Der Einfluss des Versicherungskapitalanlagen-Bewertungsgesetzes (VersKapAG) auf Überschüsse und Überschussbeteiligung in der Lebensversicherung — Eine empirische Untersuchung —

On March 26, 2002 the valuation rules for securities of German insurance companies were amended. From the reporting year ending later than September 29, 2001, firms no longer need to apply the strict rules of short-term investment securities. If assets are classified as held-to-maturity or available-for-sale, temporary impairments need not be recognised in the profit and loss accounts. The legislator wanted to create a level playing field for financial institutions as similar rules were already applicable to banks. As an effect with-profits policies were expected to show a more stable pattern of profit sharing. Analysing data from 1998 to 2003 for German life insurers, no different picture of surplus-sharing emerges. This may be due to the fact that valuation rules are only one mechanism of surplus sharing, and other mechanisms that were well established already serve the insurance industry well enough to compete with other providers of financial products.     

The international oil industry in the 1980s

Few industries have undergone such rapid changes during the last ten years as the international oil industry. During this decade, there have been radical changes in the conditions under which international oil companies acquire and trade crude oil. In addition to the changes in the upstream sector the two quantum jumps in oil prices have drastically altered the conditions of downstream operations. Since 1979 oil demand fell more sharply than total energy demand, thereby reducing its relative importance in the energy economy. These events initiated a far-reaching adjustment process which is likely to continue.     

Der direkte internationale Preiszusammenhang

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Manipulierte Schadenfälle als Herausforderung für die Praxis

Der Versicherungsbetrug hat insbesondere in den letzten Jahren stark zugenommen. In diesem Artikel werden Abwehrstrategien und Erfolgsfaktoren der Betrugsabwehr eines Versicherungsunternehmens beispielhaft dargestellt. Mit Hilfe der vorgestellten Vorgehensweisen wird sowohl dem Eigenschutz des Versicherungsunternehmens als auch dem Schutz der Versicherungsgemeinschaft Rechnung getragen.     

Can the international debt strategy use the concept of corporate compositions?

So far, it has been possible to stave off really serious consequences for the world economy and the international financial system since the developing-country debt crisis started in 1982. Yet for many developing countries, external debt problems and the underlying economic crisis are as pressing as ever. The following article identifies five central elements of a general orientation framework for dealing with the debt crisis which has been inspired by the basic idea of the concept of corporate compositions found in commercial law.     

The Influence of Firms' Emissions Management Strategy Disclosures on Investors' Valuation Judgments

Recent accounting research indicates that capital markets price firms' greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and that disclosed emissions levels are negatively associated with firms' market values. The departure point for this study is to investigate whether investors value firms differently based on the strategies firms use to mitigate GHG emissions. These strategies include making operational changes, which reduces emissions attributable to the firm, and purchasing offsets, which reduces emissions unattributable to the firm. Using an experiment, we hold constant a firm's financial performance, investment in emissions mitigation, and net emissions, and find evidence that nonprofessional investors perceive the firm to be more valuable when it primarily uses an operational change strategy versus an offsets strategy. However, consistent with theory, this result only occurs when the firm's prior sustainability performance is below the industry average and not when it is above the industry average. This difference in firm value is consistent with the notion that nonprofessional investors believe information about a firm's emissions management strategy is material. Supplemental exploratory analyses reveal that our results are mediated by investors' perception that an operational change strategy is more socially and environmentally responsible than an offsets strategy for below industry average firms. Implications for our findings on theory and practice are discussed.     

Accounting for farmers’ production responses to environmental restrictions within landscape planning

Environmental planning aims to safeguard and foster the ecological functionality of agricultural landscapes. In order to reach a sustainable development of agricultural landscapes, in addition to ecological objectives socio-economic ones also need to be considered. In this context, the authors draw attention to three points. First, whenever ecologically sensitive areas (“ecological sites”) are used for agricultural production, it is necessary to take account of the fact that farmers tend to adapt to environmental requirements by production responses outside the ecological site itself. Second, in order to identify the socially most “desirable” land-use responses it is necessary to supplement the above-mentioned environmental objectives by socio-economic ones. Third, when choosing an appropriate model for such multi-criteria decision analysis, the question of substitutability between criteria is of utmost importance. The paper discusses the above-mentioned issues against the background of a case study of environmental planning for an ecologically very valuable agricultural landscape in Germany, the Bayerisches Donauried. Two models of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) are applied, one based on the “single synthesizing criterion” method, and the other one based on the “synthesis by outranking” method. The models serve to evaluate four different land-use options, using criteria mainly derived from landscape functions and weights gained from interviews with major stakeholders. The paper presents the models’ results concerning the ranking of the different land-use options and discusses the implications for agri-environmental policies and rural development planning.