Lower tick sizes and futures pricing efficiency: evidence from the emerging Malaysian market

We provide robust evidence of the impact on spot market liquidity and the pricing efficiency of FBM-FKLI index futures following the introduction of lower tick sizes for the stocks listed in the Bursa Malaysia. Our findings show a significant increase in unexpected trading volume and the speed of mean reversion of the futures mispricing. We find that the increase in the unexpected trading volume of the underlying stocks helps in reducing inter-market price discrepancies. The findings offer new evidence that lowering of tick sizes improves pricing efficiency in the Malaysian futures market.

     

The Innovation‐R&D Nexus in an Emerging Economy: Evidence from the Indian Manufacturing Sector

While R&D is considered an important input for innovation, its relationship with the output of the innovation process continues to remain enigmatic, especially in developing countries with low levels of domestic research. Using patents and knowledge capital stock as proxies for the output and input of the innovation process, we study their nexus in the emerging economy of India using a large sample of manufacturing firms over the period 2001–2010. Using a specification that addresses the problem of ‘excess zeroes’ in count data, the firm's non‐technical knowledge stock as an additional factor of the success with which R&D transforms into patents, and a linear feedback mechanism that yields consistent estimators, we find that a one unit increase in knowledge capital likely raises expected patent count by only about 4.3% at most. Further, although patenting experience, resource access and knowledge spillovers are strongly significant in explaining patent counts, the magnitude of these effects is marginal at best. In brief, evidence for the knowledge production function is rather weak even in the context of a dynamic developing economy.     

Did efficiency of Indian public sector banks converge with banking reforms?

This paper examines the issue of convergence of efficiency levels among Indian public sector banks (PSBs) during the post-reforms period spanning from 1992/1993 to 2005/2006. The empirical results indicate that the majority of PSBs have observed an ascent in technical efficiency during the post-reforms years. Further, the inefficient PSBs have been noted to be catching up with the efficient ones. That is, the banks with low level of efficiency at the beginning of the period are growing more rapidly than the highly efficient banks. In sum, the study confirms a presence of convergence phenomenon in the Indian public sector banking industry.

Institutional versus non-institutional credit to agricultural households in India: Evidence on impact from a national farmers’ survey

A goal of agricultural policy in India has been to reduce farmers’ dependence on informal credit. To that end, recent initiatives are focused explicitly on rural areas and have a positive impact on the flow of agricultural credit. Despite the significance of the above initiatives in enhancing the flow of institutional credit to agriculture, the links between institutional credit and net farm income and consumption expenditures in India are not very well documented. Using large, national farm household level data and IV 2SLS estimation methods, we investigate the role of institutional farm credit on farm income and farm household consumption expenditures. Findings show that, in India, formal credit does indeed play a critical role in increasing both net farm income and per capita monthly household expenditures of Indian farm families. Finally, we find that, in the presence of formal credit, social safety net programs like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) may have unintended consequences. In particular, MGNREGA reduces both net farm income and per capita monthly household consumption expenditures. On the other hand, in the presence of formal credit, the Public Distribution System may increase both net farm income and per capita monthly household consumption expenditures.     

Information Asymmetry about Investment Risk and Financing Choice

Though it is generally accepted that information asymmetry has an impact on capital structure policy, the nature of the information asymmetry is not well understood. Recent theoretical work and empirical evidence suggests that financing choice depends upon the information asymmetry associated with the investment risk of the particular use of proceeds. Consistent with this view, using the sources and uses of funds framework, we find that equity is used to fund projects with greater information asymmetry about their risk such as research and development expenditure, while debt is used to fund investments with lower information asymmetry about their risk such as liquidity enhancement.     

