The information content of stock split announcements: Do options matter?

We provide a new test of the informational efficiency of trading in stock options in the context of stock split announcements. These announcements tend to be associated with positive abnormal returns. Our traditional event study results show abnormal returns that are significantly lower for optioned than non-optioned stocks, whether traded on the NYSE, Amex, or Nasdaq. After controlling for market returns, capitalization, book-to-market ratio, and trading volume, we find that the abnormal returns are significantly lower for NYSE/Amex optioned than non-optioned stocks. Although the results for Nasdaq stocks are not as clear, the overall effects tend to be lower after optioning. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that the prices of optioned stocks embody more information, diminishing the impact of the stock split announcement. They provide new evidence of the beneficial effects of options on their underlying stocks.     

Could immigration explain wage inequality in a skill-biased technological model?

The aim of this paper is to evaluate how immigration of high-skilled workers affects the technological-knowledge bias and, in turn, the skill premium in the host countries, in particular bearing in mind the recent experience in a number of European countries. We study a skill-biased dynamic general equilibrium R&D growth model in which the standard R&D technology is modified so wage inequality results from the direction of the technological knowledge, which in turn is induced by the price channel. By solving the transitional dynamics numerically, we show that the rise of the skill premium arises from the price-channel effect, complemented with a mechanism that reflects the impact of immigration on R&D. According to our quantitative results, our model is able to account for a significant proportion of the dynamics of the skill premium in the data for a number of European countries, thus, suggesting that differences in labour skills between immigrants and natives are, in practice, an important source of skill premium variation over time.     

Reexamining the uncertain information hypothesis on the S&P 500 Index and SPDRs

This paper examines the uncertain information hypothesis on one major index and its corresponding exchange-traded fund: the S&P 500 Index and SPDRs in the pre-SPDRs (01/63–12/93) and post-SPDRs (01/94–12/03) periods. Two strategies are used to measure the economic significance of the uncertain information hypothesis. Overall, we present evidence confirming the uncertain information hypothesis in the post-SPDRs period. However, we fail to convert the statistically significant gains observed into economic gains under a conservative approach. In addition, the degree of difference in the volatilities of the 5-day post-event returns (in both the S&P 500 and the SPDR) among the three subgroups diminishes in the post-SPDR period. Hence, we conclude that the market is in fact short-term efficient in a more realistic setting.     

Economic development and inflation: a theoretical and empirical analysis

This paper studies the relation between inflation and economic development. The literature is largely silent regarding both the theoretical and empirical perspectives that undeveloped countries endure higher average inflation than developed economies. We present a simple theoretical model linking the inflation phenomenon to the tradition of development economics. Empirical evidence is garnered to test the hypothesis that economic development engenders a downward bias to inflation rates. Through the feasible-GLS estimator in a panel of 65 countries from 2001 to 2011, we aim at listing a number of variables most commonly used to explain differences in the stage of economic development across countries and identifying the most statistically relevant ones to account for differences in inflationary patterns. While our results show that inflation is inversely correlated with the level of the technological content of the economy (measured by share of high-tech exports), human capital and cyclical unemployment, it is directly related to the degree of inflation persistence and terms of trade growth. However, our findings still present an inverse and low correlation between inflation persistence and economic development, implying that development-sensitive variables allowed into the model can only partially account for the differences in inflation at different levels of economic development.     

Using mean reversion as a measure of persistence

This paper suggests a new scalar measure of persistence together with a companion estimator, which has the advantage of not requiring the specification and estimation of a model for the series under investigation. The statistical properties of the companion estimator are established, which allow tests of hypotheses to be performed, under very general conditions. The use of the new measure is illustrated by re-evaluating persistence of inflation for the United States and the Euro Area. The conclusions for the United States do not differ significantly from what has been found in previous empirical studies. However, for the Euro Area we find evidence of a significant break occurring in 2001/2002, such that persistence becomes virtually nil for the period that follows the launch of the euro and the implementation of a common monetary policy by the European Central Bank.     

How the Perceptions of Five Dimensions of Corporate Citizenship and Their Inter-Inconsistencies Predict Affective Commitment

Through a convenience sample of 260 employees, the study shows how employees’ perceptions about corporate citizenship (CC) predict their affective commitment. The study was carried out in Portugal, a high in-group and low societal collectivistic culture. Maignan et al.’s (1999, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science 27(4), 455–469) construct, including economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary responsibilities was used. The main findings are: (a) contrary to what has been presumed in the literature, the discretionary dimension includes two factors: CC toward employees and toward community; (b) perceptions of CC explain 35% of unique variance of affective commitment; (c) the best predictors are perceptions of economic and legal CC and, mainly, perceptions of discretionary CC toward employees; (d) the perceptions of discretionary CC toward employees are significantly better predictors of affective commitment than are perceptions of economic, ethical, and discretionary CC toward the community; (e) perceived inconsistency of the several CC dimensions is detrimental to employees’ affective commitment. The study questions the four-dimensional model of the CC construct as operationalized by Maignan et al., suggests that culture should be included as a moderating variable in future research, and stresses that affective commitment may decrease when employees perceive that their organizations act upon the several areas of CC inconsistently.     

The Innovation Process and the Development of a Sustainability Strategy

ABSTRACT

This article analyzes what influences a firm's choice of strategy—why some firms stick to defensive strategies while others rely on offensive ones. With this in mind a survey was conducted on mineral sector companies associated with the Brazilian Mining Institute. The results show that the majority of companies use an offensive strategy and that some companies use more than one strategy at the same time. That is, they possess a corporate strategy and a sustainability strategy.     

Environmental factors and satisfaction in a specialty store

Given the intense competition experienced in the sector, retailers have been designing strategies to create an environment conducive to consumer satisfaction and purchase, particularly in supermarkets and hypermarkets. This paper develops a conceptualization of customer satisfaction based on field data collected in a specialty store, focusing on the relative importance of the environmental factors on satisfaction. The results show that the most important environmental determinant of customer satisfaction is the variety of products. The help from employees, lighting, layout and design also stand out from the set of stimuli considered.     

Trade effects of the Europe agreements: A theory-based gravity approach

We analyze normalized productivity differences for 15 developing Latin American countries and four firm types: National Domestic, National Exporter, Foreign Domestic, and Foreign Exporter. There are no productivity thresholds for viability, export activity, or multinational activity, but we do find a clear size productivity premium and development productivity premium in the manufacturing sectors. We also find a clear foreign-ownership productivity premium, both for domestic firms and for exporting firms and both for manufacturing sectors and services sectors. In contrast, we only find an export productivity premium for national firms in the manufacturing sectors.     

The contribution of resources and capabilities to the competitiveness： The case of Port of Sines

The main objective of this paper is to analyse the competitiveness of the main maritime Port sited in Portugal - Port of Sines. This paper is developed under the resource-based view approach. A literature review about the resource-based view is presented with a special highlight on the contribution of organisation owns＇ resources to the competitiveness. With this study we intend to emphasize the applicability of a management theory to a different type of organisation which only recently starts to be preoccupied with its competitiveness. A case study methodology is used in order to collect all information needed about its main resources and capabilities of Port and also its competitiveness. The resources analysed in this paper are： The infrastructures, the accessibilities, the Port operations and also the information systems used on it. Also, a set of performance data is analysed as the main indicators of competitiveness. After that, a conceptual model is presented in order to systematise the main resources and capabilities under which the competitiveness of the Port of Sines is built on.