Contemporaneous ADR pricing: intraday dynamics during overlapping trading hours

We contribute to the literature by identifying and accurately measuring the drivers of American depositary receipt (ADR) returns contemporaneously across various global time zones. We consider ADRs as two inherently distinct asset classes – stocks and currencies – bundled into one. Throughout, we use a relatively refined, focused, and synchronized minute-by-minute data set on ADRs and all other variables. ADRs from all countries with regular trading hours that overlap with those of the US are considered individually and in clusters. We analyze the interplay of several factors that influence ADRs pricing patterns. Further, we investigate whether such patterns vary by currency, ADR, industry, and emerging/developed market classifications. Our findings indicate that synchronized returns on underlying shares comprise 68.5–74% of the explained returns in ADRs. The remaining 31.5–26% of returns are generated by movements in currency rates. These results are robust across the several models and estimation methods employed. Our findings also show persistent small price discrepancies between ADRs and dollar-adjusted underlying shares on a minute-by-minute basis, implying possible arbitrage opportunities. However, we conclude that trading and ADR conversion costs render such opportunities unattractive.     

PFIs involving multiple public partners: a case study from the Italian healthcare sector

The financial crisis experienced by many countries since 2008 has given new importance to private finance initiatives (PFIs) for providing public services. This paper analyses the relationships between multiple public and private sector actors participating in a PFI in the healthcare sector in order to better understand the motives and behaviour of public and private sector partners. High levels of trust and the active participation of a regulatory body were found to be significant factors in terms of creating a partnership that benefits all sides.     

Input Chains and Industrialization

A key aspect of industrialization is the adoption of increasing-returns-to-scale, industrial , technologies. Two other well-documented aspects are that industrial technologies (ITs) are adopted throughout intermediate-input chains and that they use intermediate inputs intensively relative to the technologies they replace. These features of ITs combined imply that countries with access to similar technologies may have very different levels of industrialization and aggregate income, even if the degree of increasing returns to scale at the firm level is relatively small. Furthermore, a minor improvement in the productivity of ITs can trigger full-scale industrialization and a large increase in aggregate income.     

Vocational skills in the accounting professional profile: the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) employers' opinion

The increasingly dynamic environment in which accountants work has necessitated a reorientation of accounting education. In some countries this issue has raised great interest amongst accounting educators and practitioners. The ongoing debate has already resulted in the publication of several statements and research papers that have raised the question of the relevance of the role of vocational skills in accounting education. Examples of these vocational skills are communication skills, interpersonal skills, and problem-solving skills. This paper reports on the importance that the employers of management accountants gave to a specified set of vocational skills and capabilities and the level of ability of these skills exhibited by students. In order to prioritize future developments an integrated analysis of the two attributes, importance and exhibited level, is enabled by the use of strategic mapping. The results of this study suggest that the employers perceive deficiencies in several capabilities that they have identified as being quite important. These deficiencies exist, in the employers' opinion, both prior to recruitment and on professional qualification. The research also indicates that, in the opinion of these employers, the development of these skills should be a central concern for universities and professional bodies. The employers also indicated that vocational skills should be attained in an integrated way.     

Introverts abroad? Long-term visitors' adaptations to the multicultural tourism context of Costa Blanca,Spain

Many people from North-Western Europe have quite long stays in Mediterranean Spain, partly related to phenomena such as ‘wintering’, seasonal movements and sabbatical holidays, for the most part dwelling in their own houses or apartments. This paper explores intercultural relations of long-term visitors and it raises some questions on differentiation and dedifferentiation in the consolidated holidaymaking context of Costa Blanca (Alicante, Spain). The paper includes visitors' assessments of certain central aspects of their (temporary) life in Spain, based on an exit survey. It is revealed that long-term visitors have far more varied and wide-ranging adjustments to their new and/or temporary surroundings than is usually assumed in news media and in some previous scholarly works. The study also demonstrates that generalised views depicting long-term visitors as secluded and living predominantly in compatriot enclaves are too simple, especially in long-established holiday destination areas. A considerable proportion of long-term visitors make an effort to relate to the language, culture, and social conditions of the host society. It is argued that a more nuanced and complex analysis is needed in order to describe the varied life situations of sojourners and other long-term visitors in Mediterranean Spain.     

EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION IN POLLUTION REDUCTION: A SOCIO-TECHNICAL PERSPECTIVE

Is industrial pollution reduction solely a matter of applying technical solutions to technical problems, or do organizational strategies and human factors also play an important part? In 1991 the US Environmental Protection Agency began collecting data on organizational strategies in pollution control as part of its Toxic Release Inventory database. An exploratory analysis of the 1991–1992 Toxic Release Inventory data revealed evidence that internally based, socially driven organizational strategies such as employee participation can have a dramatic impact on pollution reduction. The results are reported here of the second phase of this research: the approach is broadened to define general ‘internal’ versus ‘external’ strategies, and ‘social’ versus ‘technical’ approaches. There is strong evidence that the combination of internal and external strategies is superior to either alone; there is even stronger evidence that a socio-technical approach is better than either alone, and still stronger support for a combination of all of these criteria.     

VALUING REAL OPTIONS: CAN RISK‐ADJUSTED DISCOUNTING BE MADE TO WORK?

This paper examines three alternative approaches to valuing real options: (1) the standard option pricing technique using "risk-neutral" probabilities; (2) the use of risk-adjusted discount rates; and (3) discounting certainty-equivalent values with a riskless discount rate. As suggested by the title, a question of particular interest is whether an approach based on risk-adjusted discount rates can be "made to work" for valuing options. The answer is yes. Indeed, the authors show that any of the three approaches will provide a correct valuation if properly employed.
Nevertheless, there are important differences in the information requirements associated with each of the three methods. Another important issue is the relative degree of difficulty in calculating the correct option value. When these two considerations are taken into account, the risk-neutral option pricing procedure generally proves to be the preferred method. It tends to be computationally more convenient—often much more convenient—and to require less information than either the risk-adjusted discounting or certainty-equivalent procedures.     

A theory of socialistic internal capital markets

We develop a model of a two-division firm in which the “strong” division has, on average, higher quality investment opportunities than the “weak” division. We show that, in the presence of agency and information problems, optimal effort incentives are less powerful and thus managerial effort is lower in the strong division. This leads the firm to bias its project selection policy against the strong division. The selection bias is more severe when there is a larger spread in the average quality of investment opportunities between the two divisions.     

Management of capabilities and situations in R&D centres: the matrix of competences

The paper presents the first results of research carried out by the authors in the research centre of an important Italian industrial group. The management of the centre is strongly interested in new methodological approaches to identify and to represent individual competences. To satisfy this specific need, the authors suggest a method based on the matrix of competences that is the set of relationships between capabilities and situations. The situations and the capabilities are identified by analysing the judgements that other subjects, internal or external to the organization, express on an individual's behaviour.
A sample of fifteen individuals has been investigated in order to identify their individual competences and the most significant situations within the centre. For each individual a network of subjects, the supervisor and some clients and collaborators, has been considered. On the basis of the results, the implications for management are discussed, with particular regard to the design of new procedures for personnel evaluation.     

Intra-industry trade and inter-industry specialization as concurrent sources of International Trade in manufactures

