMF policy, or specifying personal exposure management options actions resulted in a better understanding of exposure. We demonstrated that information provision as such had no effects on concerns about EMF nor on perceived risk of personal sources, i.e. mobile phones, but lowered perception of risk of public sources, i.e. mobile phone base stations and high-voltage power lines. In addition, information explaining the distance–exposure relationship in combination with policy information resulted in reduced self-reported risk-aversive responses. Moreover, participants who understood more about exposure in relation to the distance to the source showed lower perceptions of risk, were less likely to restrict their own exposure, and more likely to accept new installations of public sources of EMF in their neighborhood. In contrast, awareness that exposure was mainly determined by personal use of EMF sources corresponded with higher perceptions of risk from personal sources and a higher likelihood to restrict one’s own exposure. Our findings provide focal points for improving communication on EMF. In particular, we suggest to include information clarifying the distance–exposure relationship to improve understanding of exposure.     

The strength of R&D network ties in high-tech sectors – a multi-dimensional analysis of the effects of tie strength on innovation performance

We study the effect of the tie strength of inter-firm R&;D partnerships on the innovation performance of companies in four high-tech sectors (pharmaceuticals, computers, semi-conductors and telecom). Returning to Granovetter's (1973 Granovetter, M. S. 1973. The strength of weak ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78: 1360–80. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) seminal contribution, tie strength is analysed through a broad multi-dimensional perspective. We find that inter-firm R&;D network ties that are stronger in terms of their extent (measured by the length and multitude of R&;D partnerships) and weaker in terms of their depth (the degree of cooperation and the similarity of ties of companies) improve the innovation performance of companies. Interestingly, we find strong support for the role of these R&;D ties in the context of the run-of-the-mill innovation performance of companies. However, there is no support for this effect on significant innovations of companies.     

Negotiation protocol based on ordered weighted averaging and Fuzzy metrics

ABSTRACT

Negotiation Support Systems are used to exchange offers and to improve the negotiation process. Some methods are based on perspectives like heuristics in order to bring the negotiation protocol gradually closer to reality. These approaches can be important in real negotiation as they can help to improve skillsespecially in distributive bargaining. This paper proposes a Negotiation Support framework to provide the negotiator with recommendations on making decisions in a negotiation process. To input this idea into negotiation protocols, this paper suggests that some concepts based on OWA (Ordered Weighted Averaging) and some of its metrics (Orness, Dispersion) be included in the heuristics of a structured negotiation schedule. It is expected that the support provided will aid the negotiator to make decisions during the negotiation process, to learn from the elicitation and his own behavior the results obtained can help the negotiator improving his skills in the negotiation process.