Analysing the roadblocks of circular economy adoption in the automobile sector: Reducing waste and environmental perspectives

The automobile industry is one of the most rapidly growing sectors in our society. The increase in demand for vehicles drives the growth of the automobile sector worldwide. Fabrication of vehicles consumes an enormous amount of water, energy and resources, thereby increasing carbon emissions. Nonbiodegradable and manufacturing waste after the end of life usage results in a significant contribution to incineration, landfills, air acidification and water eutrophication. The adoption of circular economy (CE) initiatives can play a significant role in dealing with increasing waste and environmental pollution. The main goal of CE is to recycle and reuse materials to reduce waste and also to minimise environmental impacts. This article strongly supports the adoption of CE in the Indian automobile industry. For the successful adoption of CE in the Indian automobile sector, first, it is important to analyse roadblocks to the adoption. Twenty potential roadblocks towards the adoption of CE have been identified from a literature review and in consultation with experts in the field. To capture the vagueness of the data and to carry out a robust analysis, a Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method with Fuzzy theory is employed. The results reveal that roadblock ‘lacking ability to deliver high-quality remanufactured products’ is ranked first among all considered roadblocks. This study will help the Indian automobile industry, decision makers, research practitioners and government officials develop effective strategies for adopting CE in Indian automobile companies. A sensitivity analysis has been conducted to validate the stability of results.     

Information disclosure,firm growth,and the cost of capital

We study how information disclosure affects the cost of equity capital and investor welfare in a dynamic setting. We show that a firm’s cost of capital decreases (increases) in the precision of public disclosure if the firm’s growth rate is below (above) a certain threshold. The threshold growth rate is higher when the firm’s cash flows are more persistent, or when other firms in the economy are growing at low rates. While current shareholders always prefer maximum public disclosure, future shareholders’ welfare decreases (increases) in the precision of public disclosure if the firm’s growth rate is below (above) the threshold.     

Negotiation via the World Wide Web: A Cross-cultural Study of Decision Making

INSPIRE is a Web-based system for the support and conduct of negotiations. The primary uses of the system are training and research. Between July 1996 and April 1997, 281 bilateral negotiations were conducted through the system by managers, engineers and students from over 50 countries. INSPIRE has been used at eight universities and training centers. In research it is being used to study cross-cultural differences in decision making and the use of computer support in negotiation. This paper outlines the system, the negotiation methodology embedded in it, and reports the initial results of the experimental study of the impact of culture on Web-based bilateral negotiation.     

Geographic Deregulation and Competition in the U.S. Banking Industry

We examine the effects of geographic deregulation on state‐level competition in U.S. banking markets over the period 1976‐2005. The empirical results confirm that the U.S. banks in general operated under monopolistic competition during the period examined. After partitioning the sample based on bank size we find that the market competition for large banks in Delaware, Oregon, and Rhode Island can be characterized as monopolistic while small banks in Arizona and Massachusetts seem to have operated under the conditions of perfect competition. The removal of geographic restrictions appears to have very limited and non‐uniform effect on state‐level competitive conduct. There is some evidence that the U.S. banking industry might have actually experienced a less competitive behavior in recent years due to increased market power of larger banks.     

Stock index futures hedging in the emerging Malaysian market

The paper investigates hedging effectiveness of dynamic and constant models in the emerging market of Malaysia where trading information is not readily available and market liquidity is lower compared to the developed equity markets. Using daily data from December 1995 to April 2001 and bivariate GARCH(1,1) and TGARCH models, the paper uses differing variance–covariance structures to obtain hedging ratios. Performance of models is compared in terms of variance reduction and expected utility levels for the full sample period as well as the three sub-periods which encompass the Asian financial crisis and introduction of new capital control measures in Malaysia. Findings show that rankings of the hedging models change for the in-sample period depending on evaluation criteria used. TGARCH based models provide better hedging performance but only in the period of higher information asymmetry following the imposition of capital controls in Malaysia. Overall, despite the structural breaks caused by the Asian financial crisis and new capital control regulations, out of sample hedging performance of dynamic GARCH models in the Malaysian emerging market is as good as the one reported for the highly developed markets in the previous literature. The findings suggest that changes in the composition of market agents caused by large scale retreat of foreign investors following the imposition of capital control regulations do not seem to have any material impact on the volatility characteristics of the Malaysian emerging market.