Estimating Congestion Costs and Segmenting Motivations for Recreational Festivals

This paper aims to evaluate the willingness to pay (WTP) of visitors to reduce congestion and to segment the market of visitors by motivations. A double-bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation method and survival analysis are adopted to estimate congestion costs for tourists. Analysis of variance is used to test the satisfaction and the WTP of tourists among the segmented motivation groups. Exploratory factor analysis method is conducted to extract four major factorial dimensions, and cluster analysis was performed to identify the characteristics of visitors' motivations into three clusters. The average amount that a tourist is willing to pay to mitigate congestion is US$2.22. The most important market segmentation is the “pursuit of multiple goals”, which has the largest segment of the market. Festival managers need to mitigate overcrowding and identify the segmentation information to develop effective strategies and to refine advertising campaigns to attract more people.     

The interdependence between FDI and R&D: an application of an endogenous switching model to Taiwan's electronics industry

Foreign direct investment (FDI) and research & development (R&D) are mutually dependent and should be treated as endogenous variables in empirical studies. An endogenous switching regression model is used to examine the mutual effect of FDI and R&D in Taiwan's electronics industry. The empirical results show that FDI and R&D are positively related and do reinforce each other. Unbiased coefficients are obtained as they are compared to those estimates if FDI and R&D are treated as exogenous variables. The results have a strong public policy implication for Taiwan's foreign direct investment and can be further used to estimate the difference in R&D expenditures between FDI and non-FDI firms.     

Efficient quadrature and node positioning for exotic option valuation

We combine the best features of two highly successful quadrature option pricing streams, improving the linked issues of numerical precision and abscissa positioning. Coupling the recombining abscissa (node) approach used in Andricopoulos, A., Widdicks, M., Duck, P., and Newton, D.P. ( 2003 ) (AWDN as well as AWND, 2007 ) with the Gauss‐Legendre Quadrature (GQ) method of Sullivan, M.A. ( 2000 ) yields highly accurate and efficient option prices for a range of standard and exotic specifications including barrier options and in particular for NGARCH, CEV, and jump‐diffusion processes. The improvements are due to manner in which GQ positions nodes and the use of these values without interpolation. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark     

Developing an evaluation model for destination attractiveness: sustainable forest recreation tourism in Taiwan

This study explores the opinions of an expert panel on factors affecting the attractiveness of forest recreation tourism in Taiwan. Twenty-three determinants of destination attractiveness were selected by reviewing the relevant literature. The relative importance of these determinants was analyzed by a panel of experts using the Analytical Hierarchy Process method. Results show that the uniqueness of forest landscapes and scenery and special climate phenomena are two of the most important attributes determining the attractiveness of forest recreation tourism. The reliability and convenience of access to forest recreation sites owing to their remote location are also highly evaluated. The provision of high-quality accommodation and cuisine is considered an essential component to enrich visitors’ recreational experience in forest settings. The major implications for both the public and private sectors to achieve long-term sustainability are threefold: ensuring sustainable use of natural environment, enhancing the reliability of access modes to the destination, and improving the quality of lodging facilities and catering services. Together these three requirements can help create socioeconomic sustainability in remote forest communities with limited alternative employment opportunities.     

Toward a global low carbon fuel standard

A new policy instrument, known as a low carbon fuel standard (LCFS), is a promising approach to decarbonize transportation fuels. An LCFS has several important features: it applies a lifecycle carbon intensity standard, incorporates market mechanisms by allowing credit trading and targets all transport fuels. A harmonized international framework is needed that builds on newly enacted LCFS policies adopted in California and the European Union.     

Analysis of E-commerce and information technology applications in hotels: Business travelers' perceptions

Numerous research studies have been conducted that are related to e-commerce and information technology (IT) applications in the hospitality industry with regard to business operation, profit, output, and management perspective. The focus of this study is to examine current e-commerce and IT applications in the hospitality industry and to identify the business travelers' perceptions in order to improve customer service. One of the problems in the hospitality industry is that customers want advanced e-commerce and IT applications, but restaurants and hotels are not necessarily implementing them. This study discusses the typical problems and obstacles of implementing e-commerce and IT applications in hospitality, using the lodging e-commerce and IT applications to satisfy customers, and developing the lodging e-commerce and IT applications as a corporate competitive advantage. Moreover, this study investigated a variety of e-commerce and IT applications related to customer service, satisfaction, and retention as well as e-commerce and IT applications as a distribution channel for receiving travelers' information and accommodation booking. This study provides valuable implications for hospitality practitioners about customer perceptions relative to e-commerce and IT applications.     

The Composition and Effectiveness of Audit Committees in the Presence of Large Controlling Shareholders

The authors' study of audit committees in 450 large East Asian companies (150 each in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaysia) finds a strong positive correlation between the “cash flow” ownership (as opposed to just the voting rights) of large shareholders and the percentage of independent audit committee members. The study also reports a strong positive correlation between the “cash flow” ownership of large shareholders and the percentage of audit committee members with financial expertise and experience. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that larger cash flow ownership provides large shareholders with strong incentives for more effective governance. Conversely, the lower percentages of independent or professional audit directors at companies with large disparities between cash ownership and voting rights is consistent with the authors' hypothesis that entrenched large shareholders prefer inferior governance structures that pose fewer obstacles to their tendency to exploit the wealth of minority shareholders. Furthermore, the authors find higher valuations (market‐to‐book ratios) for companies with audit committees that consist entirely of independent directors and have larger percentage of members with financial expertise. And when viewed as a whole, the authors' findings provide support for the argument that ownership structure affects the composition of audit committees, and that independent and professional audit committees can help increase firm value.     

Junp-Diffusion Interest Rate Process: An Empirical Examination

We investigate a jump-diffusion process, which is a mixture of an O-U process used by Vasicek (1977) and a compound Poisson jump process, for the term structure of interest rates. We develop a methodology for estimating the jump-diffusion model and complete an empirical study in comparing the model with the Vasicek model, for the US money market interest rates. The results show that when the short-term interest rate is low, both models predict an upward sloping term structure, with the jump-diffusion model fitting the actual term structure quite well and the Vasicek model overestimating significantly. When the short-term interest rate is high, both models predict a downward sloping term structure, with the jump-diffusion model underestimating the actual term structure more significantly than the Vasicek model.