Rice demand in Tanzania: an empirical analysis

We investigate the consumer side of the Tanzania rice market with the primary objective of estimating price elasticities of imported and domestically produced rice. Previous studies of the rice market in Tanzania claim that domestic rice is implicitly protected by consumer preference of its perceived better quality. However, rice producers increasingly complain that imported rice adversely impacts the price of domestic rice. Using household consumer survey data, we estimate price and expenditure elasticities of imported rice, domestic rice, and maize to assess their substitutability in the Tanzanian diet. Our results show that Tanzanian consumers have a preference for domestic rice varieties with weak substitutability between domestic and imported rice varieties.     

Does location matter for disclosure? Evidence from geographic segments

The segment disclosures of multinational companies provide strategic information. We use the location characteristics of geographic segments to identify the reasons for withholding or disclosing segments. We examine segment data from around the adoption of IFRS 8, a reporting standard that requires firms to reveal more disaggregated information. Consistent with a proprietary cost motive for nondisclosure, we find that segments in regions that are deemed better for business tend to be hidden, while higher entry barriers for a segment are positively related to disclosure. These effects appear to be stronger for firms for which proprietary cost motives are more important. Among the previously unrevealed segments, proprietary costs explain the nondisclosure of segment earnings and other relevant financial information for investors.     

App Users Unwittingly in the Spotlight: A Model of Privacy Protection in Mobile Apps

Mobile apps are increasingly jeopardizing app users' online privacy by collecting, storing, and sharing personal data disclosed via apps. However, little is known about mobile app users' current privacy protection behavior and the factors that motivate it. Drawing on Roger's Protection Motivation Theory (PMT), this study develops and tests the App Privacy Protection Model among 1,593 Western European app users. The results demonstrate that, on the one hand, increased levels of perceived self‐efficacy, vulnerability, and privacy concern enhance mobile app users' motivation to engage in risk‐reducing behavior, while on the other hand, higher levels of knowledge of the data collection practices of mobile apps, app attitude, and perceived response costs diminish it. Being the first study that applies PMT in the mobile app context, this study offers several important implications regarding privacy protection in mobile apps.     

Cooperation among companies,universities and local government in a Swedish context

The importance of the business context for company's development work has been stressed in previous research and substantial public resources are now being directed towards university–company interaction to generate innovations. However, cooperation between companies, the public sector and universities could be obstructed by differing logics and purposes for action. This paper examines the interaction among these three actor categories to clarify the possible benefits of becoming more actively involved in each other's development work. A case study in a Swedish context showed that the three actor categories entered into each other's domains in new ways, sharing resources and increasing the potential for innovation. We also found that cooperation allowed a fourth actor category, financiers, to be reached, thereby securing additional resources for the innovation activities, creating action space for cooperation, and for a fifth actor category in the form of independent cooperation facilitators.     

Tercentenary of Ars Conjectandi (1713): Jacob Bernoulli and the Founding of Mathematical Probability

The Tercentenary of the publication of Jacob Bernoulli's Ars Conjectandi (The Art of Conjecturing) provides an opportunity to look at the origins of mathematical probability from Jacob Bernoulli's point of view. Bernoulli gave a mathematically rigorous proof of what has come to be called the weak law of large numbers, relevant to discovering ratios of unknown factors through sampling. The Art of Conjecturing was a bridge between the mathematics of expectation in games of chance as found in Huygens's On Reckoning in Games of Chance and mathematical probability as found in Abraham De Moivre's The Doctrine of Chances. This paper looks at the conceptual context as well as the mathematics of Bernoulli's book.     

Changes in foreign operation modes: Stimuli for increases versus reductions

This article explores the reasons leading executives to change foreign operation modes by contrasting mode increases and reductions. Our study is grounded on stimuli identified through in-depth interviews by a former IBR study which we employ through two different measures in the course of analyzing data from 265 German firms on 320 mode changes. The results show that executives recognize a wide range of reasons for mode change, but the importance and magnitude of those stimuli differ for mode increases and reductions. While performance and external environment increase the likelihood of mode reductions, internal environment and managerial attitudes induce mode increases. Moreover, stimuli for incremental and radical mode changes differ as well.     

Divergent Oil Interests of the First and Third Worlds

EUROPE AND WORLD ENERGY, by Hanns Maull OIL PRICES AND TRADE DEFICITS: US CONFLICTS WITH JAPAN AND WEST GERMANY, by David A. Gisselquist OIL DEBT AND DEVELOPMENT: OPEC IN THE THIRD WORLD, by Paul Hallwood PORTUGAL: REYOLUTIONARY CHANCE IN AN OPEN ECONOMY, by Rodney J. Morrison MONETARY INTEGRATION IN WESTERN EUROPE: EMU, EMS AND BEYOND, by D. C. Kruse ECONOMIC GROWTH AND EMPLOYMENT IN CHINA, by Thomas G. Rawski THE FADING OF THE MAOIST VISION: CITY AND COUNTRY IN CHINA'sDEVELOPMENT, by Rhoads Murphey EQUALITY, THE THIRD WORLD AND ECONOMIC DELUSION, by P. T. Bauer THE POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN TURKEY, by William Hale DISASTER ASSISTANCE: APPRAISAL, REFORM AND NEW APPROACHES, edited by Lynn Stephens and Stephen J. Green BRITISH INDUSTRY AND THE NORTH SEA: STATE INTERVENTION IN A DEVELOPING INDUSTRIAL SECTOR, by Michael Jenkin and Stuart Sinclair     

Does Shareholder Composition Matter? Evidence from the Market Reaction to Corporate Earnings Announcements

We examine whether institutional ownership composition is related to parameters of the market reaction to negative earnings announcements. When firms report earnings below analysts' expectations, the stock price response is more negative for firms with higher levels of ownership by momentum or aggressive growth investors. There is no evidence, however, that these institutions cause an “overreaction” to earnings news. Ownership structure is also related to trading volume and to stock price volatility on days around earnings announcements. Our findings are consistent with the idea that the composition of institutional shareholders effects stock price behavior around the release of corporate information.