Zusammenfassung Intra-industrieller Handel und interindustrielle Spezialisierung als Ursachen des internationalen Handels mit Industrieerzeugnissen. — Der Hauptzweck dieses Aufsatzes ist es, zur besseren Einsch?tzung der empirischen Relevanz von Intra-Handel und industrieller Spezialisierung als gleichzeitige Quellen des internationalen Handels mit Industrieerzeugnissen beizutragen. Nach einigen überlegungen zur theoretischen Natur des Ph?nomens des Intra-Handels wird gezeigt, daβ die Indizes, die Grubel und Lloyd zur Messung seiner empirischen Relevanz vorgeschlagen haben, dann ganz unzuverl?ssig sind, wenn sich der Gesamthandel des Landes in einem erheblichen Ungleichgewicht befindet. Es werden andere Mase für den Intra-Handel vorgeschlagen, die nicht mit diesen M?ngeln behaftet zu sein scheinen, und die groβen Unterschiede im empirischen Verhalten der verschiedenen Indizes werden an Hand des Handels mit Industriewaren im Jahre 1972 gezeigt. Dann wird die Beziehung zwischen der Export- und der Importstruktur für Industriewaren untersucht mit dem überraschenden Ergebnis, daβ ein Land dann, wenn es verh?ltnism?βig groβe Mengen eines Gutes exportiert, im allgemeinen auch verh?ltnism?βig viel davon importiert. Schlieβlich untersucht die Arbeit auf Jahres-basis die Ver?nderungen des Ausmaβes der interindustriellen Spezialisierung im Zeitraum 1951–1974. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, daβ das Ausmaβ der interindustriellen Spezialisierung in diesem Zeitraum recht begrenzt war und sogar im Laufe der Zeit abgenommen hat.

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Résumé Le commerce intra-industriel et la spécialisation inter-industrielle comme des sources concurrentes du commerce international en produits manufacturiers. — Le but essentiel de cet article est de contribuer à une détermination meilleure de l’importance empirique du commerce intra-industriel et de la spécialisation inter-industrielle comme de sources concurrentes du commerce international avec des produits manufacturiers. Après quelques réflexions sur la nature théorique du phénomène du commerce intra-industriel nous démontrons que les indices proposés par Grubel et Lloyd pour mesurer son importance empirique sont toujours entièrement douteux si le commerce total du pays est substantiellement disbalancé. Nous proposons quelques mesures différentes du commerce intra-industriel qu’elles ne semblent pas être influé par ces défauts et nous démontrons les grandes différences de la performance empirique des indices différents concernant le réseau du commerce avec des produits manufacturiers en 1972. Puis nous analysons la relation entre les réseaux d’exportation et d’importation des produits manufacturiers avec le résultat étonnant que si un pays exporte relativement beaucoup d’un produit il normalement veut aussi importer relativement beaucoup du même produit. Finalement, le papier analyse sur une base annuelle les changes de l’étendue de la spécialisation inter-industrielle en produits manufacturiers en cours de la période 1951–1974. Les résultats démontrent que l’étendue de la spécialisation inter-industrielle en produits manufacturiers était assez limitée en cours de cette période et même déclinait en cours du temps.

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Resumen Comercio intra-industrial y especialización inter-industrial como fuentes concurrentes del comercio internacional en manufacturas. — El principal propósito de este artículo es contribuir a un mejor entendimiento de la relevancia empírica del comercio intra-industrial y de la especialización inter-industrial como fuentes concurrentes del comercio internacional en bienes manufacturados. Después de algunas reflexiones acerca de la naturaleza teórica del fenómeno del comercio intra-industrial se muestra, que los índices propuestos por Grubel y Lloyd para medir su relevancia empírica son poco confiables en el caso que el comercio total de un país está sustancialmente desequilibrado. Se proponen medidas diferentes del comercio intra-industrial que parecen no ser afectadas por estas limitaciones y se muestran las grandes diferencias en el desempe?o empírico de los distintos índices con respecto al partón de comercio en manufacturas de 1972. En seguida se investiga la relación entre los patrones de exportación e importación de manufacturas con el resultado sorprendente, que cuando un país exporta relativamente mucho de un bien también importará relativamente mucho del mismo bien. Finalmente, el artículo investiga sobre una basis anual los cambios en la magnitud de la especialización inter-industrial en manufacturas parael periodo 1951–1974. Los resultados muestran, que la magnitud de la especialización inter-industrial en manufacturas ha sido bastante limitada a través de este período e incluso ha declinado a través del tiempo.