Electric Utility Stranded Costs: Valuation and Disclosure Issues

We analyze the stock market's valuation of electric utility "stranded costs" (i.e., costs that might become unrecoverable under deregulation), and investigate whether stranded costs that have arisen as a result of voluntary firm business decisions are valued differently from those that are more directly linked to regulatory mandates. Further, we study whether investor valuations differ across jurisdictions. Finally, we examine the relation between investor valuation of stranded costs and the decision by utilities to make stranded cost-related disclosures in their financial statements voluntarily.
We find that investors anticipate that, on average, approximately 10% of total stranded costs will be borne by utility shareholders. Stranded costs arising from voluntary operating or investing decisions made by utilities are valued more negatively than those associated with mandatory power purchase contracts, consistent with investors assigning a higher recovery probability to the latter. Investor valuations of stranded costs associated with utility generating investments do not differ systematically across jurisdictions. We find that stranded costs are valued less negatively for voluntary disclosers not just in the year of disclosure but also in the preceding two years, implying that it is not disclosure per se that favorably influences valuation. Voluntary disclosers operate in jurisdictions that have more clearly established stranded cost recovery mechanisms, suggesting that both stranded cost disclosure and valuation are prompted by reduction in uncertainty about recoverability.     

Fusionen im deutschen gesetzlichen Krankenversicherungsmarkt

With regard to the intensified consolidation trend in the field of German statutory health insurances since the introduction of the GKV-WSG, it can be stated that there are multi-causal motives. Especially personal, financial and strategic reasons are decisive. In this context, personal motives are driven by individual power ambitions, while financial motives are primarily caused by implications of health policy reforms and strategic motives are characterized due to the aspiration for greater market power.Mergers in the statutory health sector can be regarded as highly promising, if the central motivation for merging is the creation of price or brand advantages. Merger of different types of insurers in the statutory system enables a new strategic positioning in the market. The choice of the potential partner is critical for success; the respective strategic positioning of the merger candidate should be the starting point for merging considerations. However, in business practice, informal relationships are frequently the decisive aspect. For the future in the statutory health sector, it is expected, that the pressure of consolidation increases and mergers keep their great strategic importance.     

Discussion of “Are Related Party Transactions Red Flags?”

Kohlbeck and Mayhew ( 2017 ) create a new data set featuring two types of related party transactions. They use empirical‐archival methods to investigate the effect of such transactions on the likelihood of restatements and on audit fees. Their findings suggest that related party transactions related to directors, officers and major shareholders are associated with poor “tone at the top” and that this leads management to negotiate for lower‐quality audits to minimize monitoring costs. To offer avenues for future research, we focus our discussion on three aspects of their paper related to causality, definitions of variables, and generalizability to non‐U.S. jurisdictions.     

Value chain integration of base of the pyramid consumers: An empirical study of drivers and performance outcomes

The seminal works on Base of the Pyramid (BOP) markets encourage companies to explore untapped low-income markets and to alleviate poverty by providing affordable products and services. The transition to second generation BOP strategies has centred on the integration of local consumers across value chain activities. This integration presents challenges both for firms and for low-income consumers due to the nature of informal BOP markets, severe institutional voids and lack of local knowledge of firms. In this context, little is known about the motivational drivers of firms to integrate BOP consumers in value creation activities and the impact on different performance dimensions, namely economic, social and ecological. This study adopts the perspective of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) and investigates drivers and performance outcomes of BOP consumer integration. For this purpose, we develop a theoretical framework and test it empirically by employing a unique dataset of 142 enterprises which provide basic products and services to low-income markets. Our findings provide empirical support for the claim that BOP consumer integration enhances economic, social and ecological performance. MSMEs in our sample engage consumers mainly due to a strong intrinsic motivation to drive social impact rather than a pragmatic motivation to overcome information asymmetries. While studies of multinationals entering BOP markets almost exclusively report the need for cross-sector partner collaboration, our findings suggest that this may not be the case for MSMEs.     

The impact of cost allocation errors on price and product-mix decisions

We use simulations to examine the impact of cost allocation errors on pricing and product-mix decisions. We compare the imperfect cost allocation of cost systems based on heuristics to the ideal cost allocation of a benchmark model. First, we find that more complex cost systems are associated with substantially lower profit errors. Second, we decompose the profit error and find that production quantity errors are larger than product portfolio errors indicating that reducing product portfolio errors is less critical in designing cost systems. We also document that overproduction errors are larger than underproduction errors and errors from keeping unprofitable products are larger than errors from dropping profitable products suggesting that cost systems tend to underestimate full costs. Third, we find that profit errors increase for more complex cost systems as resource sharing levels rise, which is an interesting counter intuitive result.     

Pflichthaftpflichtversicherung für Hersteller von Medizinprodukten – überfällig oder überflüssig?

Given actual legislative initiatives in the German Bundestag the question arises as to whether in the interest of patient safety-compulsory liability insurance for producers of medical devices should be implemented. At present, these proposals for reform are incompatible with the constitutionally-guaranteed principles of professional freedom and freedom of contract. Furthermore, it is questionable whether compulsory liability insurance would in fact improve the situation of patients taking into consideration the insurer’s status and possible release from obligation. Should compulsory liability insurance pass constitutional review due to new factual findings in the future, a direct claim against the liability insurer is not advisable. A possible victim compensation fund is not to be financed by the producers or their liability insurers.     

The importance of sample selection: An instructional resource using U.S. presidential elections

The purpose of this instructional resource is to use a non-auditing situation, predicting the election of the President of the United States, to help students understand the importance of sample selection in drawing inferences about a population. Of particular focus are the importance of understanding the characteristics of the population, using the appropriate sampling unit, the risks of drawing incorrect inferences about a population, and the power and limitations of sampling. These sampling-selection concepts are also applied to a routine auditing task: the confirmation of accounts receivable.     

The relationship between product and international diversification: The role of experience

We establish prior diversification experience as a key determinant of the relationship between growth of product and international diversification. Prior diversification experience allows firms to overcome short‐run constraints on simultaneous diversification growth imposed by the difficulty to transfer tacit knowledge, ambiguous competencies, and limited absorptive capacity. Studying U.S. and European firms, we find a positive relationship between growth in product and international scope for firms with high and a negative one for those with little prior diversification experience. Further, we find that product diversification experience has greater impact than international diversification experience. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.