The U.S. listing gap

Relative to other countries, the U.S. now has abnormally few listed firms. This “U.S. listing gap” is consistent with a decrease in the net benefit of a listing for U.S. firms. Since the listing peak in 1996, the propensity to be listed is lower for all firm size categories and industries, the new list rate is low, and the delist rate is high. The high delist rate accounts for 46% of the listing gap and the low new list rate for 54%. The high delist rate is explained by an unusually high rate of acquisitions of publicly listed firms.     

The Role of Foreign Shareholders in Disciplining Financial Reporting

We investigate the role of foreign shareholders in improving the quality of accounting information provided by firms domiciled in countries with low de facto institutional quality. Using a sample of firms from four South European countries (Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain) for which we observe detailed ownership evolutions over the period 2002–2007, we find that increases in foreign ownership lead to increases in financial reporting quality but only if the foreign shareholders are domiciled in countries with strong investor protection mechanisms. Further, we find that the improvement in financial reporting quality is more pronounced in the case of foreign institutional investors. Finally, our results hold before and after the introduction of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in 2005.     

Sequential vs. single-round uniform-price auctions

We study sequential and single-round uniform-price auctions with affiliated values. We derive symmetric equilibrium for the auction in which k₁ objects are sold in the first round and k₂ in the second round, with and without revelation of the first-round winning bids. We demonstrate that auctioning objects in sequence generates a lowballing effect that reduces the first-round price. Total revenue is greater in a single-round, uniform auction for k=k₁+k₂ objects than in a sequential uniform auction with no bid announcement. When the first-round winning bids are announced, we also identify a positive informational effect on the second-round price. Total expected revenue in a sequential uniform auction with winning-bids announcement may be greater or smaller than in a single-round uniform auction, depending on the model's parameters.     

Cellular phones in Mozambique: Who has them and who doesn't?

Cellular phones are considered one of the success stories of contemporary technology diffusion: there are three billion cellular telephones globally, and just over six billion people. This article describes the distributional boundary of the cellular telephone enterprise, as we see it in data from Mozambique. A telephone survey of mobile phone users there revealed that men outnumbered women, especially at higher levels of service and that most were urban, with a particular concentration in the capital city. Thus while pre-paid telephone plans have made basic cellular service affordable to many Mozambicans, the lack of rural infrastructure stills puts access out of the reach of a majority. In addition, pre-paid users pay more per minute for their service—probably not a fair situation for the poor families that tend to take this route to telecommunications.     

The Link Between Wages and Productivity in Spain

This paper examines the effect of productivity on wages for Spanish industrial sectors by developing a model that captures effects from both sector‐specific and aggregate variables. The results show that a dual behaviour can be inferred, at the sector level, in the wage‐setting mechanism. It is also found that the linkage between wages and productivity varies over time. Some explanations for the increase in wage dispersion are provided, focusing on the increasing decentralisation in wage bargaining after 1986. Finally, we cast some light on the theoretical structure underlying the labour market.     

Business and Social Reputation: Exploring the Concept and Main Dimensions of Corporate Reputation

Different theoretical approaches highlight the growing relevance of corporate reputation as strategic factor. Among these approaches the arguments of the Resource-Based View are special worthwhile (Grant, 1991, California Management Review 33(3), 114–135; Barney, 1999, Sloan Management Review Spring, 137–145). Nevertheless, this topic poses several methodological problems (Barney et al., 2001), as the unavailability to identify and measure this organizational factor, that is “socially complex” and intangible in its nature. In this work, using the findings of our empirical research on Spanish biotechnology firms, we carry out an identification and measurement of corporate reputation, highlighting its two key components: “business reputation” and “social reputation”. Dr. Gregorio Martín de Castro is Assistant Professor at the Business Administration Department in Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Spain). He has several years of research experience at CIC Spanish Knowledge Society Research Centre, he holds an Expert Diploma in Intellectual Capital and Knowledge Management from INSEAD (France), and he was a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at Harvard University during 2004–2005. He is author and co-author of several papers concerning Resource-Based View, Intellectual Capital and Knowledge Management. Dr. José Emilio Navas López is Professor and Head of the Business Administration Department in Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Spain). He is author and co-author of several books and papers concerning Technology Management, Strategy and Knowledge Management. He has held the first Knowledge Management Chair in Spain at I.U. Euroforum Escorial. Dr. Pedro López Sáez is Assistant Professor at the Business Administration Department in Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Spain) and he was a Research Fellow at Harvard University during 2004–2005. He has several years of research experience at CIC Spanish Knowledge Society Research Centre and he is author and co-author of several papers concerning Resource-Based View, Intellectual Capital and Knowledge Management.     

Valuation in Emerging Markets: A Simulation Approach

Most of the foundations of valuation theory have been designed for use in developed markets. Because of the greater, and in some cases different, risks associated with emerging markets (although recent experience might suggest otherwise), investors and corporate managers are often uncomfortable using traditional methods. The typical way of capturing emerging-market risks is to increase the discount rate in the standard valuation model. But, as the authors argue, such adjustments have the effect of undermining some of the basic assumptions of the CAPM-based discounted cash flow model. The standard theory of capital budgeting suggests that estimates of unconditional expected cash flows should be discounted at CAPM discount rates (or betas) that reflect only “systematic,” or “nondiversifiable,” market-wide risks. In practice, however, analysts tend to take what are really estimates of “conditional” expected cash flows—that is, conditional on the firm or its country avoiding a crisis—and discount them at higher rates that reflect not only systematic risks, but diversifiable risks that typically involve a higher probability of crisis-driven costs of default. But there is almost no basis in theory for the size of the increases in discount rates. In this article, the authors propose that analysts in emerging markets avoid this discount rate problem by using simulation techniques to capture emerging-market risks in their estimates of unconditional expected cash flows—in other words, estimates that directly incorporate the possibility of an emerging-market crisis and its consequences. Having produced such estimates, analysts can then discount them using the standard Global CAPM.     

Smiles over Frowns: When Curved Lines Influence Product Preference

The present research examined the possibility that subtle face‐like features (a smile‐ or a frown‐like line) on a product can influence evaluations of and preferences for that product. The same within‐participants experiment was conducted twice, once in the United Kingdom and once in Colombia: participants viewed four variants (concave [smile‐like] line, convex [frown‐like] line, straight line, line absent) of three different products (tea, shampoo, juice) and both evaluated the products on visual analogue scales and completed a forced choice decision task. The results revealed a general tendency across scales, products, and countries for the participants to rate products more positively and to choose products more frequently when they displayed a concave line relative to a convex line; comparisons with the straight line and absent line conditions suggested that the effects were present for both concave and convex lines, but were stronger in the concave instance. These findings provide both a deeper theoretical understanding of the influence of subtle cues on evaluation and decision making, and concrete, practical information for both product designers and marketers.     

The influence of price and brand loyalty on store brands versus national brands

Abstract

This article investigates how price and brand loyalty of three frequently purchased product categories can influence the purchase decision process of store brands versus national brands. A multinomial logit model was constructed to analyse the data obtained from a consumer panel. The results confirmed that brand loyalty is the main variable which influences the purchase decision process of both national and store brands. The influence of price on the purchase decision process is product specific. There is a clear distinction between the buyer's profile of store brands and national brands. But there is no evidence of any correlation between demographic variables and national brands or store brands.