Perceived marketing–sales relationship effectiveness: a matter of justice

There is a compelling need to improve the relationship between managers in marketing and sales departments. This paper argues that one critical way of enhancing individual managers’ perceptions of relationship effectiveness between these departments is to view the issue as a matter of justice and suggests that perceived marketing–sales relationship effectiveness is positively influenced by managers’ perceptions of organizational justice. Furthermore, it proposes that interfunctional communication has the potential to enhance the proposed positive effects of justice and hence needs to be considered and effectively managed when looking at marketing–sales relationship effectiveness. Data drawn from a survey of 203 marketing and sales managers in 38 consumer packaged goods companies are used to empirically test these predictions. The authors find that perceived sales–marketing relationship effectiveness is influenced by perceptions of distributive, procedural and interactional justice. Greater interfunctional communication is found to further enhance the positive effects of distributive and procedural justice on perceived relationship effectiveness, but it does not contribute to the already strong positive effects of interactional justice. Furthermore, results reveal important differences in the effects of justice on perceived relationship effectiveness across the marketing and sales departments.     

Perks and the informativeness of stock prices in the Chinese market

While the literature shows that perks can affect firm values positively or negatively, we argue that firms with higher perks are more likely to be associated with a lower quality of financial reporting, which, in turn, can affect the informativeness of stock prices. Based on hand-collected data on perks from Chinese listed firms, we find that firms with lower perks are associated with higher informativeness of stock prices (or lower R-square). Moreover, the positive association between perks and R-square is shown to be weaker for firms with higher financial reporting quality through audit and earnings quality measures.     

Calibration Weighting Methods for Complex Surveys

This paper presents a careful investigation of the three popular calibration weighting methods: (i) generalised regression; (ii) generalised exponential tilting and (iii) generalised pseudo empirical likelihood, with a major focus on computational aspects of the methods and some empirical evidences on calibrated weights. We also propose a simple weight trimming method for range‐restricted calibration. The finite sample behaviour of the weights obtained by the three calibration weighting methods and the effectiveness of the proposed weight trimming method are examined through limited simulation studies.     

Reserves and Baskets

We discuss three well known plans that were offered in the twentieth century to provide an artificial replacement for gold and key currencies as international reserves: Keynes’ Bancor, the SDR and the Ecu(predecessor to the euro).The latter two of these reserve substitutes were institutionalized but neither replaced the dollar as the principal medium of international reserve.     

Marketing strategy and the efficacy of procedural justice: The mid-level marketing manager in industrial service firms

A principal challenge confronting the senior marketing team in B2B firms is how to ensure that the marketing strategies they develop are implemented effectively. The literature indicates that mid-level marketing managers' perceptions of the procedural justice within the firm may be critical in this respect. However, there has been little empirical research on this issue. The authors develop and test a conceptual model of the key drivers and consequences of marketing managers' procedural justice perceptions. The findings show that if mid-level marketing managers trust their senior marketing colleagues and simultaneously operate within moderately organic structures, then procedural justice will thrive. A consequence of this is more effective implementation of marketing strategy which, in turn, leads to increased market performance.     

Discretionary accounting choices and the predictive ability of accruals with respect to future cash flows

Using a sample of restatement firms and a meet-or-beat model to classify firms as making discretionary accounting choices for opportunistic meet-or-beat (OP-MB) reasons, we show that originally reported earnings and accrual components are less predictive of future cash flows relative to the restated numbers. We find the opposite is true for firms classified as making discretionary accounting choices for non-OP-MB reasons. We consider a number of competing explanations for these latter results. Our findings are most consistent with the informational hypothesis, weakly consistent with conservative-motivated efficient contracting hypotheses, but inconsistent with opportunistic contracting and misapplication/errors of GAAP explanations.     

High School Economic Education and Access to Financial Services

This study provides a long-term assessment of economic education by examining an individual's decision to have a bank account. Using the results of a nationwide telephone survey, high school courses in economics and business reduced the probability that an adult was unbanked, ceteris paribus. In addition, adults who demonstrated a higher level of understanding of basic economic concepts were less likely to be unbanked. The results indicated that an individual's understanding of the economic system was as important as formal coursework in explaining access to basic financial services.     

Forecasting volatility: Roles of sampling frequency and forecasting horizon

This study empirically tests how and to what extent the choice of the sampling frequency, the realized volatility (RV) measure, the forecasting horizon and the time‐series model affect the quality of volatility forecasting. Using highly synchronous executable quotes retrieved from an electronic trading platform, the study avoids the influence of various market microstructure factors in measuring RV with high‐frequency intraday data and in inferring implied volatility (IV) from option prices. The study shows that excluding non‐trading‐time volatility produces significant downward bias of RV by as much as 36%. Quality of prediction is significantly affected by the forecasting horizon and RV model, but is largely immune from the choice of sampling frequency. Consistent with prior research, IV outperforms time‐series forecasts; however, the information content of historical volatility critically depends on the choice of RV measure. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark     

Ordering the extraction of renewable resources: The case of multiple aquifers

Optimal sequencing of resource extraction is typically studied for nonrenewable resources. We provide conditions for optimal use of multiple sources of a renewable resource and characterize the resulting extraction sequence, resource scarcity values, and (single) efficiency price path for two groundwater aquifers and an abundant alternative resource. Even with one demand, the optimal sequence depends on the differential opportunity costs of the two renewables. A numerical simulation for the South O‘ahu aquifer system, which also allows for different distribution costs, illustrates the case of using the “leakier” aquifer first and then switching to simultaneous use of both resources. The welfare gain from specialization relative to independent management is $4.7 billion.