AN EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION INTO THE IMPACT OF PROFIT SHARING SCHEMES OF EXECUTIVIES ON THE CONTENT OF CORPORATE SUBMISSIONS ON PROPOSED ACCOUNTING STANDARDS

This paper examines the comments submitted by UK companies on 20 proposed accounting standards to test the hypotheses that executives favor standards that increase, or dampen the variance of, accounting profit numbers on which their incentive remuneration is based. Test results were generally as hypothesised but only the profit variance outcomes were statistically significant. Allowing for political environment changes affected only the profit variance results. There was no evidence that the relative monetary size of bonus payments was a significant lobbying factor. No significant differences were found between the lobbying preferences of companies with or without executive incentive schemes.     

Development and the mystification of ‘cultural factors’: One destiny: Our common future in Africa,by A S van Niekerk

In One destiny: Our common future in Africa the author relates, in popular fashion, a series of incidents which convinced him that the basic difference between black and white in South Africa is cultural deep‐seated and the cause of underdevelopment and conflict He develops a circular argument in which world‐view is taken as the root of perceptions, values and activities. The effects of experience and economic and political factors are given secondary importance. This argument cannot accommodate social change and differentiation, and the author tends to concentrate on perceptions and events which he finds morally unacceptable. He gives an unbalanced assessment and an ethnocentric interpretation of African life. Possible reasons for this type of argument are explored and an alternative which takes its departure from the interaction between experience and perception is offered     

Permanent magnets: a technological analysis

Abstract
Technology analysis is a new technomanagerial discipline that provides common frameworks for analysing individual technologies and their relationships to each other. It is used here to probe the development of a particular technology, namely that of permanent magnets.
The paper traces the development of permanent magnets over the past decade and explores possible future improvements in performance parameters. The strength of magnets (i.e. energy product as expressed in kilo Joules per cubic metre) has increased from approximately 40 in the 1930s to approximately 400 at present.
Future developments will be constrained by a barrier which seems to exist at approximately 525 kilo Joules per cubic metre. However this is viewed as a barrier that can be transcended and not as an immutable limit. It therefore signifies a possible breakthrough zone.
S-curve theory leads analysts to speculate about a possible breakthrough during the five year period leading up to 1995. At that date magnetic strengths of 600+ kilo Joules per cubic metre could be aimed for.
Increased magnetic strength will improve the performance parameters of all technologies utilising magnets, unleash new magnetic based technologies and threaten many traditional areas in the fields of matter processing, transporting and storing, energy processing, and information processing and storing.
These effects will cascade through the entire technological landscape creating new markets and destroying others. The article gives an overview of these impacts on the technological landscape.     

On the Statistical Significance of Event Effects on Unsystematic Volatility

We develop a method for determining the significance of the effect of a certain event (stock split, corporate restructuring, change in regulation, etc.) on unsystematic volatility of asset returns. Simulations show that the suggested tests reject the true null hypothesis of no effect on volatility at appropriate levels, whereas the rejection rates of a false null hypothesis increase with the magnitude of the effect. An application of the method to corporate spin‐offs reveals statistically significant and long‐lasting estimated increases in unsystematic volatility of parent companies' returns.     

Nonlinear dynamics and competing behavioral interpretations: Evidence from intra‐day FTSE‐100 index and futures data

Extant empirical research has reported nonlinear behavior within arbitrage relationships. In this article, the authors consider potential nonlinear dynamics within FTSE‐100 index and index‐futures. Such nonlinearity can be rationalized by the existence of transactions costs or through the interaction between informed and noise traders. They consider several empirical models designed to capture these alternative dynamics. Their empirical results provide evidence of a stationary basis term, and thus cointegration between index and index‐futures, and the presence of nonlinear dynamics within that relationship. The results further suggest that noise traders typically engage in momentum trading and are more prone to this behavior type when the underlying market is rising. Fundamental, or arbitrage, traders are characterized by heterogeneity, such that there is slow movement between regimes of behavior. In particular, fundamental traders act more quickly in response to small deviations from equilibrium, but are reluctant to act quickly in response to larger mispricings that are exposed to greater noise trader price risk. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 26:343–368, 2006     

Service procurement in manufacturing companies: Results of three embedded case studies

An increasing part of companies' purchasing expenditures is being spent on (business) services. At the same time, the interactive character of business services has so far largely been neglected in purchasing and supply management studies. The success of a service purchase is however established during the ongoing production and consumption of that service, which takes place in continuous interaction between buyer and seller.This paper investigates these ongoing interactive processes between buyer and seller after the purchase decision has been made. The specific focus is on services buying by manufacturers, since manufacturers' services spend increasingly encompasses services that eventually become part of the final offering to customers. This is expected to pose specific challenges for manufacturing companies, who have traditionally been involved with purchasing goods.Case studies into ongoing buyer-seller interaction are conducted at three manufacturing companies. Starting from a usage-based classification which contains four types of business services, four services are studied at each manufacturing company. The results show that indeed the different types of services can be associated with distinct patterns of ongoing interaction. Furthermore, the results provide initial support for the idea that having differentiated patterns of interaction contributes to successful ongoing service exchange.     

Harmonizing the interests of a city and its region: Krasnoyarsk krai experience

The paper focuses on the emerging system of territorial strategic planning in the constituent entities of the Russian Federation and municipalities. Suggested for practical application are the best Russian research studies and practices of coordinating the interests of municipal and regional authorities. The analysis of scholarly approaches to the issue in focus allows one to infer that the best elaborated position is that of the staff of the North-Western Office of the Russian Research Center for Local Governance (RRCLG). As regards the express-analysis of practices adopted in the number of the Russian Federation constituent entities, the practices of the Krasnodar krai appear to be the most promising.