An analysis of prediction error for new prime-time television programmes: a comparative study between the USA and Korea

This study investigates possible factors in prediction error for audience share for new prime-time television programmes in the USA and Korea. While previous studies have focused on the factors affecting the size of a programme's actual audience, little attention has been paid to the accuracy of audience share prediction. A total of 193 new prime-time TV programmes from 1994 to 1997 for the USA and from 1998 to 2001 for Korea were examined. Advertising industry forecasters' predicted audience share, and actual share data were accumulated from Broadcasting & Cable and Weekly Nielsen Reports. Findings show that the ‘Programme Type’, ‘Returning Lead-Ins’ and ‘Returning Lead-Outs’ worked as significant factors for estimating error in audience share in the USA, and ‘Programme Type’ and ‘Programme Length’ played major roles in forecasting error in Korea. The degrees of relationship with forecasting error are consistent with previous studies' findings. Similarities and dissimilarities in prediction error in both countries were found and are discussed in this study.     

Strategies for Dividend Distribution: A Review

Abstract

In today’s world of financial uncertainty, one major public concern is to assess (and possibly improve) the stability of companies that take on risks. Actuaries have been aware of that issue for a very long time and have a great experience in modeling the activity of a risk business. During the first part of the twentieth century, they focused on the probability of ruin to assess the stability of their company. In his seminal paper of 1957 Bruno de Finetti criticized this approach and laid the foundations of what would become an increasingly popular topic: the study of dividend strategies. The contributions made by actuaries in that field constitute a substantial body of knowledge, whose interest is relevant not only to insurance but also to a much broader range of areas of practice. In this paper we aim at a taxonomical synthesis of the 50 years of actuarial research that followed de Finetti’s original paper.     

Stock price synchronicity and liquidity

We argue and provide evidence that stock price synchronicity affects stock liquidity. Under the relative synchronicity hypothesis, higher return co-movement (i.e., higher systematic volatility relative to total volatility) improves liquidity. Under the absolute synchronicity hypothesis, stocks with higher systematic volatility or beta are more liquid. Our results support both hypotheses. We find all three illiquidity measures (effective proportional bid-ask spread, price impact measure, and Amihud's illiquidity measure) are negatively related to stock return co-movement and systematic volatility. Our analysis also shows that larger industry-wide component in returns improves liquidity. We find that improvement in liquidity following additions to the S&P 500 Index is related to the stock's increase in return co-movement.     

Informed short sales and option introductions

This study examines how the introduction of options affects the level of informed short selling. In particular, we test whether option introductions increases or decreases the level of informed short selling. Our tests are motivated by a theoretical debate in the literature. The first stream of literature argues that introducing options into markets may increase speculative trading which can result in less informed trading when informed traders perceive speculative trades as noise. The second stream argues that introducing options into markets improves the informational environment of the market because option prices provide an additional information mechanism for informed traders. We approximate informed short selling by examining (i) non-exempt short sales, (ii) contrarian short-selling activity, and (iii) the return predictability contained in shorting activity. Results show that non-exempt shorting activity increases after options become available. Further, we show that both the level of contrarian short selling and the return predictability contained in short selling increase after options are listed. Our results suggest that informed short selling increases after options are introduced.     

Financial fragility in a general equilibrium model: the Brazilian case

This paper employs a general equilibrium approach to model the Brazilian financial system. We show that the model is able to replicate the main characteristics of the data and to predict short-term trends. We calibrate the model for the years of 2002–2006, which comprise a crisis period in Brazil’s financial system. Empirical results suggest that the financial system is improving in terms of financial stability over time. Furthermore, the model has been proven useful to model the Brazilian banking system and could be employed to evaluate the impact of changes in financial regulation on the banking system.     

Foreign Participation in Housing Development in Mainland China: Legal Concerns on Property Ownership

Since the economic reform in the 198Os, real property development, especially in the housing sector, has become one of the major economic activities in mainland China. Housing development was commercialized initially for the overseas market, particularly for the Chinese emigrants, as foreign capital was much needed. Under the new socialist market economy, a clear legal definition is still to be established for ownership of real property, which is a crucial issue for any real property development. This paper critically reviews the evolving concept of property ownership and evaluates the major pieces of legislation that govern participation of foreign investors in "commodity units" housing development. A critical evaluation highlights the legal concerns that hinder foreign involvement in "commodity unit" housing development.     

Swedish GDP 1620–1800: stagnation or growth?

This paper reconstructs an annual volume series of GDP and GDP per capita for Sweden within present borders 1620–1800, extending the annual series that exist from 1800 onwards. Annual fluctuations of GDP are estimated from the annual fluctuations of harvests, which in the nineteenth century were strongly correlated with each other. Long-term trends are determined based on estimates of the values added of various activities for a few benchmark years. The paper shows that the long-term trend of GDP per capita increased modestly during the studied period, a different development from real wages that fell substantially. Henceforth, available data on real wages are at best a quite weak indicator of the development of GDP per capita. If Sweden is representative of Western Europe, the new data indicate a somewhat slower growth than assumed by Maddison. The increase in GDP per capita occurred in the seventeenth century and came entirely from non-agricultural activities, especially mining, public services, trade and transports. The lack of dynamism in the aggregate economy is explained by the dominance of agriculture. Per capita agricultural production displayed a stagnating tendency. Nevertheless, the expansion of the population in the eighteenth century was largely made possible by the increased use of iron tools in agriculture. Without technological progress, the strong population growth would probably have led to decreased per capita production.