Central bank responses to COVID-19

Business Economics - Central bank responses to COVID-19 have been extraordinary in speed, in size and in scope. Much easier monetary policy, massive liquidity provision, and targeted credit support...     

Mortgage Markets and Inter-Regional Differences in Conventional Mortgage Terms

One of the purposes of the secondary mortgage market is to move funds from areas of capital surplus to areas of capital shortage. If mortgage funds move freely throughout the economy then the price of mortgage funds (the terms of the mortgage) should be the same everywhere. Thus, if the secondary mortgage market is efficient, mortgage terms should show less geographic variation after the secondary market began in 1970 than they showed before. In this paper, the efficiency of the market is tested in two stages. In the first, the average terms of mortgage loans in 1968 and 1978 are examined to determine whether they became more homogeneous after the secondary market was begun. In the second stage, the terms are modeled as a function of region, year by region interaction variables, foreclosure rates, the usury ceiling and the average cost of funds. This model is estimated and analyzed using a multivariate multiple regression technique.     

Implied Equity Duration: A New Measure of Equity Risk

Duration is an important and well-established risk characteristic for fixed income securities. We use recent developments in financial statement analysis research to construct a measure of duration for equity securities. We find that the standard empirical predictions and results for fixed income securities extend to equity securities. We show that stock price volatility and stock beta are both positively correlated with equity duration. Moreover, estimates of common shocks to expected equity returns extracted using our measure of equity duration capture a strong common factor in stock returns. Additional analysis shows that the book-to-market ratio provides a crude measure of equity duration and that our more refined measure of equity duration subsumes the Fama and French (1993) book-to-market factor in stock returns. Our research shows how structured financial statement analysis can be used to construct superior measures of equity security risk.     

Sarbanes-Oxley and the Future of Accounting

Following the Enron debacle, massive public pressure led the United States government to enact the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. While this act was intended to protect investors and improve the accuracy and reliability of corporate disclosures, it also contained provisions which could have a major impact on the public accounting profession in the United States. It is possible that these effects could extend to Australia, where the public accounting profession is also subject to scrutiny following revelations of corporate misconduct. This paper explores the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act relating to the accounting profession, the reaction of the profession and possible ramifications for public accounting in Australia.     

Business Ethics and the Origins of Contemporary Capitalism: Economics and Ethics in the Work of Adam Smith and Herbert Spencer

Both Adam Smith and Herbert spencer, albeit in quite different ways, have been enormously influential in what we today take to be philosophies of modern capitalism. Surprisingly it is Spencer, not Smith, who is the individualist, perhaps an egoist, and supports a "night watchman" theory of the state. Smith's concept of political economy is a notion that needs to be revisited, and Spencer's theory of democratic workplace management offers a refreshing twist on contemporary libertarianism.     

Brand Investment Controlling

Controlling &; Management Review -     

The impact of citizens' groups on urban policies: towards a contextual analysis

Book reviewed in this article: Castells, M., Cherki, E., Godard, F. and Mehl, D. 1978: Crise du logement et mouvements sociaux urbains; enquěte sur la région parisienne. Godbout, J. and Collin, J.-P. 1977: Les organismes populaires en milieu urbain: contre-pouvoir ou nouvelle pratique professionnelle? Abu Lughod, J. and Hay, J. R. 1977: Third world urbanization. Costello, V. G. 1977: Urbanization in the Middle East. Aubin, H. 1977: City for sale.     

An econometric model of the petroleum industry

This paper describes a forty-two nonlinear equation model of the U.S. petroleum industry estimated over the period 1946 to 1973. The model specifies refinery outputs and prices as being simultaneously determined by market forces while the domestic output of crude oil is determined in a block-recursive segment of the model. The simultaneous behavioral equations are estimated with nonlinear two-stage least-squares adjusted to reflect the implications of autocorrelation for those equations where it appears to be a problem. A multi-period sample simulation, together with forecasts for 1974 and 1975 are used to evaluate the model's performance. Finally it is used to forecast to 1985 under two scenarios and compared with the Federal Energy Administration's forecast for the same period.     

Accounting and the state: Consequences of merger and acquisition accounting in the U.S. hospital industry

The interaction between government, industry and accounting policy is examined in a study of the consequences of merger and acquisition accounting in the U.S. hospital industry. The research combines statistical and historical methodologies to analyse both the political antecedents, and the distributional and organizational consequences of accounting policies adopted by the U.S. Medicare health insurance program. Implication of the study for understanding the role of accounting at the meso-level of state-industry relations are discussed.