RELATIVE STOCK PRICES AND THE FIRM SIZE EFFECT

A stock's relative price ratio, defined as the ratio of the current price to the average of the highest and lowest prices over some holding period, is shown to be a better predictor of future stock returns than firm size. The price ratio has an even stronger January seasonality than does firm size. After controlling for price ratio variations, firm size has no significant relationship to return. The abnormal returns for the price ratio effect are consistent with those predicted by optimal tax selling considerations.     

An Analysis of the Effects of Recent Changes in the Exchange Rate and the Terms of Trade on the Level and Composition of Economic Activity

Over the eighteen-month period ending June 1986, the Australian economy experienced two major shocks: a nominal devaluation of the $A of some 28 per cent and a terms of trade decline of some 16 per cent. The effects of these influences are examined using the ORANI model of the Australian economy. The effects of the devaluation on selected macroeconomic variables and key sectoral variables are presented for various degrees of wage indexation. Effects on quota rents are calculated and compared with actual outcomes. The terms of trade decline has an adverse impact on the balance of trade and in order to offset this impact while maintaining aggregate employment demand the model calculates that both real wages and real absorption would need to be around 4 per cent less than the values they would otherwise take.     

THE INFLUENCE OF OFFERING YIELD ON UNDERWRITING SPREAD

This paper presents a model that explains variation in underwriting spreads among primary issues of investment quality bonds and assesses the impact that offering yields have on underwriting spreads. The results indicate that issues having higher (lower) offering yields pay lower (higher) underwriting spreads.     

Sensitivity Analysis And Schemes Of Arrangement

Formal mathematical techniques are being used increasingly as aids to commercial decision-making. We propose that those deciding whether to liquidate or trade-out should, as a matter of course, have sufficient information to enable sensitivity analysis on any forecast returns. Sensitivity analyses are notably lacking in documentation used for predicting the outcomes of schemes of arrangement such as the complex Estate Mortgage Trusts (EMT) moratorium on the withdrawal of funds by unitholders. This article details the outcomes of some schemes of arrangement in Australia in the 1960s and 1970s and discusses the EMT moratorium. The moratorium procedures provide the setting and data for simulations and sensitivity analyses. Coupled with the evidence provided by Dean (1977, 1983) and Aitken (1981), this suggests a need for information on the expected timing of payouts to enable sensitivity analysis whenever a scheme involves delayed distributions.     

A gentle approach to corporate change

For the past half decade a planning-forecasting nucleus has been operating at Bell Northern Research based on some of the newer ideas in these arts. Designed as a supplement to the normal corporate planning activities, this group's objective was to probe the future using only unusual, but logical techniques, to inject uncertainty, and to otherwise challenge the accepted assumptions about the corporate group's future. Success at this activity demanded research to discover the essence of the principles that lay beneath the corporation's business. Finally, techniques had to be developed to ensure the meaningful diffusion of this knowledge throughout the organization and its environment.