Structural shocks and dynamic elasticities in a long memory model of the US gasoline retail market

A structural multivariate long memory model of the US gasoline market is employed to disentangle structural shocks and to estimate the own-price elasticity of gasoline demand. Our main empirical findings are: (1) there is strong evidence of nonstationarity and mean reversion in the real price of gasoline and in gasoline consumption; (2) accounting for the degree of persistence present in the data is essential to assess the responses of these two variables to structural shocks; (3) the contributions of the different supply and demand shocks to fluctuations in the gasoline market vary across frequency ranges; and (4) long memory makes available an interesting range of convergent possibilities for gasoline demand elasticities. Our estimates suggest that after a change in prices, consumers undertake a few measures to reduce consumption in the short- and medium-run but are reluctant to implement major changes in their consumption habits.     

The Causes and Consequences of Accelerated Stock Repurchases

We examine the choice between accelerated share repurchase (ASR) and open market repurchase (OMR) as repurchase mechanisms between 2004 and 2007. For a sample of ASRs and OMRs that actually buy shares in the announcement quarter, we find that ASR firms have lower market‐to‐book ratios, less cash, but greater managerial entrenchment. Prior to repurchase, ASR firms are subject to significantly more takeover rumors than OMR firms are, and this, along with entrenchment and undervaluation, affects the choice to use ASRs. ASR firms experience positive average abnormal returns both before and after the announcement. Moreover, the latent takeover probability is significantly lower for both ASR and OMR firms (when compared with pre‐announcement levels), but the reduction for ASR firms is more pronounced. Our results suggest that repurchases, and especially ASRs, indeed make a firm a less attractive prospect for takeover.     

Supporting the Collaborative Construction of a Shared Understanding About Work with a Guided Conceptual Modeling Technique

The existence of a shared understanding about a collaborative work process among all involved actors is one prerequisite for its successful implementation. The development of a shared understanding is facilitated when the actors make explicit their individual views and create externalizations that can be used as subjects of discourse. Instruments supporting externalization and discourse about collaborative work need to provide adequate forms of representation and guide actors in implementing these reflection and alignment processes. Appropriate guidance can facilitate the construction of a shared understanding for actors not accustomed to such processes. This paper introduces a methodology that offers structural and procedural guidance by adopting diagrammatical conceptual modeling techniques. This methodology has been evaluated extensively in a multiple case study. A combination of interaction analysis of the modeling process and ex-post assessment of the actors’ perceptions has been used to evaluate the adequacy of the proposed methodology with respect to the pursued objectives. The results confirm that the modeling methodology and the proposed guidance measures appropriately support the process of constructing a shared understanding about collaborative work processes.     

42 Years of Urban Growth and Industry Composition

In recent decades, knowledge spillovers have taken the helm as the driving force of growth in cities. The ease of communicating ideas and the sheer density of large urban areas have made this a plausible explanation for continued growth of employment and population in cities. However, there is little consensus on the nature of the optimal conditions for stimulating knowledge spillovers. This paper identifies these optimal conditions by exploring the relative importance of industry specialization, diversity and competition across all industries and all metropolitan areas from 1970 to 2011 in the U.S. Long-term employment growth in cities is found to be driven by industry diversity combined with a high level of competition. This combination fosters the greatest amount of cross-industry fertilization of ideas and knowledge spillovers.     

International Trade Finance and Exports: Evidence from Korean Bank-Intermediated Trade Finance Instruments

This paper investigates the effects of trade finance shocks on real exports by using novel data on two bank-intermediated instruments of trade finance in Korea: foreign trade loans extended by commercial banks and documentary bills purchased by them. Using a vector autoregression (VAR) model, the results show that a negative shock to both instruments adversely affects exports, particularly the exports of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The trade financing condition explains as much as 10–14 % of the variation in exports, which is comparable to the estimates in previous studies. Noteworthy is that the effects of trade finance on SME exports vary upon whether it is pre- or post-shipment financing.     

Antecedents and effects of emotions in strategic decision-making: a literature review and conceptual model

Individual emotions are essential driving forces in strategic decision-making. Nevertheless, the current state of research on emotions and their effects on strategic decision-making is fragmented and inconsistent. Therefore, this paper presents a narrative literature review that aims to bring some structure into current research and to advance an agenda for a future research on emotions in the strategic decision-making context. Based on cognitive appraisal theory and affective events theory this review focuses on organizational and individual antecedents for the development of emotions in the strategic decision-making context as well as on the effects of emotions on the strategic decision-making process. The paper concludes with a conceptual framework that summarizes the findings of this review and indicates possible directions for future research.